Harsh lesson about wind load, magnets, and "metal" surfaces

Over the last few months, I've been participating in Parks on the Air (POTA) and Simplex Saturdays (sponsored by TARA) and the antenna I've used is the Comet UHV-4, a quad-band antenna that works with my FT-8900 radio (10m, 6m, 2m, and 70cm).

It's a great antenna, and it's nice to have one antenna to rule them all, but one disadvantage is that its profile is not the most conducive for magnet-mounting. It's heavy, even somewhat top-heavy, and has a high profile for windy conditions. Most of the time I've owned it, I kept it indoors, or stored in my shed, taking it out to operate on Saturdays.

Admittedly I can be lazy, and thus was the case three weeks ago (as of this writing) when I last operated Simplex Saturday/POTA. I came home and simply left it on my Dodge Durango in anticipation of operating the next weekend. Unfortunately I was unable to do that, so I left it on the roof of the Durango as the weather was fairly pleasant, if not a bit chilly, but little precipitation occurred.

Last Wednesday (25 February) I went to Morristown for a SKYWARN Board meeting and simply left the antenna atop the roof. I didn't bring my radio (although I considered it) and it turned into a blustery day and I didn't think much of it as the temps were in the 50s. and it was relatively nice.

On the way home I took the interstate and was traveling westbound into an eastern wind. At one point a stiff gust hit and I heard the noise I never expected...*THUD* *THUMP*, and looking in the rear-view mirror I saw a flailing coaxial cable trailing. 

Other cars around me must have seen the hilarity ensuing and allowed me to move over to the shoulder. And when I got out, my worst fears had come to pass. The only thing remaining was the shell of my tri-magnet mount, with the coax adapter where the antenna once stood sheared right off. Whatever remained of the antenna was now about a half-mile back and destroyed. 

I had purchased the antenna at the Dalton Hamfest the year prior. And what a coincidence...guess what  event was the following Saturday!

I now had a mission for the Dalton Hamfest: To get a replacement UHV-4 and magnet mount.

So why not get a more "permanent" mount for my UHV-4? It's complicated, but in short, I have the quad-band radio mounted to my battery box, and so it's portable, and sometimes I take my vehicle to participate, and other times, I use my wife's car. So I need to be able to remove and attach to either car.

So I went to Dalton last Saturday and picked up the UHV-4 (thanks to ChattRadio for holding one back for me!) and a larger and (hopefully) stronger magnet mount for continuing to do POTA and Simplex Saturdays. Tower Electronics had the mount and connector for the UHV-4.

Unfortunately I was not able to get up on a mountain for Simplex Saturday that day but was able to get up on the Parkway a couple of weeks afterwards.