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Quick Disconnect for Doublet Antenna

 

Quick Disconnect for Doublet Antenna

Filed in Antennas on Mar.23, 2011

To finish the job we started in January, I got a 2″x4″ weathertight plastic electrical box from Home Depot.  This was used to mount a permanent set of banana jacks to the house so the doublet could be quickly attached or detached.

 
Doublet Disconnect

To make the box ready, I cut two slots in the hole on the bottom to allow the ladder line to pass easily into it.

 
Slots in Electrical Box

Next, I passed the window line through the slots to make sure it fit.

 
Window Line in box

After that, I mounted the box to the side of the house with some 1-1/2″ screws to the trim.  The window line was fitted with ring terminals and attached to the two banana jacks on the inside.

 
Connections

Finally, a snap ring was attached to a loop of rope to serve as a strain relief.  This is easily snapped to the eye ring at the bottom of the box.  It works pretty well.  I still need to use a ladder to connect/disconnect, but that keeps it high enough to prevent running into it as you walk around.

 
Strain Relief
 
Migrated Comments:

2 Responses to “Quick Disconnect for Doublet Antenna”

  1. Bob Says:
    September 22nd, 2016 at 3:48 pm

    Hi Randy

    I am in the process of doing the same as you have done and finding your page just completed my search for ideas, thank you.

    If I may ask where did you get the banana plugs/jacks? I’ve searched and could not find anything like what you depict. Nice and clean install.

  2. wb0smx Says:
    September 22nd, 2016 at 5:58 pm

    Hi Bob. They had been in my junkbox for a long time. As I recall, I salvaged them from an old Hewlett Packard Power supply. Sorry that I can’t be much help here… 73…

 

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