The West Coast Ham Convention called Pacificon has come and gone, and it was another good one. We had a presentation at 8AM. Perhaps due to the early timeslot the room was not overstuffed, but there was a nice crowd and things went fairly well aside from the video not working on the projector.
We spent most of the time in the Buddipole booth where the Dual-Valve Launcher was on display, answering questions about Antenna Launching.
Recently we have been testing a new trigger strut. This simple upgrade to the CSV launchers prevents the trigger from moving on the threads. In the distant past we used to glue these threads, but that did not always work and it made service difficult. Recently we have recommended using teflon tape in the threads which works well but does not provide firm support for the trigger, so it may move. The new aluminum strut goes from the rear of the barrel to the top of the trigger and solves this problem.
Eric and Alan are preparing to do an invited presentation on Antenna Launching at the March 25th meeting of the North Hills Radio Club near Sacramento. If you are in the area we hope you can come by. This will be a bit different than the last presentation in Sacramento when the projector was not available. At least we hope it will be different, and we can show the slides and video that we have. We will also bring some launchers to look at. No selling is planned for this event.