-I have had many antenna relay boxes on my towers which were all homebrew since
the first and only commercial one I had. I have never used caps or chokes and
they have all performed admirably. (However, I will probably put caps across
the leads of my next box.)
One note though, I use 12v relays and put 24v on the line at the shack. I have
tested the relays with just a short lead to them and there were no failures
using 24v. You will get more positive switching and will not worry about line
loss to the relays.
Chuck, KZ5MM
Steve Zettel wrote:
> What is the collective wisdom of the reflectors concerning decoupling tower
> mounted antenna-switching relays with RF chokes on the relay coil leads? I
> am building a relay box to be mounted on my tower for switching an 80M
> array. Should I take the time and trouble to wind some rf chokes on toriods
> for each of the relay coil leads, or is this a waste of time and effort. RF
> de-coupling caps are already planned in the design (0.1 or 0.01 uf 500v
> ceramics) for the control cable leads. If the RF chokes are a good idea,
> I'm open to pointers -- how many u-henries, number of windings and gauge of
> wire on what type toroidal core, etc.
>
> Thanks for you assistance,
>
> Steve Zettel KJ7CH
> near Libby, MT USA
>
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