On 12/31/10 03:48 pm, Bill Jackson wrote:
> Happy New Year!
>
> I have a question for the Group about the various brands of coaxial lightning
> protection.
>
> Without going into a lot of detail, I have a SPG copper buss bar in the
> basement that serves as my coax and control cable entrance panel. Each coax
> and control cable has an appropriate Polyphaser protector mounted to the
> panel.
> For my HF antennas, I currently have a Polyphaser IS-50UX-C0 protecting the
> single run of 1/2" Heliax out to the tower where I have a remote antenna
> switch
> installed.
>
> This morning during a heavy snow and sleet squall, I walked into the shack to
> the sound of "tick, tick, tick" coming from the Drake LP-1000 low pass filter
> connected to the coax line running to the SPG in the basement. As soon as I
> turned the antenna switch to the "off" position, which grounds the feedlines
> feeding the remote antenna switch on the tower, the "tick, tick, tick" noise
> stopped. This is the first time in the 15 years the antennas have been
> installed that I have ever heard a static discharge inside the shack.
>
> My first assumption is that the Polyphaser surge protector on the coax cable
> feeding the coax switch has lost it ability to shunt a high voltage build-up
> on
> the center conductor to ground. However, I have not seen any other symptoms
> such as high SWR indicating the protector may have gone bad. I do not have a
> schematic of the protector, but I assume there is some type of gas discharge
> device from the center conductor to ground? Short of having a Hi-Pot tester,
> is there any other way to verify the protector is still working as intended?
>
> Reading some of the reviews on eHam.net would suggest there have been quality
> control issues with Polyphaser since the company merged with Transtector. Has
> anyone performed any evaluation or testing of the various brands of coaxial
> surge protectors, such as ICE or Alpha Delta that would recommend a
> replacement
> for the Polyphaser? The current price of a IS-50UX-C0 is about $60. I do not
> want to spend good money on a protector that is questionable or is going to
> fail prematurely under QRO operating conditions.
I have PolyPhaser coax and control-line surge protectors, but they were
all purchased before the company became part of the Smiths Group (to
which Transtector -- of which I had not heard previously -- apparently
belongs).
I forget what other components were in the one coax protector I opened
up, but there was no gas-discharge tube; there was an MOV, but I don't
recall whether it was labeled to indicate its specs.
ICE was being offered for sale -- on eBay!!!! -- a few years back, and I
have no idea about the current state of the company or of its products.
I do have one Alpha Delta protector on my original VHF/UHF antenna coax.
I guess I really need to check it.
73 and HNY
Alan NV8A
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