Recently, I noticed the 2m flower-pot antenna that has been my home base antenna for some 15 years now, had developed a high VSWR. Either that, or the feed-line had. I haven’t tried troubleshooting which.
I tried a mobile antenna on a mag-mount base sat atop the corrugated iron roof of the deck, plugged in where the flow pot connects, and got good results there, so I think the cabling going from the back deck into my room is fine, it’s just the section that connects to the bulk-head BNC to the outside world and/or the antenna itself.
That section includes a 3m-length of HDF-400 coax, purchased back in the days of the now defunct Brisbane Mesh. I figured if the coax is bad, okay, I’ll re-use the flower-pot for other requirements (it’d be great as a small antenna to use at Imbil), the base antenna could use an upgrade anyway.
I ordered a Diamond X300N, something that would have decent gain on 2m/70cm, not be too obnoxiously large, and still should allow me to get a signal out up high. I ordered it through Andrews Communications, and it arrived late last week… today I finally got around to putting it together.
The instructions seemed simple enough:
Okay, so insert this bit into that bit… sounds simple enough, except:
(1) the tip of the lower element has a tag on it saying “do not pull on this” (fair enough), and
(2) the coupling I’m supposed to insert it into is buried far down the end of the upper antenna section
Turns out, you can put the hack-saw away, the answer is simple enough. The top-section can slide back and forth, and in transit it may settle inside the tube. You grab the top-section by the upper outer-shell joint to stop it rattling, and bang the whole lot against a flat surface to encourage gravity to “pull” that upper conductor down. Eventually it reaches the bottom and you can pull it out with conventional needle-nose pliers.
The instructions are pretty straight-forward from here, although installation will have to wait until someone is here to guard the door or until “Jesus Cat” is sound asleep, as I’m not having a repeat of last week-end again.
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