[Amps] Antenna Tuner Overheating

[John- W4DJ]

Sounds to me like you don't have enough current to run the equipment.
If the lights are dimming than you don't have enough AMPs or your tuning is 
drawing to many AMPs from the service..
When you overload a wire and draw more Amps than it can handle it gets HOT 
just like an extention cord.
I don't know what kind of breakers you got or if your running 117V or 240V 
but thats the first thing I'd look at.
I'm not an expert but hope my opinion helps.
GL 73s de John W4DJ


>From: "Jim Brown" <jim at audiosystemsgroup.com>
>To: "Tower Talk List" <towertalk at contesting.com>,"amps at contesting.com" 
><amps at contesting.com>
>Subject: [Amps] Antenna Tuner Overheating
>Date: Sat, 15 Oct 2005 20:44:31 -0500
>
>I'm seeing some overheating that can only be in one of two possible
>components. One is a TenTec 238 antenna tuner, the other is the
>loading coils in the antenna that I'm feeding with it. I've also
>observed the same symptoms using a Ten Tec 229B tuner with the same
>antenna. The tuners are nearly identical. Here's the setup.
>
>Antenna is an 80/40 dipole with no balun, fed with some vintage 75
>ohm KW twin lead, with both ends of the twin lead tied together and
>fed as a long wire on 160m. The tuner has a good counterpoise on it
>(roughly 140 feet of 6 ft high wrought iron fence that runs around
>the front of my house). This thing tunes nicely, and indicates a nice
>low VSWR at the beginning of transmission, but the SWR rises, and the
>lights start dimming when I key it (indicating more power supply
>current), about 15 seconds into the transmission. I'm seeing this now
>with a Ten Tec Herc II at only 500 w, but I've also seen it with my
>Titan.
>
>Any ideas what's going on?  The fixed capacitors in the tuner high
>voltage types, but with significant temperature coefficient. Are they
>heating and changing value?
>
>The other possibility is that the loading coils are arcing or
>drifting as they heat. They are pretty near each end of the antenna.
>
>Jim K9YC
>
>
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