Noticed a huge difference after swapping out old coax cables at the hangar in Denver

Last month I replaced all the ancient RG58 cables in a Cessna 172 with some new RG400 stuff. The signal loss on the VOR dropped from about 3 dB to under 1 dB after the swap. Has anyone else seen that big of a jump just from changing cables?

3 comments

3 Comments

charles_young921mo ago

Used to think coax was coax and it didnt matter much. Old RG58 in my hangar was causing this weird static on the comms that I just chalked up to the radio itself. Finally swapped it out with some RG400 after reading a post like this and the difference was honestly jarring. The static cleared up completely and the VOR needle actually locked on steady instead of wobbling. Made me feel pretty dumb for ignoring it so long.

ray_williams1mo ago

@charles_young92 is overselling it a bit, I swapped out some coax in my own ride a while back and the change was there but not night and day. Maybe his old cables were really beat to hell or something.

the_terry1mo ago

Must be nice having cables that were in decent shape to begin with. I probably had the same static Charles did and just thought it was the radio yelling at me for other life choices.