I’ve been taking a break over the past week to deliver another load of household goods down to my storage unit down in North Carolina in support of my upcoming move there later this year.  On the way back home to northern Virginia I stopped by to spend a couple of days with my very good friend & fellow Long-EZ builder Marco and his lovely wife Gina.

During my visit Marco very graciously opened up shop to help me in lathing 4 aluminum standoffs for 2 of the 3 GNS480 GPS antenna connectors (2 standoffs per each antenna connector).  After talking to the guys at Stein Air a few months ago, I took their advice and ordered some 1/2″ high 4-40 threaded hex standoffs from McMaster-Carr but then for some inexplicable reason forgot them at home during this trip.  Since I had one of the original hex standoffs with me, Marco and I were able to figure out the configuration and use a simple aluminum rod to lathe the 4 antenna standoffs out of it.

It took a bit to get the configuration dialed in, but once we did, Marco worked his magic and had 4 standoffs knocked out in fairly short order.

Here’s another shot of the original hex GNS480 antenna standoff and the 4 new aluminum standoffs.

Tomorrow I’ll be back home and will get back to work for a few days on electrical system. Then with the forecasted weather for the next few weeks, I plan on firing up the heaters and being back to work in the shop this upcoming Sunday.