[ADXA] directionally challenged

[Steven Rutledge]

I use a smaller hammer.  It does work.

Steve, N4JQQ

On 12/5/2025 7:28 AM, w5znjoel at gmail.com wrote:
>
> Somewhat funny story, Dennis in that I have never whacked a power pole 
> with a big hammer here, simply because I’m a bit scared to HOWEVER 
> when Entergy was out here late last summer confirming a severe 
> sparking line noise issue that I had already identified, it was 
> intermittent on a lightning arrester ¼ mile away on the highway. The 
> “investigating crew” heard it, thought they had confirmed the exact 
> pole so to confirm the head guy said “Jim get that big ass sledge 
> hammer out of the truck and whack that pole”. When “Jim” did, the 
> sparking went wild!!
>
> So, while it is definitely NOT recommended that we do this, apparently 
> the Entergy folks are quite familiar with, and use, this “specialized 
> technique” !!!! 😊
>
> 73 Joel W5ZN / ZF2ZN
>
> *From:*adxa-bounces at mailman.qth.net <adxa-bounces at mailman.qth.net> *On 
> Behalf Of *Dennis Schaefer
> *Sent:* Thursday, December 4, 2025 4:26 PM
> *To:* ADXA <ADXA at mailman.qth.net>
> *Subject:* [ADXA] directionally challenged
>
> Which way is up?
>
> During the DX contest, I turned the beam SE and worked ZF5T quickly on 
> several bands.  They were booming in, with a big signal.  Saturday 
> morning, I noticed  EU was weaker than I expected and ZF was coming in 
> better from about 60 degrees.  Sticking with BIC guidelines, I 
> couldn’t be bothered to go outside and actually look at the antenna.
>
> I tried unsuccessfully to work 4U1UN, a band counter on 10M.  The 
> signal was best around 300 degrees.  I finally went out and looked, 
>  and discovered the antenna was off course.  EU was much stronger when 
> the indicator showed NW.  This was more than calibration could fix, so 
> I corrected the rotator scale with a dry erase pen and will deal with 
> it soon.  (I did bag 4U1UN once I got this figured out).
>
> Since my dead trees have been removed, I can put the Pennant receive 
> antenna back up.  Last year, my main noise source was to the South so 
> I put the null toward that direction.  The South noise source has 
> disappeared.  I never did figure out where it was coming from.  Now 
> the noise is from the power pole that is to the North. Putting the 
> null to the North is not ideal for DX but I think I would get the best 
> S/N by doing that.   I need to figure out a new ideal location for the 
> pennant and how to steer the null.  The weather is not cooperating 
> with this.
>
> Maybe I should give the pole a few whacks with the BFH. Although I 
> have never done that, nope, never, I have heard of it being done.  But 
> again, I’ve never done anything like that, no sir!  Did I mention that 
> I would never do anything like that, and if I did, I would be sure 
> nobody saw me :)
>
> 73,
>
> Dennis/RZ
>
>
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