Jon: Thanks for this. This has crossed my mind since I use hose clamps to attach the wire from the top and bottom of the caps. I had used copper flashing between the two caps. I'll change that to a heavy insulated wire. Get out the NoAlOx too. :)
Thanks again. 73, Jamie WB4YDL -----Original Message----- From: Topband [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Jon Zaimes AA1K Sent: Thursday, January 30, 2014 3:21 AM To: James C. Hall, MD; [email protected] Subject: Re: Topband: Bad tower shunt capacitor Look closely and you may see a hairline crack on the bad one. Also look for other possibilities. A number of times I've swapped out "bad" matching capacitors without solving the problem, only to find later it was simply an oxidized connection that needed to be cleaned up and tightened down. 73/Jon AA1K On 1/29/2014 7:26 PM, James C. Hall, MD wrote: > I have an omega matched 120 foot tower and I apparently have a bad vacuum variable capacitor. Upon applying more than about 300 watts, the SWR goes off scale. Tuning it out and trying again, yields the same thing. > > The question is which capacitor is the culprit. These are surplus Soviet caps obtained from the Ukraine and, as I recall, the larger value capacitor is the parallel one, not the series one. I could buy one of each and switch one at a time and have a spare left over. Any suggestions ? > > 73, Jamie > WB4YDL > > Sent from my iPad > _________________ > Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband > _________________ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean. _________________ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
