Sunday, August 24, 2014

How to Install Anderson Powerpoles

The last time I took my Icom 7200 to the field one of the Anderson Powerpoles on the end of its power cord came off. I had a spare power cable that I swapped in after I returned home, and this afternoon I fixed the old one.

PowerWerx has a nice illustrated guide  showing you how to install them, here. Both PowerWerx and Quick Silver Radio are good sources for powerpole related items including the powerpoles themselves, cables terminated with them, and crimp tools.

APPs are pretty much the standard among ham radio operators, especially those who participate in EMCOMM. That said, I’m not a fan of them. For one, they are a bit of a PITA to assemble. Two, they are not secure when you connect one cable to another or to a plug, i.e., they don’t click into place, or even have much friction keeping them together when plugged in.  PowerWerx sells retention clips to keep two cables together, but IMHO this is a workaround for poor design.

I’ve only adopted APPs because they are the de facto standard for ham radio power connections.

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