i'd guess you won't really know w/out a detailed physical inspection
unless somthing happens drastic when it rains vs a long dry spell

sure the coax could have gone bad but you have a nice meter seems you
could actually test it ,

any chance animals chewed any of the coax did anything touch the
raditors such as a branch or such perhaps near a endpoint tie off?

prb i am not much help but good luck

In article ,
KC1DI wrote:

Michael Coslo wrote:
After the bout of windy weather we had a week or so ago, my mini antenna
farm was wrecked. My HF6V sustained a broken mast, which was easily
repairable.

My OCF dipole on the other hand, stopped working properly.

Originally cut for the standard 80-40-20-10 config, the best SWR
near 80 meters has risen to around 4.37 MHz, 40 meters is around the
correct frequency, but has SWR has risen a bit to around 2.5. 20 meters
is over 3, and 10 is better than 7.

18 MhZ also has a 1.2:1 SWR.

SWR measured with a MFJ259 meter.


The specs of the antenna are (roughly, as I'm doing this from memory)

48 feet short side, 130 long side

4:1 Balun

Height around 50 feet.

Coax coiled balun near house entrance Coax split just above balun for
lightning arrester installation.


Since I bought a new 4:1 balun at Dayton last year to replace one that I
fixed a while back, I decided to replace it. Same result.

I took the choke balun and lightning arrester out of the picture to
isolate them, and measured from there. No difference.

Coax connectors look good.

So what I am left with is the coax and the antenna wire itself.

Unless someone has played an *awesome* practical joke on me, the
antenna dimensions haven't changed.

So can coax go bad in a way that will raise the lowest SWR in the
way I describe? Of course I could just replace it, but I'd like to know
why.



- 73 de Mike KB3EIA -




Hi Mike,

You do not mention what type of Coax /fittings your using But I've had
the foam insulated type change in high winds here in the past. Also was
there any driving rain with the wind.. check for moisture penetration at
the connectors. if moisture has gotten into the coax braid it may
produce the results you speak of also.
good luck
73 Dave Kc1di
let us know what you find