[TowerTalk] Fw: SteppIR problem-update from the front lines

[wb4mle at ctvea.net]

On Sun, 17 Jun 2007 19:00:21 -0400, you wrote:

>Bill sorry it did not work. I hope you dont give up on the SteppIR. Thire 
>has got to be a fix.
>
>Ron K4WZ
>
>----- Original Message ----- 
>From: "Bill Carnett" <ah6fc at yahoo.com>
>To: <towertalk at contesting.com>
>Sent: Sunday, June 17, 2007 6:32 PM
>Subject: [TowerTalk] SteppIR problem-update from the front lines
>
>
>> Ok, Friday I received a new 440 foot control cable
>> from Mike at SteppIR.  In addition he prepared a 6
>> volt DC battery pack to piggy-back on the 33 volt
>> power supply for the controller.
>>
>> Neither worked.  Unit comes on, then shuts off with
>> band selection.  Even tried going into set-up mode to
>> individually select elements, same problem.  Make the
>> selection, and the entire unit shuts down.  With a
>> short control cable, i.e. 80 foot at the base of the
>> tower, the unit works fine...full functioning.
>>
>> So, anybody have other suggestions?  The problem seems
>> to be related to the cable length.  Increasing the
>> controller voltage to the maximum 38 doesn't help.
>> The SteppIR folks, Jerry, Jim, and Mike have been
>> great, but we still can't figure out the problem.
>>
>> This is pretty frustrating.  I want to give this
>> antenna a good opportunity to get functional, but I'm
>> not sure it will in my application, i.e. 500 feet from
>> controller to antenna.  It might be time to start
>> looking for an alternative antenna?
>>
>> Again, thanks to all and any suggestions appreciated.
>>

Any chance the cable could be coupled to a buried power line or
possibly picking up a broadcast rf signal?
-- 
Eddie, WB4MLE