[Boatanchors] Beam antenna question

[Al Parker]

Hi Ray,
	Does this beam have separate traps for each band, or "one does all" 
like Mosely?  Anyhow, maybe spiders in a 15m trap if they're separate. 
I've had that problem.  Probably not corrosion at the traps-element 
connx, haven't heard of that much, if at all.
73,

Al, W8UT
www.boatanchors.org
www.hammarlund.info

"There is nothing -- absolutely nothing -- half so much
worth doing as simply messing about in boats"
Ratty, to Mole

On 2/18/2012 5:11 PM, RAY FRIESS wrote:
>
> Need some advice from the fellow old timers here ... or even the wise newcomers...
>
> I have a HyGain beam antenna, the Explorer 14.   Fairly old, but has been a great performer with nearly unity SWR from one end of the band the other on 10, 15 and 20 ..
> until recently.
>
> Now, a few weeks ago the SWR on 15  shot up so high that it nearly pins the SWR meter.   However, the SWR on 20 and 10 are still less than
> 1 to 1 and it continues to load fine.   Barely moves the needle on the SWR meter.
>
> My question is, what should I suspect?    A 15 meter trap gone bad, or maybe corrosion in the area where the traps and elements are clamped together?
> The antenna has been up for about five or six years now, without any trouble prior to now.   Sometimes there would be brief periods of a few hours with a
> high SWR such as when we had snow accumulate on it, but when it dried up, the SWR came back down to normal.
>
> I thought if it was either a bad trap or a corroded element to trap joint that the SWR would be all out of kilter on all three bands, not just 15 meters.
>
> I'm sure it's something with the antenna.   I use a TS-50 solid state rig with the automatic antenna tuner.  It still loads and puts out full power on 20 and 10,
> but on 15 because the SWR is so high, the power dips down to about 5 watts output on the beam.   I can load a regular dipole without problems.
> I tried taking the auto tuner out of line to see if it was having a problem on 15, but I still get the same high SWR without it in line.
>
>   		 	   		
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