Speaking of "shorting sticks", I saw one a while back on the e-place,
but didn't seriously bid on it. Can one of you guys enlighten me as to
the best material to use for the insulator and about how long to make it?
Thanks,
Rick
Not only is a shorting stick not a bad idea, not using one is a
terrible idea. As someone who has spent many hours working on high
power transmitters, I would NEVER touch anything inside a transmitter
without first touching it with a shorting stick. When I do not have
a proper shorting stick available, I connect a grounded wire to a
well insulated screw driver and use that as a makeshift shorting
stick. There is are no allowable exceptions to the shorting stick
rule, as far as I am concerned.
Never rely on meters, pilot lamps or switch positions to tell you if
HV is present. Switches can short and pilot lights can burn out.
I've seen at least one high power uplink amplifier where the
designers used the bleeder resistor as part of the meter multiplier
string. An open bleeder meant zero HV on the meter but possibly a
full charge on the filter caps. In that situation a shorting stick
could be the difference between life and death. Never, ever, touch
anything inside of a high power transmitter without using a stick.
Period!
Alan
WA2DZL
