Specifications

SMARTUNER MANUAL 11
SGC Inc. SGC Building, 13737 S.E. 26th St. Bellevue, WA. 98005 USA
© Nov2000 SGC, Inc. P.O. Box 3526, 98009 Fax: [phone] Tel: [phone]
E-Mail: [e-mail] Web Site: www.sgcworld.com
Coupler Information. Please have the serial number of your coupler, the name of
the dealer from whom the unit was purchased, and the approximate date of
purchase.
Antenna Information. Please be ready to describe your antenna installation.
You will need to advise us whether the antenna is a wire type, a dipole, V,
vertical, long wire, or whip antenna.
Ground System. You should be ready to describe your ground system in detail.
If you are dealing with a marine installation, you should have a description of
the vessel's bonding system. If you are using the coupler in a mobile setting, you
should be able to describe bonding of the hood, trunk, and other vehicle parts
that may have been done. In an aircraft, you should be able to describe location
of the coupler and type of ground connection used.
Power supply voltage. One of the common mistakes made when installing
couplers is to assume that a connection is good when it hasn't been measured. If
you experience any type of erratic or intermittent operation, please measure the
power supply voltage inside the coupler.
. Describe Coupler behavior. If you are having a problem, determine if it is
happening all the time or only part of the time. Does the problem occur only on
certain frequencies? Does the problem happen only in certain modes?
. Be patient. Finding the reason for less than ideal system operation may take one
telephone call or it may take several calls. Regardless of how complex the
problem is, your SGC representative will be able to walk you through the
process of solving your problem in a logical step-by-step manner. The Smartuner
and accessories will always give top performance when carefully installed.
4.0
Antenna Types
The automatic antenna coupler is designed for use with end-fed unbalanced antennas
such as whips and long wires. The radiating portion of the antenna is connected
directly to the coupler through a high voltage insulator. It is extremely important that
the antenna type, site location, and grounding technique be correctly chosen so that the
system will radiate effectively.
Wideband antennas (e.g., log periodic) that cover the full range of the system may be
used with the coupler if desired. Narrow band resonant antennas, such as dipoles, Vs,
and inverted Vs may only be used if the antenna VSWR (including coaxial feeder) is less
than, or equal to 3:1 at the operating frequency.
Note that if a dipole or V type antenna is used, the antenna may be operated at any
frequency within the range of the coupler if each side of the V or dipole is 23 feet or