TopBand: de 4X4NJ Re: Beverage Terminator Protection

I've used the gas tubes, but they are difficult to find, and of limited life
too (only being able to withstand  "so many" arcs).  More recently, I've been
putting a pair of airgap electrodes in parallel with the resistor.  This is
very easy to fabricate and no special materials are needed.  My termination
resistors are mounted in a small weatherproof plastic box  commonly used by
electricians.  I simply drill 2 holes to hold the screws which have "tear drop"
lugs on the inside for the resistors, and on the outside, they allow putting
nuts and washers to enable connecting the Beverage wire and the ground wire.
Now, on the inside, I also put a second lug on each screw and solder to this
lug a relatively large diameter solid wire - say about AWG 10 or so. Then, I
bend these solid wires and cut their ends so that I have an extremely small
airgap between them - just the thickness of some paper that I use as a feeler
gauge.  The plastic box holds everything solid, etc.  I've been using this
method for 2 years now, and so far it has been working wel - the resistors have
been holding up.  I hope you find this useful.



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