Antenna Spray paint on an antenna?

You might want to mask the areas around your terminals to make sure you get good electrical contact. Sometimes a flat off-white or light gray is less noticeable than black against a bright sky.

Guy

I would not "paint" an antenna or its support structure. Instead, I always use a clear acrylic spray to protect tripods, masts etc. Especially around all non stainless steel hardware (99% of the cheap consumer 'stuff'). This way, you can see any deterioration. Painting only covers it up, hiding problems.

I have tried to 'coat' my installation once a year using a can of clear acrylic spray (Krylon for example). Making multiple passes, again, especially around all of the nuts & bolts of the tripod, mast, rotor and antenna mounts. This has extended all of these rust collectors many additional years. Even though most of this stuff is 'coated', it will rust after a few years making removal of nuts and bolts impossible.

Although not thought of as a paint as it's not pigmented, clear acrylic is still a paint.

The last UHF and VHF antennas I put up came with instructions to paint everything with the clear acrylic. I think I gave it all about 5 coats. One of these was over 29' long and may get as much as 1,500 watts into it.

Out in the sun the UV will cause most "useable" paints including the clear acrylic and epoxies to deteriorate.
On of the main things to "clear coat" ARE the connections. It serves to protect them.
Many of the Krylon spray paints will work, but I don't know specifically which colors will and won't. I've seen antennas painted to blend in with the surroundings and they worked fine.

TV antennas are usually of the "snap in place" type for elements and connections with the exception of the screw terminals or wingnuts. These need at least several thin coats. (don't put the stuff on so thick it drips) The "clear coat" will protect the cheap connections which usually just rust away within a few years. OTOH the "clear coat" may not last much more than 5 years before needing to be redone. Do the recoat BEFORE rust or corrosion shows up. Remember that most TV antennas are flimsy and very fragile, VHF being particularly so.

In addition I coat the balun and 300 ohm line. The Balun and coax connector are fitted inside what is called "flooded" heat shrink tubing. This stuff has "hot melt glue" on the inside and is great for water proofing connections, but it does take a heat gun to install...No, a hair dryer won't do it<:-)). Prior to installing the heat shrink, I give the 300 ohm twin lead coming out of the balun 3 or 4 coats of "liquid electrical tape" which is available in most hardware stores. (even comes in 3 or 4 colors) I run that coating up to and include the antenna terminals. I've never had one with this treatment rust yet. The center image in the bottom row of photos, in the following link, shows a Balun completely enclosed in MMM heat shrink as well as the coated twin lead ( http://www.rogerhalstead.com/ham_files/AV-640/AV640.htm ). Watch out for line wrap of the URL. The bottom right hand photo shows the coax grounding at the base of the tower. The TV antenna mounts about 8' below the ham antenna but is not shown.

The reason I said not use use 'paint' was the lack of the ability to actually 'see' the surface that you are trying to protect. To verify that the metal (or insulator) has not deteriorated (rust and/or corrosion for example). Actual 'paint' would not allow this.

I have never worked with what you described. Do you have specific links to the product? I have used 'flooded' snap type splices (telephone for example, I forgot what they are called). This "MMM heat shrink" is what you are referred to?

Morning All!

Not an absolute "cure" of course, but, the small price penalty for two stainless steel or solid brass bolts & nuts @ the connections IS quite worth while.

eli

Absolutely!

A couple of sources. Here is a brief tutorial of using two types of MMM flooded heat shrink. http://www.rogerhalstead.com/ham_files/connectors.htm
and http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/e ... electrical will get you to the MMM site. The heat shrinkable products are near the bottom of a list on the right side of the page. A search on MMM Heat shrink tubing will produce many pages of dealers. Unfortunately the search produces far more dealers than information, but it is there.

I purchase it in 3' or 4' lengths (what ever is standard) in the two sizes shown in the first link, from a local electrical supply house as I use a lot of the stuff.

As you will note in the tutorial, the tubing I use has a rather heavy wall. The stuff is strong and will add *some* mechanical strength to connections. The numbers on the outside such as the 0.80/.22 indicate the size (in inches) or 20 and 5.6 (in mm) before and after shrinking for the large size tube. The smaller tube is 0.4 and 0.12 (inches) or 10 and 3.1 (mm). This is a shrink ratio of 3:1.

I agree that SS or Brass screws in the connections are far better than the cheap threaded *stuff* that most antennas come with (IOW the way to go), but as simple as it sounds, most of those connectors and crimped in and it might be a bit much for many TV viewers to "neatly" remove them and replace them with a mechanically sound SS or brass connectors.

BTW if I didn't say so, in addition to the clear Krylon I like to coat the connectors with the liquid electrical tape. It is opaque, but gives a good weather proof coat. When You want to remove the connection, if ever, the stuff will just peel out of the way. Welll... It may not be quite that easy, but removing it is relatively easy.

I'll need to check, but I may have some UHF antennas that are accessible complete with baluns and weather proofing. If so I'll shoot some photos and put them up. Most of the baluns available or that come with today's antennas do not last long our in the elements so I pay particular attention to weather proofing them as well as protecting the twin lead from the balun to the antenna connections.