[DX] TA32-final resolution

[John Geiger]

I received many good emails about my TA32 problem, and
would like to thank everyone who responded.  Got lots
of good ideas, and I will admit that the antenna
height, in general and above the roof is not ideal,
but it is the best that I can do at this time, which
beats nothing.

I first went to the Mosley website, which is very
informative about antennas, traps, and beam things in
general. Would recommend it to anyone having problems.
 From their information, I narrowed the problem down
to the outer set of traps.

The next morning I called the Mosley Tech assistance,
and after fighting with a busy signal for about 30
minutes, got thru to tech support-as I was on the roof
taking the traps apart.  The gentleman I spoke with
was most helpful.  On the one trap there was strong
evidence of previous arcing-which left a burn trace. 
When running higher power, this trace would still arc,
and short the trap to the element.  He recommended
removing oxidation by soaking in a 1/2 vinegar-1/2
water solution for an hour, and then digging out the
burn trace, and refilling the plastic with some
plastic cement, and reassembling the trap.  

He also stated that I could order a new trap for $24. 
I first chose to fix it for 3 reasons:
1. save money
2. the challange
3. The Pratas operation starts today, and don't want
to wait for the trap.

I followed his guidelines, including two trips to the
hardware store to find a suitable filling material
(the expoy the first suggested was too runny), and
getting a decent cut on my index finger from the
pocketknife folding back on itself (no stitches yet). 
Let the filler set while I was teaching a summer
school course, and then went to reassemble the trap. 
The end of the coil wire-which attaches to the trap
cover-then breaks.  Soldering it doesn't work, so I
just do the next best thing and shorten it by drilling
a new hole in the plastic to attach the trap cover to,
understanding that this may or may not greatly affect
performance-by hey, it didn't work before.  It was
only about half a winding on the coil.

Anyway, I then reassembled the trap, back on the roof
during darkness to reinstall the trap, and then the
crucial SWR check.  The antenna analyzer-done from the
shack using the regular coax LOOKS FINE!!!  Try out
the Kenwood TS2000 at low power-SWR stays fine! 
Slowly raise it to full power, and SWR STAYS FINE!!

So the problem is solved-for now.  It seems that
someone had probably run a little too much power thru
the antenna at one point (this is the junior model)
and messed up the trap with some arcing.  Take away
the corrosion and oxidation from the arc, and
everything is fine again.

Worked BX4AF on 20 cw this AM, so it must be working
OK.  It resonantes in the phone band on 20 and 15, but
I can live with that, and the internal tuner takes
care of it for the rest of the band.

Thanks to all who responded.

73s John NE0P

=====
John Geiger
Assistant Professor, Cameron University
Ham Call NE0P, active 160-23cm
Kenwood TS2000, Kenwood TH31, Icom T81A
Now on RTTY, PSK, Hellschreiber, JT43, and HSMS with WSJT
SMIRK 5768, 10X 67581, 6 club 497
5BWAS, DXCC, 2 VUCCs on 50 mhz (Iowa, Illinois)

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