[TowerTalk] Cushcraft kudos

[jim Jarvis]

OK,  enough CC bashing!

It's obvious that a QC problem existed.    I know that they were  
informed about it, but I also know
there were still units in distribution, which couldn't be  
recalled.    And if they COULD, it was far
less costly to fix the component problems once they got out, rather  
than re-ship whole antennas
around the country.   Remember, any company is basically spending its  
customers' money.

In my personal experience, Cushcraft has been quite willing to help  
when I've had problems.
My R7000 was rebuilt with new traps, after a lightning strike.     
Turned out we had some
defective coupling caps in the MN7000 decoupling balun network.    
Wasn't their problem,
the antenna was years out of warranty, and they still gave me new  
caps!   Go figure!

My old CC 40 came down from 90' when a tree took out a tower  
guyset.   CC had available
crash parts, and the beast is still ticking, 8 years later.

It is true that the company has limited assets deployed for its  
amateur line.
One product marketing manager, manufacturing, and project limited  
engineering.
Within the bandwidth limits of that staff, I have found them to be  
quite supportive,
helpful, and forthcoming.

As with any operation which ships component parts, and not assembled,  
tested products,
it is possible for inspection failures to not be detected until  
they're out of the barn.
That's all this was.

As an amateur community, we really need to think about why ANY  
company would market products to us.
We're cheap, cranky, and, frankly, a small niche.    We may find  
ourselves having to build our own gear,
again, one of these days!

N2EA