LeoG

LMR600 is more expensive ($2.69/ft) than 1/2" Heliax ($1.99/ft) and has greater loss. It has the advantage of being more flexible. (antenna farm prices) https://theantennafarm.com/images/specs/34/lmr-600-coax-cables-datasheet.pdf https://theantennafarm.com/images/specs/36/ldf4-50a-product-specifications.pdf The fittings for both run about the same although the LMR has a wider variation.

My KGXS20 will set off my neighbors motion detector light on a certain repeater channel. My H3 can activate my headlamp, my Fein Vacuum with the tool activation. It has turned on my stove when I am very close to it, but you need to push the 2nd button to make it turn on. RF energy can do strange things to unshielded equipment. I've never had my set off a GFCI though.

Love mine too. I'm up to buying 14 of them. Had 2 bad ones that were replaced without issue. I have 6 of them that I can use and the rest given away to family and friends.

Ya ya. Just what I need. More toys

By accident. Apparently there is a 625 repeater that I know about, but he also has a 600 repeater I didn't know about. My repeater operates on 600 with a PL of 100 and apparently his is on 103.5. I can trigger his repeater on occasion when I key up. I noticed when I keyed up the other repeater would activate and it's a much stronger signal than mine. It would block out mine for a second before it released. One day I moved my TX PL and found it was only 1 click up from what I was using. Not sure if my radio PL is wobbly or the selectivity of his repeater is lax. Either way I've decided to change my PL to stop the interference.

Interesting that it was demonstrably affected by temperature. At very specific temps. At 26ºF the problem would go away. As the temp approached and exceeded 32ºF the problem would return. Certainly sounds like a water problem to me. Cables were professionally made, doesn't make them infallible of course. All connections were tight and secure. All connections were triple sealed. 2 wraps of self fusing tape and electrical tape on top. It's not like this is my first foray into electronics, electrical or radio. Until I do some RF testing on both the coax and antenna I can't say what exactly happened. All I know is it was broke. I replaced the two components it could possibly be, and now it ain't broke lol.

I have no analyzer other than an SWR meter. I have to locate my 50' section of RG59/U that I got with the RT97S and hook it up to the antenna and my mobile unit. See what the SWR says. If it says good then I know it was the coax in the system. If it says bad then it's the antenna. I can always double check by putting the Hyperflex on and see what the SWR says. I guess I could test continuity between the pin and shield on the cable and make sure it's a fully open circuit.

I pulled everything apart on the old antenna and coax. I don't see anything that stands out. I see no cracks or bulges/warping of the fiberglass. All the waterproofing at the joints of the antenna seem fine. The screw joint between the upper and lower sections of the antenna were secure. I opened it up and there was no indication of water penetration past the Oring. The Oring was in good condition, still soft and plyable. I removed the lower sheild/support and there was a small spider web in there. The electrical tape and the self fusing tape were in great shape. Took a hell of an effort to get them off. Clean and dry inside. Took the fitting off and it looked perfect. Shiny, no evidence of water at all. And same with the lightning arrestor side. That was an N fitting, so just by itself more water resistant. Of course this was wrapped with the self fusing tape and covered with the electrical tape. Made sure to have a water loop drip so there was no water that could slide towards the fitting. I don't know. I'll have to do some tests because physical inspection says there was no water penetration.

I have no idea the impact of the Heliax. It was only 25', less than 1/3rd the run. But the price difference wasn't that great so I said just do it. Was more worried about the problem of different metals in the coax blah blah blah. Plus this is an N connector antenna and the other was a 239 which isn't waterproof. The main reason is I already had to do it twice, and I do not plan on doing it a 3rd time.

The most surprising thing was I thought it would take me 2 hours with the bucket truck and I did it in 2 1/2. Usually you are off by a factor of at least double when you do things you aren't use to doing. And the original guestimate of time didn't really include the guy wires other than putting the harness on the mast. We attached 2 to the house which probably took about 20 minutes and then cleanup. I was very happy with how it progressed and the results. With my other antenna, even before the water infiltration issue going from my house to my shop repeater was usually R3-R5. Every once in a while it was R7. I had an wind issue that bent my mounting hardware at the shop repeater and that's when I had the best connection. I ended up turning the repeater antenna 10º and that helped a lot for some reason. Cheap antenna I'm guessing. Now with the new setup from my house it's coming in R9, not quite full quieting. But miles different than before. So between going from 7.2dBi to 9.8dBi gain and the new antenna being 5' taller (raising the center of radiation 2 1/2 ft) it made a world of difference. Now I have to investigate what's bad on the other setup. The antenna or the coax. Hoping the antenna so I can keep the length of coax for future repurposing.

OK, today was the big day. I got my buddy to bring over the bucket truck. I had already made up the antenna with the cable as you all know. 1st thing to do was get the existing antenna down. So up to the lightning arrestor and cut off the water protection. Used a set of channel locks to undo the N connector. Didn't see anything that would be a water issue in there. So up the mast I went in the bucket clipping off the tie wraps as I gained altitude. Got to the antenna and loosened the nuts on the U bolt and removed the antenna. Back down to the ground. 2nd thing was to put up the guy wire system. I used a triple clamp designed for 1 1/2" mast and attached 1/8" stainless steel cable using loop thimbles and aluminum double barrel sleeves. Crimped them up using 2 sleeves. One tight against the thimble and one about 1 1/2" away where the sleeve hid the end of the cable to make it prick proof. Had 50' of cable on each of the 3 legs which I knew was more than enough. I also knew it wouldn't be too short. Up in the bucket again and mounted it about 2' from the top of the mast and opened up the looped cable and let it hang down. Back to the ground again. 3rd thing was bring up the antenna. All the way to the top this time and mounted the antenna using the U bolts that came with it. And slowly went down to unfurl the cable. Forgot to bring the tie wraps up, crap. Back down to fetch them and back up and tied the coax off about every 10" with two tie wraps at each spacing. Then to the bottom to attach into the lightning arrestor. Put the heat shrink tubing on, ya.. didn't forget LOL. And used the self fusing tape to seal the joint. Slipped the tubing over it and hit it with the heat gun at 700ºF. Back down again. 4th.. Went into the house to pull the trigger. Hit my repeater and it came back with a good signal. Hit the Holyoke repeater which I could barely do lately and I got a response from a friend that I was Lima Charley (loud and clear) which I haven't been in 6 months. SWR on my repeater frequency was 1.01. Switched to Channel 22 and the SWR was 1.00, fantastic. 5th I got the 5/16" stainless steel turnbuckles and crimping equipment and tied off one side to take the slight lean out of the antenna that I've had ever since a wind gust bent my chimney mount a bit. I put 2 more straps on and lengthened the mast 8' and tied it into the chimney with a wood working clamp which stabilized it quite a bit. The guy wire straightened out the slight lean. Had to install a screw eye that I needed the bucket to do (or a ladder, but why I had the bucket truck here) I pulled out one of the long nails holding up my gutter and put a 3/8"x8" eye hook with a PVC ferrule and it hit good. Very secure, I was worried it's be a rotted pc under the aluminum siding. But I hit a roof rafter end. Tied that off with the guy wire and crimped everything up. Time was up for the bucket truck and he went on his merry way. I gave him a pair of the TD-H3s for the help and a bit more. 6th .. One more guy wire to tie off and I just moved my truck into position and stood on my tool box and secured the guy wire and turnbuckle. Pretty much completed the job. Took about 3 hours, 2 1/2 with the bucket truck. Still have to clean up all the little tie wrap clippings. That'll be a job for tomorrow. Have to paint the blocks I put in to secure the eye hooks sometime soon.

The meter working was as addition. Before it just indicated it was receiving a signal. Now it also shows a basic signal strength.

The signal meter works.

Well that would be nice because I'd have a 25' pc of coax that's still good.

It's only 25' so not much gain over the M&P Hyperflex 13. So .5db vs .37dB. The whole run is just over 80'. If I did that it would be more. 1.60dB vs 1.18dB but still, nothing Earth shattering. I waterproofed my original setup with two wraps of the self fusing and a outer wrap of electrical tape for the UV protection. No idea how water got in. Other than a crack in the fiberglass or something.

I tell you.. it better not leak.

Well I'm getting setup for the big swap out. Getting the Comet CA712EFC ready for deployment. Wrapped the area where the antenna joins with self fusing tape. And then marine grade heat shrink with the adhesive lining on the inside. Then wrapped the N connector after wrenching it tight with the self fusing tape. And then the heat shrink tubing again. Put silicon where the aluminum tube joins the ground plane area before I put the mounting tube on. Pretty stiff stuff. I guess that's why they call it hard line. And the completed assembly. Should be going up sometime this week.

Well, I'm not sure if you know this. But it's a fairly new repeater that's only been out for a year and they actually have been upgrading it. The no tone is an upgrade from the original which had no option for that at all. It also didn't have a squelch which is essential to a no tone system. So most likely the software hasn't been caught up yet. And it's not like they gave you the function and no way to activate it. It's a small annoyance to deal with while they are putting more thought into the machine to give it more features than when you bought it originally. When I got mine there was no squelch, no DCS, no microphone to talk into only program, it didn't have a no tone option and a few other small things. The menu system was still cluttered with another versions options which did nothing in this version and they cleaned that up. So my machine has had nice upgrades while you look at it as a basic machine because that's where they were in the ongoing development of this repeater.

You can get a microphone with a speaker for the H3. Put the clip right near your ear and you can use the mic too. It also has a VOX headset you can use if you are in need of communication regularly.

Not sure how flat Texas is but simplex might work pretty well for most. And wide range repeaters cost a lot of money to install and keep running. You could volunteer your money and time and put one up for the masses to use.

So that's great. You can program the repeater with no tone just how you wanted it. So you can't do it through the program, big deal. How many times do you plan on doing this? It's generally set it up once and walk away. Only in the very beginning do you play with everything. After you get it the way you like you'll rarely ever touch programming again.

One of the repeaters I use has better reception than transmission which is rare. I was able to contact my wife with my 20 watt mobile and when she responded I wasn't able to hear her from the 50 watt repeater.

No not yet. Either Tuesday or Friday I think I'll be doing the swap out. Borrowing a bucket truck and I will be swapping out the antenna from a generic 7.2dBi to the Comet CA712EFC and the 25' run of M&P Hyperflex 13 to 1/2" Heliax. Also going to be putting up some guy wires because I'm always worried when the wind whips up. I have 15' of mast with a 5' antenna and now I'll be putting a 10' antenna up there so more torque. And I don't want to go through all that work only to have it blown down. Not sure what will become of that cable. Not even sure that's the problem, could be the antenna itself.

That's what I'm using at home M&P Hyperflex 13. It's been water infiltrated.

See, that's cheating.