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New Brunswick | There have been various people complain about water/moisture in their antenna's from Trimble (https://talk.newagtalk.com/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=378185&DisplayType=flat&setCookie=1). This seems to be a long term problem over many iterations of ag antenna from Trimble. The mechanical engineer should be ashamed of themselves who designed this. Trimble glues the units shut because there is only about 30$ of electronic parts inside so it's not worth fixing from their point of view. From the farmer's point of view it's 1000$ for a new one.
Solution:
After watching this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91TSirOTNN8
I drilled a 1/2" hole in a spot I thought there would be nothing in the way (see pic). Be careful not to let the drill bit enter to far, it is best to start with smaller bits and work up. After drilling the hole you can check for moisture inside, you will usually see it. In my case you could hear is sloshing around. I then put the whole antenna in the oven for 3 or 4 hours at the lowest temperature (170 F), other methods would probably work (ie placing in a bag of rice over a longer period).
After testing the antenna I filled the hole with silicon and placed it back on the tractor. I can forsee I will have to do this again in the future. I question whether I should even plug the whole, if it were smaller diameter I would probable just leave it open as it is fairly protected from the elements. A 3d printed plug might do the trick instead.
Hope this helps someone else repair their antenna, in my case an Ag25 and Ag15.
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Attachments
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 IMG_3804 (full).jpeg (48KB - 450 downloads)
IMG_3803 (full).jpeg (161KB - 377 downloads)
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Solved: Trimble Antenna water ingress
