antenna repair

[rbigg]

After awhile, those fiberglass antennas lose their outer coating and get really nasty to handle without gloves. If you grab 'em barehanded, you get a bunch of little fiberglass needles in your hands.<br /><br />Is there any good stuff to recoat 'em with to tame 'em down a bit? They're still good insofar as performance goes, just need a coating of some kind to keep the fiberglass from shedding. Any ideas as to what product might work best?

 

[KaGee]

Re: antenna repair

The best thing to do is replace the antenna. Ultraviolet destroys the coating overtime and can penetrate into the core, breaking it down as well. The net result is poor performance, the last thing you want when you need the radio.<br /><br />If you want to try something else, maybe a spray on spar varnish or polyurethane.

 

[jurgenscraft]

Re: antenna repair

I agree, maybe the best thing to do is replace the antenna if the coating is realy bad, but a temporary repair, if the coating is only slightly dammaged, what I would do is clean / roughen up the surface with sand paper and then clean it up with acetone, once this has dried completely I would then coat the antenna from base to tip with penetrating epoxy that is uv resistant,if the antenna is working okay this should do the trick,what I do is remove the antennas from the boat and store them in the cabin or out of direct sunlight.I stay in the South African "high veld" which is 6000 feet above sea level and because of the thinner atmosphere, the high summer uv levels create havoc with both man and equipment, so precaution is the key, Kind Regards William Wright,