K6LL wrote:
>
>The four bolts that hold the two halves of one of my Ham-4
>Rotors have loosened up. In fact one of them has fallen
>out and I can't find it. Has anybody tried Loctite
>Blue on these? Anything special about these bolts other
>than the fact that they are Taptite 12-24x 3/4"? I guess
>Taptite means that they come with the captive lockwasher?
>I was thinking of looking for some locally to speed up the
>repair job. Thanks.
Corrosion between the dissimilar metals is always going to ruin those
threads. Either you can't get the bolts out, or when you do, they take a
layer of corroded internal thread out with them. Every time you remove
the corroded bolts, the problem rapidly gets worse. I found that blue
Loctite was not strong enough to lock the loose threads against the
constant leverage from wind forces.
A permanent solution is to drill and tap the holes for a slightly
larger, fairly coarse thread, and then fix stainless steel studs (all
thread) in permanently using red Loctite. It doesn't matter about
completely removing the old thread to make a perfect new thread form;
it's more important to leave plenty of metal around the holes. Then you
can use external stainless steel nuts, with blue Loctite to lock them
and prevent galling.
It solved the problem permanently here.
73 from Ian G3SEK Editor, 'The VHF/UHF DX Book'
'In Practice' columnist for RadCom (RSGB)
http://www.ifwtech.demon.co.uk/g3sek
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