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A 3 hour wire chase in a King Air wing root made me stop trusting my old coax tester
I used to swear by my old coax tester for every antenna job on King Airs. Last Tuesday at our hangar in Wichita I spent 3 hours chasing a nav signal fault in the left wing root, pulling panels and reseating connectors while my tester said the line was fine. Turned out the center conductor had a tiny crack inside the insulation, and my cheap tester read it as good because it only checked for opens and shorts, not the actual loss. I finally grabbed the shop's $2,400 TDR box and it showed the break in 30 seconds. I stood there feeling like a rookie. Now I'm saving up for a real tester, even though it means eating ramen for a bit. Anyone else get burned by trusting a basic continuity checker on coax runs?
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