[NCC] Remote antenna direction sensor?

[Robert Hayes]

Does anyone know about a remote antenna direction sensor to be used with a rotating antenna ?


Seems like I remember seeing something advertised that was magnetic sensing in nature and could be placed on a mast or rotating tower.  Even said it was accurate to within 1 degree.



My top 15 meter beam Ham-IV rotor works fine (has for 30+years), except the direction potentiomter was intermittent as you get in the 270 - 360 degree area.  But now it is totally open.  It is possible that one or both of the wires in the rotor cable connectors (that eventually wind up as pins 3 and 7) have disintigrated over time with the DC flowing through those wires (used to happen a lot at KP2A where we finally changed the control boxes such that depressing the break release switch was required in order to apply power to the meter circuit and read the direction).  I was going to look inside the connector housings.  But even if that is the issue I would still be back to where I was, and would need to take the rotor down to work on the potentiometer in that range (probably just need to bend the copper wiper arm down a little).  Or else go through the rotors I have on the ground and rebuild one of those as a replacement.  But since the only real issue is the direction indication, thought to at least look into alternatives that take less time and effort.


-TNX Bob KW8N