What a summer... the nastiest in 23 years of living here, for lightning strikes and storm damages. I found another piece of lightning strike damage by accident. We
recently had a storm that was nasty, and when I returned home I found
all the breakers in my home workshop tripped. Didn't really find any
damage in the shop, until now. I noticed the 2 meter rig (VHF radio) in the
workshop wasn't receiving very well, so I decided to put the SWR meter
on it and check the antenna. It sits on a grounded, wall mounted, metal
shelf. I reached for the feed line connector near the radio and had to
break it away from the shelf. Ruh Roh...
Check out the spot on the connector where it welded itself to the shelf...
It blew right through the powder coating on the shelf!
I haven't removed the antenna to inspect it, yet, but the SWR is about a zillion : 1 on it now :-( . I don't know if it's a direct strike, or a near strike, as there was a tree about 50 feet away that was struck. Whatever the case, this is a real eye-opener for what can come in on the feedline!
Dave
http://www.WB4IUY.net
