Is it worth paying a high price for sa supposed quality plg or can
equally used the much cheaper ones?

Been QRT for over 25 years and should be on the air in a few weeks
with a FlexRadio 6300

TIA

Guy G4DWV/4X1LT

On 8/14/2014 5:24 PM, DrTeeth wrote:
Is it worth paying a high price for sa supposed quality plg or can
equally used the much cheaper ones?

They are not all equal. Aside from actual physical dimensions being
"not right." There's also a matter of material, finish and dielectric.


--
Jeff-1.0
wa6fwi
http://www.foxsmercantile.com

Is it worth paying a high price for sa supposed quality plg or can
equally used the much cheaper ones?

Been QRT for over 25 years and should be on the air in a few weeks
with a FlexRadio 6300

The cheap ones tend to be nickel-plated brass. They can be a bear to
solder (it doesn't "wet" nickel easily) unless you grind off the
nickel to expose the brass. The cheap ones also tend to use
poorer-grade insulation such as nylon, which doesn't stand up to
high-heat soldering well... and since you need to apply a lot of heat
to these things to solder them, that's a problem. And, I've seen
cheapies whose thread dimensions seemed to be a bit "off" or which had
some roughness in the thread or barrel, and didn't fasten into the
socket smoothly.

The really good ones are silver-plated, and take solder much more
easily. They also use Teflon insulation, which resists soldering heat
quite well.

"Cheap is often very expensive". It's frustrating to have to go
through two or three cheap connectors, several installation attempts,
and a "Damn it, there's an internal short, gotta cut it off and try
again" which ends up costing you lots of time, and (sometimes) more $$
on connectors than if you'd just gone ahead and bought a good one to
start. And, having your rig not work well (or even suffer high-SWR
damage) because your connector wasn't *really* soldered right, and
went "open" or shorted out at the top end of the feedline right in the
middle of a contest or new DX contact... well, "imagine the grousing"
as my wife puts it.

HRO carries silver/teflon PL-259s for $2.69, Quicksilver sells 'em
4/$12 (or 4/$10 for the crimp-on style), and other mail-order dealers
probably have comparable prices. "Saving" a buck or so buying a cheap
connector is really not worth the risk of hassle.

On 8/14/14, 6:28 PM, David Platt wrote:
"Cheap is often very expensive".

There are many places in life to cut corners. Connectors is not one.
Neither is coax.

73, Steve KB9X

"DrTeeth" wrote in message
...
Is it worth paying a high price for sa supposed quality plg or can
equally used the much cheaper ones?

Been QRT for over 25 years and should be on the air in a few weeks
with a FlexRadio 6300

Be warned that there are both metric and imperial versions of the
PL259/SO239
combinations.

I fell over this incompatibility a few years ago when buying a second-hand
2m colinear, despite that I had been using them for 20 years previously.

On Thu, 14 Aug 2014 18:24:05 EDT, DrTeeth wrote:

Is it worth paying a high price for sa supposed quality plg or can
equally used the much cheaper ones?

Been QRT for over 25 years and should be on the air in a few weeks
with a FlexRadio 6300

Ummm... a Flexradio 6300 retails for $2500 and you're trying to be
cheap on coax connectors? That's 0.1% of the retail price for a
silver plated and PTFE connector. I'll play along, but your question
seems a bit absurd.

There are many things wrong with the PL259, few of which will have an
effect on your HF operation.

1. The PL259 is not 50 ohms and therefore produces an "impedance
bump" on the line. You can see it with a TDR (time domain
reflectometer). However, unless you're using it at microwave
frequencies, it won't have any effect on your operation.

2. The PL259 plating has an effect on PIM (passive intermodulation
distortion) where the non-linearities of some plating material, or the
insufficient thickness of the plating, can cause mixing. Also,
magnetic materials used in the connectors are a problem. Nickel
plating is the worst. White bronze or Nexcote are the best. Mixing
plating types is really bad. Unless you're running full duplex on HF
(unlikely), or listening for really weak signals at VHF/UHF and higher
frequencies, it's unlikely to be a problem.

3. The PL259 is a PITA to assemble correctly. You have a chance of
getting it right with a crimp connector, but the conventional PL259 is
an ugly mess to assemble. This is fairly accurate. Note the vise
grips and butane torch:
http://www.seed-solutions.com/gregordy/Amateur%20Radio/Experimentation/SolderCoax.htm
Despite such methods I still see broken jumper cables with rotating
connectors. Even if it's done correctly, they still tend to fall
apart. Extra credit for nickel plating that is difficult to solder.

4. The necessary insulation comes in a variety of materials. Nylon
is the worst as it's hydroscope (absorbs moisture). Bakelite is
brittle, but deteriorates over time. Some kind of white stuff looks
ok for RF, but melts easily. PTFE (Teflon) is probably the best and
does well at high power levels.

--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

On Sat, 16 Aug 2014 17:25:15 EDT, just as I was about to take a herb,
Jeff Liebermann disturbed my reverie and wrote:

Ummm... a Flexradio 6300 retails for $2500 and you're trying to be
cheap on coax connectors?

No I was not. I was just asking if it is worth spending more. I am
very happy to pay for quality but not prepared to throw my money away.
Got some very nice RG213 coax too - even though the run will be less
than 10 meters.

Just because something is more expensive does not necessarily mean
that it is better. Many things do not sell if priced cheap and fly off
the shelf when over-priced.

I do not mind paying for quality at all. In fact, I have bought some
very expensive high-quality compression PL259s that cost approx $9
each.
--
73's de Guy G4DWV/4X1LT

On Mon, 25 Aug 2014 11:35:27 EDT, DrTeeth wrote:

On Sat, 16 Aug 2014 17:25:15 EDT, just as I was about to take a herb,
Jeff Liebermann disturbed my reverie and wrote:

Ummm... a Flexradio 6300 retails for $2500 and you're trying to be
cheap on coax connectors?

No I was not. I was just asking if it is worth spending more.

I believe that I supplied that information in the technical part of my
posting which you trimmed. If none of the problems I mentioned are
applicable to your situation, then you are probably safe using low end
connectors. However, if one or more appear to be applicable, you
might do well to buy something better. It's YOUR decision.

I am
very happy to pay for quality but not prepared to throw my money away.

On the other hand, I'm fully prepared to spend quite a bit of money on
connectors and coax if I suspect that using junk might be problematic.
For the PL259, the problem is not the connector or the coax. The
problem is the person that assembles the connector. I've seen some
very bad assembly and soldering on PL259. The more expensive crimp
connectors are much better.

Got some very nice RG213 coax too - even though the run will be less
than 10 meters.

RG-213/u is good stuff. Double shielded and 95% coverage. However,
I've seen some RG-213 "style" coax, which is basically junk
counterfeit coax. If it's not from a known name brand manufactory, it
might become a problem.

Just because something is more expensive does not necessarily mean
that it is better. Many things do not sell if priced cheap and fly off
the shelf when over-priced.

Yep. A friend had trouble selling his house. He kept lowering the
price, but nothing helped. The realtor suggested that he raise the
price instead. That worked because it brought in a new class of
buyer, that wasn't interested in buying a cheap house. I assumed that
anyone purchasing a $2500 radio would be a better class of buyer. I
guess not.

I do not mind paying for quality at all. In fact, I have bought some
very expensive high-quality compression PL259s that cost approx $9
each.

I can't tell without a manufacturer and model number for the
connectors if they are worth $9/ea.

Incidentally, I recently bought some 7/8" Heliax "N" connectors for
about $25/ea. It was for 900 Mhz, so the criteria is quite different
from HF. In this case, it was low PIM and reliable enough so that I
don't have to pay an overpriced tower climber to fix the installation.
Perhaps you can compromise with your installation. Use a cheap
connector on the ground, where it can easily be replaced, and use a
more expensive connector on top of the tower or pole, where
replacement and repair are more of a problem.

Incidentally, various cheap crimpers that work well:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/antennas/Misc/slides/crimpers.html
About $25/ea. The largest size (yellow handles) is for LMR-400.


--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

On 8/25/14, 10:54 PM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

RG-213/u is good stuff. Double shielded and 95% coverage. However,
I've seen some RG-213 "style" coax, which is basically junk
counterfeit coax. If it's not from a known name brand manufactory, it
might become a problem.

I expect that this is a story most of you have heard in one form or
another and/or experienced.

A local ham was having trouble hitting the repeater using his handheld
at home, so he decided to put a whip up on his tower. He did so, and
discovered that he couldn't hit the repeater at all with the new
improved antenna.

The problem was that he bought poor quality coax. Note that I did not
write "cheap coax". Based on the type designation he shouldn't have had
much loss in the run. The designation makes little difference if the
manufacturer and/or vendor is providing shoddy merchandise that doesn't
really meet the standards implied by the designation of the coax.

So perhaps more important than the price is the source.

73, Steve KB9X

On Tue, 26 Aug 2014 16:43:15 EDT, Steve Bonine wrote:

On 8/25/14, 10:54 PM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

RG-213/u is good stuff. Double shielded and 95% coverage. However,
I've seen some RG-213 "style" coax, which is basically junk
counterfeit coax. If it's not from a known name brand manufactory, it
might become a problem.

I expect that this is a story most of you have heard in one form or
another and/or experienced.

Yep. I've seen plenty of counterfeit cables of all types. Usually
the cable leaves out something, such as insufficient shielding, or
lack of tin or silver plating. Sometimes they substitute copper
plated steel wire for solid copper. Others have outer jackets that
fall apart in the sun, or are full of holes.

It's an all too common problem:
http://www.belden.com/blog/datacenters/5-Things-You-Need-to-Know-About-Counterfeit-Cable-and-Connectivity.cfm
http://mpddigital.us/lmr-coaxial-cable-counterfeiting-rises/

In about 2011, UL instituted and anti-counterfeiting move that
required anything with a UL label to include a holographic label on
the box, and very specific labeling on the cable:
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2011/02/counterfeit-cable-exposed.html
At the time, I went through my bulk cable inventory and discovered
that about 25% of the cable I had in stock was counterfeit, mostly
CAT5e and CAT6 cable.

I haven't seen any counterfeit RG-213/u but did run into a
malfunctional UHF duplexer that used RG-214/u. The previous owner had
built and installed new phasing lines in order to move it onto ham
frequencies. It would tune to frequency, but the isolation (i.e.
notch depth) was insufficient. I eventually took apart one of the
phasing lines and immediately noticed that the shielding was not
plated. RG-214/u is suppose to be silver plated. Although this was
well past the return date for an eBay purchase, I contacted the
seller, who was sufficiently horrified to send me a replacement set of
cables. That fixed the tuning problem.

So perhaps more important than the price is the source.

Generally true. However, I suspect that some vendors are unaware that
they're selling counterfeit products.

Caveat Emptor.
--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558