[ARC5] 10 meter BC-454 - more

[Neil]

> Result of solidifying the coils was to reduce, but not eliminate, the ringing,
> but it did eliminate the "jumping" of frequency. The jumping was obviously
> caused by the loose slugs.

I believe you once said that every plate except one had been removed
from each stator and rotor, and that these plates were the split ones that
are tweaked during alignment. If so, I believe they are flexing due to no
longer being braced to adjacent plates by the cross piece at their ends.

IMO, a far better way of raising the operating frequency would have been
to solder a small capacitor in series with each tuning cap section, the value
being determined by experiment. This retains the structural integrity of the
plates, raises the frequency, reduces the full mesh to nil mesh tuning range,
and minimizes any unwanted changes in the tuning cap capacitance.

Think of the small cap (high reactance) and tuning cap (low reactance) as
a very large resistor R1 in series with a very low resistor R2. Even major
changes in R2 have small effect on the total series resistance. In other
words the small cap has now become the dominant frequency-setting
component.

If you have a spare tuning cap from the same model, I'm sure it would be
worthwhile to change it and try this method.

73 de Neil ZL1ANM