18 foot coax, predator 10-k antenna wired to battery, ground to antenna bracket, and swr on external meter 1.3
VR9, VR2 or VR15 may just be out of adjustment. This does assume you are transmitting signal and recieving.
It might not hurt to check with second SWR meter.
Depending on location, there is only a tiny possibility of residual capacitance causing this. However you might want to put a few neon bulbs around your base to monitor for stray RF. If there is stray RF, they will light up- no need to connect them to anything, you can tape them to convenient places you can see. If they do light up- check coax connectors- which you should really do as a routine anyway, and check coax for damage. Then add a flat braid strap ground to "earth bond" for the radio. Which you should have anyway,
Tuning/completetly aligned. would help the reception. Whether it would help the key up flickering is debatable, but with the added information, it seems most probable at this point the issue is minor and likely in the radio itself, perhaps little more than humidity in the relay, or lint- the contacts may be arcing on key up. I would double check the quench rectifier, should be D7 and also check D5, D6, R16 and Q2 as they are in the relay coil circuit.
Any decent shop should be able to handle the tune up. The bigger issue is the reception, but that may be influenced by where you have the predator set up and how it is pointing. and if the people in the shop know you, it helps a lot.
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SOURCE: coax length
the shorter the better between radio and linear, all coax has to run in 3 ft, 18 foot is recommended for all antennas.
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thank you for your help!! the coax is new just made up at the radio shop rg-8 with new connectors....only thing i did not have was a ground ******** the radio. i added the strap did not help....coax checks out with DVOM meter...... swr checks out on three different meters ..it does recieve doesnt seem great ,but talks like a monster!! on a bird meter at the radio shop turned all the way up, it would dead key 100 watts and swing 220...will i hurt the radio by using it?? can a regular old radio shop be able to adjust vr9 vr2 or vr15 correctly?? or should i send it to a reputable place to fix it? i havent tried the rf light trick but i will..just dont want some idiot with a golden screwdriver working on my radio....thanks again for your help!!
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