Sorry, Jerry. I said "wires" when I should have said "strips." Same
point - the strips stay inside the housing when retracted during
assembly and then run inside the fiberglass tubular arms. You hever see
them except at the FluidMotion booth at a hamfest!
/Rick
Jerry Keller wrote:
>The cut-away SteppIR I saw didn't have wires inside.... the elements were
>flat strips about .5" wide with regular holes punched every quarter inch or
>so. Those holes travel on a toothed gear which drives the elemnts in and
>out, sliding inside the fiberglas tubular arms. Very nicely designed and
>set-up, and I was told they have driven one through a million cycles or more
>with zero failures. I'm saving my shekels for one. Jerry K3BZ
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: towertalk-admin@contesting.com
>[mailto:towertalk-admin@contesting.com]On Behalf Of Rick Tavan
>Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2002 1:37 AM
>To: Ragnar Otterstad
>Cc: towertalk@contesting.com
>Subject: Re: [Towertalk] SteppIR and results
>
>
>...
>There has been discussion of the beryllium issue on the SteppIR reflector
>
>http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SteppIR
>
>FluidMotion, the manufacturer, says the material is only toxic when
>ground into a fine powder and inhaled. So don't breathe after grinding
>up these wires. ;-) I assembled and installed the antenna without ever
>seeing the beryllium wires. They are wound up inside a rigid housing
>until the antenna is assembled and its control line powered up. Then
>they move inside the fiberglass poles that constitute the visible
>"elements."
>
>
>
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