Category: Broken aerial

Fixing the Hexbeam … again

I posted about three weeks ago about my Hexbeam failing again and you can read that by scrolling down the page a little or by clicking here.  I spoke to the manufacturer directly after and he sent me a set of his new custom made PTFE spacers.  There was a contest the following weekend so […]

15m + 400w + snow/rain + Hexbeam = *sigh*

It’s the EA PSK63 contest. I had a decent run yesterday and this morning I was up nice and early to carry on my 15m single band entry. It snowed overnight, it’s raining now and very damp outside. After twenty minutes I was working a run of Japanese stations and my IMD meter started beeping […]

More work on the Hexbeam following another failure

On the 25th August I was warming up for the SCC RTTY contest and having a few quick QSOs prior to the start when I noticed my SWR had jumped from 1.1:1 to over 2:1.  This is exactly what happened before so I went into the garden and peered up at the aerial.  This is […]

The Ipswich Rally and new elements on my Hexbeam, it’s good to be back on the air

It’s surprising how just a few days without being able to play radio can affect someone.  I was up unusually bright and early this morning and off to Ipswich for the East Suffolk Wireless Revival 2012 (Ipswich Rally) where I met up with a few friends for breakfast before heading into the rally. Unfortunately the rally […]

I’m without an HF aerial again after melting the G3TXQ Hexbeam

Last weekend was the Ukrainian DX Digi contest and I intended to run for a while but not make a serious entry, I’d decided to do a single band for a few hours.  The contest started at 13:00 local time and I kicked off using PSK63 which turned out to be a good choice because […]

Cushcraft MA-5B is repaired with a new MT1 trap

Cushcraft were always known for good quality products but some years ago they were taken over by MFJ.  It’s no secret that MFJ have a bit of a reputation for poor quality control and they may or may not deserve the many nicknames that they’ve been given. Personally, I’ve had no problems with any of […]

One of the traps on my Cushcraft MA-5B has melted

Today I took down my Cushcraft MA-5B again to investigate the problem of high SWR on 20m and 15m and after a struggle to get the traps on the driven element disassembled, this is what I found. The bottom section was taken from the ‘hot’ side of the feed, ie the centre core of the […]

More problems with my Cushcraft MA-5B

There I was, at quarter past eight this morning calling CQ in the April Fools Day contest on 20m 😉 when I noticed that my SWR had gone from 1.1:1 to 3.5:1.  Something was clearly wrong so I stopped calling straight away and started to investigate. The first thing I did was to tune around […]

A replacement balun for my Cushcraft MA-5B from Balun Designs

After the investigative work a couple of weeks ago where I tracked the fault on my Cushcraft MA-5B to the cable between the balun (matching network) and the 12m/17m element I decided that I wanted to replace the entire balun, including the two coax tails out to the elements.  I figured that because one tail […]

Cushcraft MA5B is broken – and repaired

Last weekend was the Hungarian DX contest and I decided a few days prior that I was going to enter it.  I planned on a single band entry which would allow me to spend a few hours on the Saturday afternoon and then come back again on Sunday morning when the band re-opened. I worked […]