The AM Forum

A couple kids have been building a dam in the stream behind the house.
I enjoy seeing kids playing down there rather in front of a tube so after I found they wanted to make a pond to fish I didn't pay much attention The stream is a good 20 feet below the back yard and they don't have a D8 to cause trouble.  Last night I was buzzarding away on 160
with W1NZR and a big zorch came out of the final output transformer then blew the breaker. That was traced to a primary to secondary short. An easy thing to fix. Wow was the #10 secondary hot! I fired up the V2 and forund the VSWR was almost 100% reflected. So much for not having VSWR shut down.
This morning I walked out back to  see what happened and looked next door and found a 60 foot tall oak in the neighbor's back yard a couple feet off the ground. Under it was the rope for the north end of the 160
meter antenna and the west end of the north dipole of the phased array.
The bow saw quickly released them since most of the tree was in the woods.  Both antennas damaged and the 160 meter feed line was twisted
making a short. Class E Rig into a short.
The kids had diverted the stream a bit so the roots washed out during yesterday's storm and gravity did its thing.
Perfect weather for antenna work.

Kids - Beavers, you have the same problem. You need Tina with his bow & arrow!
Keith
WA1HZK

Dam kids!

I don't have a problem with the kids and was impressed with their dam.
I have a compound bow that easily gets over 100 feet. My problem is getting it down to repair as the end insulator was pulled theough the crotch. I have tension on pull down rope and there is supposed to be some wind today. Ca mon mother nature.