[Moon-net] European storm damage

[SAM JEWELL]

Folks,
it seems like I didn't get away without damage to the dish in the recent wind storm, after all. A hinge pin had worked loose on the polar mount leading to the scissor jack collapsing back against the verical mount. This in turn bent the top hinge support plate. I think I have repaired the damage, but perversly the bent plate may give me a couple of degrees more negative declination! The main culprit seems to have been vibration from the dish with the strong, gusty wind that reached 99MPH (160kph) on the local coastal headland.
This is a very exposed site and wind will always be a problem here, but at least the horizons are clear. All the terrestrial antennas survived without damage. It guess they are not big enough.

I also found rain water in a receive -feed N coupler on the dish. This may explain the 'funny' noises on receive that caused me to fail on a couple of skeds late last year.

I hope to be back on 23cm EME again soon.

73 deSam, G4DDK