No argument here Roger but given a choice when product is equal or
better I would rather put my money into the American economy instead of
a foreign on, particularly China. I sure recall the difference in
rolled aluminum tubes and extruded ones as elements on TV Yagis. When
re-purposed as wing spars in DIY RC aircraft the extruded were terrific
and the rolled were useless.
I have been dealing with a retired USAF tech who runs a TV repair shop
and only recently stopped doing antenna installs. He concurred with my
Winegard selection and opined as to how it was better construction than
the recent Chinese competition. Maybe the next 9 guys would pan Winegard
quality. My HD7698P is sched for delivery tomorrow when reality will be
revealed.
For those who may never have seen it, you might want to take a look at
tvfool.com which does some interesting propagation predictions for any
address or Lat-Lon coordinates in the US. based on terrain models etc.
Patrick NJ5G
On 1/30/2016 11:31 PM, Roger (K8RI) on TT wrote:
I agree with the purchase at the places where you get cheap products,
But when it comes to TV antennas, (for a back ground) When I was in
my 20s and started work at a new job, I also installed TV antennas on
the side. Like most of the younger crowd with at least a little
ambition, I tried many side jobs, but settled on ham radio as a
business as well as firearms. It didn't take long to work out all the
good TV antenna installations and I got tired of long days and short
nights with a good job and the business out of the home. I had
forgotten some of the ways I tried to make extra spending money. Most
were far too much work for too little money and I definitely was not
going back to farming!
At any rate, ALL the TV antennas back then, including Winegard were
made cheap. Now that was a long time ago, When we moved here in 84 I
installed a relatively small Winegard UHF/VHF antenna with a rotator
above the old TH3 at 90 feet.
*http://www.rogerhalstead.com/ham_files/tower8.htm* It worked well,
but the elements were still made from thin, rolled, thin Aluminum
sheet. They were very fragile.
Still, on the American made front there is equipment made to a price
with over rated equipment and I'm not picking on one company. Through
the years, many of us can recall antennas with outrageous claims.
Still today, many gain figures require a grain or two of salt.<:-)
When the 45G went up, I played with a few antennas including
http://www.rogerhalstead.com/ham_files/tower21.htm , but settled on
http://www.rogerhalstead.com/ham_files/tower34.htm The photo only
shows the TV antenna pointed ESE as we had to remove the one pointed
NW while taking the 7L 6-meter C3i down. The 144 and 440s were next.
the antennas made it to the ground safely, but that long, rusty mast
got away from him and made it all the way to the concrete, inside the
tower ,where it still resides. Amazingly, despite all the noise it
made on the way down, it did no damage to the tower. Not even to the
galvanizing! The plan is to eventually cut it up and take the short
pieces out the side. .
I found that all the TV antennas were all fragile, regardless of the
reviews which appeared much like Ham equipment reviews, each had their
detractors. I tried from Radio Shacks imports to Winegard. I settled
for the biggest UHF antennas Radio Shack sold as I saw very little
difference in robustness across the lot and little price difference
for comparable antennas. The only thing The Winegard antennas had
going for the ones I tried, was the "Made in America", but we are now
in a global economy.
As for ham antennas, I like the C19XR, but would like the larger
C31XR. Like most mass produced antennas, it is fragile when on the
ground or sawhorses, but rugged in the air (neglecting large migrating
birds). I don't have a photo of what a lawnmower tire did to one end
of the 20 meter reflector, or the broken boom truss on the 7L C3i from
the Cormorants, but "somewhere among over 30,000 plus photos I have a
series of the Cormorants on the antenna and truss, just like some
where I have a series of photos from the 70s of our full size cars
completely covered with snow in the driveway. <:-) OTOH, this is what
it did to the TH5 before I could get a climber to get it down.
http://www.rogerhalstead.com/ham_files/tower36.htm
73
Roger (K8RI)
On 1/30/2016 Saturday 12:38 PM, Patrick Greenlee wrote:
See the quality of Chinese goods at Harbor Freight and Northern tool
to name two places. The Chinese are not backward third worlders
devoid of technology, including an understanding of QA and QC.
Stateside resellers of Chinese "junk" like the aforementioned get
exactly what they order. The "junk" is built to cost. The retailers
like those mentioned above are getting exactly what they are
contracting for. It IS a case of you get what you pay for. Fastenall
has some pretty good Chinese hardware, again, built to a contract
price and quality level.
Recall, the Chinese have put folks in space and brought them back
alive. They have a sophisticated airforce and missile forces. They
can put comm sats in orbit AND shoot them down.
They can build technologically complex designs to demanding
tolerances B U T not at Harbor Freight prices. Harbor Freight
price level goods are not representative of Chinese capability. Do
not let cheap Chinese imported junk lull you into a false sense of
security with respect to Chinese capabilities in the market place or
in the battlespace.
I am reminded of the defection incident where the Russian pilot flew
a, then, late model MIG to Japan to defect. At first there were
guffaws of laughter because the Russian avionics was tube based
instead of solid state A N D T H E N it dawned on the team going
over the MIG that it wasn't so backward in capability but was
intended to survive in a nuclear battle space and not be toast from
EMP. Built to a requirement.
The shoddy goods we often get from China are precisely what the
contract calls for. Want better? Demand it. Pay for it. I have
recently cut the cord and trashed Sat TV in favor of Netflix and off
the air TV with a multi-tuner HD DVR for time shifted commercial free
viewing. Big monetary savings and I don't have to listen to Hindi if
I need support. I researched to find the best antenna for my deep
fringe purposes. There are some Chinese antennas that do very good
except in the robustness and quality of fit, finish and strength of
the aluminum alloy. I ordered American made Winegard. I have queried
installers and expect good quality to be evident when I open the
carton. Home Depot delivered for $110 VS Amazon at about $130.
Original post:
Rohn Bolts AND nuts - won't mateIs this just an other example of the
Chinese lack of quality assurance? I have seen mane examples of that
in the past.It appears to me that the "pimples" are made too deep.I
find Rohn's answer despicable. They should just send you a new set of
nuts, nuts that they checked against their own specifications.Hans –
N2JFS ## Even Portland Bolt buys Chinese imported nuts + bolts. Some
of it is good, and some is junk. On a similar note, locally we are
havingone of our 100 year old bridges replaced. Turning into a real
gong show. Main contractor just finished building a new bridge in VE3
land, which ended up getting shut down for several days, bad
expansion joints...in the middle of winter. No alternate path either,
so the trans canadagets cut off...... totally un acceptable. Same
contactor is building our new bridge downtown. His sub contractor
decides to buy steel, and nuts and boltsfrom china. This has turned
into a real disaster, with huge cost overuns, and junk material. The
latest is... you cant even weld to it !! WTF. Dunno what alloythey
are using, buts its not even close to what was originally speced.
Huge sections of it have had to be torn down and new replacement
steel is no where in site.New bridge is not expected to be
functioning till late 2019, way behind schedule. ## Meanwhile, the
head of the Canadian steel manufacturing, that represents all the
various steel manufacturers in VE3 land comes on TV...and sez....
told ya so. cdn steel makers could have easily supplied the correct
steel, on time,and on budget.But local city hall folks wanted to save
50 cents, and went to the lowest bidder. So far, we have saved
nothing, and will be in the hole when all is said and done.Then to
top it all off, the main contractor appears to have no clue as to how
to build a new bridge in the 1st place. ## I had the 12 x 60 inch
long x 1.125 inch diam anchor bolts for my HDX-689 custom made by
portland bolt, they were manufactured in their portland plant,to my
specs, with a 6 inch thread on each end of each rod...and are 103 ksi
yield strength. The various heavy duty nuts, washers, bolts etc, are
also made in theirplant. Including the 18 x 1 inch x 3 inch long
bolts for the legs, with correct length shank. ## when u see dimples
done wrong, excess galvanizing, threads done wrong, dont fight with
it, replace the entire mess. And avoid chinese made brake rotors like
theplague, they come warped right out of the box, or will warp
shortly afterwards. Their calipers are junk as well. Im lucky I
avoided that gong show, and bought reputableaftermarket brands. Those
pal nuts that came with my rohn TB-4 bearings were nothing to right
home about, and neither were the bolts that came with them. The 3 x
boltsthat are mounted transverse, and every 120 degs were more junk.
Mine rusted and seized up asap, sri, not impressed.
Jim VE7RF
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________
TowerTalk mailing list
TowerTalk@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/towertalk
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________
TowerTalk mailing list
TowerTalk@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/towertalk
|