The FlagPole Dipole is back up...

The new rope arrived this afternoon. All 40m worth apparently. Not sure it was well measured, but I digress. 

I pulled the failed side down, removing the pole at the top of the fence height to avoid undoing a bracket and weakening the screws. Everything was calm. 10 minutes later when trying to put it back up, the wind had picked up and trying put about 5m worth of pole straight down whilst working elevated become something of a challenge. 

Luckily I had the forethought to buy enough for both poles. When I first inspected the other pole I hadn't paid *that* much attention to it. Had I looked up I'd have noticed it warn and frayed. 

I didn't care much for pulling that pole down. A knot was never going to pass through if I tried to tie in the new rope, but a solution dawned on me. I have some 8mm 4:1 glued heat shrink tube - 4 inches of that with a small gap in between to help ensure that there would be some flex (this stuff tends to cool hard), and sending it up whilst it was still warm enough to flex without the centre stretching (and breaking), and it was essentially done. Probably one of the more interesting uses I've had for heat shrink.

All up, that was probably a 20 minute job, and cost around $30. The dipole is back to its former glory - back just above roof height between the houses, complete with boomerang shaped flag poles and ladder line flapping around in the breeze.

Unfortunately as soon as it was finished, I needed to take 2 hour drive to go collect my son and return.

Upon my return, I fired up the IC706 and the ATU100 to see what would happen. It tuned easily, so that was positive. Within minutes on 7.171MHz I saw an SSTV CQ call. I managed to receive 595 to a VK5 based in Adelaide. I'm not going to complain about that. 

I'll keep an eye on it for a day or two to make sure that this rope looks to be lasting, but it at least feels stronger and more heavy duty that the OEM rope. Theres a little tidy up still to do, and I wouldn't mind a little more excess back on the far end rope. I need to tidy up the 80m tail from the trap on that side anyway - it's currently J shaped and looks unsightly.