Those that claim crimp on connectors are not reliable probably need to look
at why they are seeing failures. I'll bet it is a problem other than the
connector design, such as improper tool, improper installation, improper
cable prep, improper strain relief or defective material. A company I worked
at for many years used crimp on connectors (mainly male N, but many male
BNC) for all their RF cables up through 960 MHz and 500 watts. The only
failures in the field we ever were aware of was an issue with center pins on
female N connectors at 900 MHz and that was fixed by going to 7/16 DIN
connectors. I saw many a 500 watt Bird dummy load pulled from a workbench
and hang by the coax without damage to the crimp on connector. Not only were
the crimp on connectors much easier to assemble in a production environment,
they were had a much lower rate of being incorrectly assembled during
production (and were much cheaper to buy) than clamp style connectors. Of
course, they were installed without gravity pulling on the connector, but no
real pains were taken in terms of strain relief. After seeing hundreds of
these installations removed and parted out, in no way was there any issue
with crimp connectors, but I sure saw lots of coax that was trashed due to
age (cracked jackets, dry and cracked dielectric, mostly RG-223 and RG-8,
213 and 214. The RG-393 seemed to live forever.
I have seen more failed solder on PL-259 connectors from a poor shield
connection than anything else, including some of my own (maybe 5%). I have
never had a failure on a crimp connector of my own, although I have only
been using crimp connectors for about 6 years and have been soldering
connectors for almost 30 years. The total number if each connector used is
probably pretty even though.
NG9R
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