Tom and Pat, just checked my 204 foot g5rv no continuity.
I believe you have a problem Tom I am no expert though.
My g5rv works pretty good even though it is only 10 foot off of the ground
on each end.
Junior Lolley
Amateur radio call KG4ITD
Liberty County Emergency Coordinator
-----Original Message-----
From: For blind ham radio operators [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Pat Byrne
Sent: Sunday, August 19, 2012 12:00 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: G5RV Disappointment
Tom,
I will check my antenna for continuity today but I would expect that you
shouldn't have continuity at D C. So perhaps there is a short in the PL259.
Also my antenna recommended a lot of coax after the twin lead, either fifty
or seventy-five feet, I don't recall which. So perhaps you would have a
jumper around that you could incorporate in to the system next weekend. The
height should be good - don't give up on it just yet.
Pat, K9JAUAt 10:48 AM 8/19/2012, you wrote:
>Hi, all.
>
>Well, I tried the G5RV out at the RV over the week-end, and alas, no
>joy. I have some theories about what the problem was, which I'll get to
shortly.
>
>First, the good news: The camp site manager had absolutely no problem
>with my putting up the antenna, and in fact helped with our initial
installation.
>So, at least I know I'm good to go if I want to try something else out
>there.
>
>Since the guy was nice enough to help with the installation, I decided
>to go ahead with his initial suggestion of putting the center on top of
>his RV, which is about 50 feet from ours, and much higher than ours.
>The legs of the antenna then went across his roof on each side to
>adjacent trees. He did wrap one part of one leg around the railing of
>his RV ladder to keep things in place. The ladder line then came down
>from the center of the antenna on about a 45 degree angle to the
>PL259feed point connection on my RV. I'd say the center of the antenna
>was up about 30 feet, with the legs up about 15 to 20 feet on adjacent
trees.
>
>Overall, my SWR's must not have been good, because the only band I
>could get the TS480 auto-tuner to tune it on was 10 meters. Everything
>else gave me the SWR no-tune reading.
>
>As for what might have gone wrong, I eliminated a number of possibilities:
>
>1. I checked my feed line on the RV, and all other jumper connections,
>for electrical integrity, and they were fine. I then physically
>checked the connections on the G5RV itself, and they looked fine. I
>had my XYL confirm this visually as well.
>
>As for what could have gone wrong, then, my theory is that perhaps the
>roof on the manager's RV was metal, or had metal in it, which served to
>de-tune the antenna. Wrapping one leg around the RV railing for a turn
>or two also might have thrown things off.
>
>Finally, I did one thing in the way of continuity checking that I want
>to be sure of with you G5RV experts out there. When you do a
>continuity check of the G5RV on the PL259 end, is it correct that you
>get electrical continuity across the coax connector? In other words,
>when I took my continuity checker, put one lead on the center
>conductor, and the other on the outer shield of the connector, I got
>continuity. I assume this indicates that I have an electrically
>complete antenna. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this.
>
>All in all, it was a rather disappointing situation, but if we can get
>out to the RV next week-end, we'll try something else, perhaps in
>nearby trees if we can figure out a way to get the center up at a
reasonable height.
>
>73 from Tom Behler: KB8TYJ
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