This past weekend I finished my antenna tower project which I started this summer.
I purchased two used towers from a farmer on Craigslist. They were on the ground so I did not need to unstack them. Only two sections were rusted to a point of being unusable. That left me with 4 ten foot sections, one eight and one five foot section to place in the ground.
I began by digging my base hole. 4ft deep, 3ft square. This took several days as down about 2ft I hit clay. Once dug, I built a form and set the 5ft section and 8ft section in and leveled then. I used 4 bags of gravel in the bottom for drainage and a re-bar basket for strength.
A few weeks later I rented a towable concrete mixer with a yard and half of concrete in it and towed it home and poured the base.
While waiting for the concrete to cure I set to work on cleaning up the tower sections. A light wire bushing removed the surface rust, then the sections were wiped down and sprayed with a rust stabilizing primer, then a heavy coat of Cold Galvanizing Paint followed by a coat of silver Rustoleum. They look almost new.
Stacking day finally arrived. I rented a towable 42ft articulated boom lift and borrowed a friends gin pole and began the stack. I was surprised how easy this was to do by myself. I would mount the gin pole bracket, slide the pole up into place, pull up a section of tower within about 6 inches of where it needed to be and tie off the rope and easily set the sections. All 4 sections were up in less than an hour.
A word about the lift. It was advertised as 47ft but it was more like 42ft. Consequently I was unable to get to the very top of my 48ft of tower. I had planned to mount my dual band 2m/440 antenna there but was forced to mount it on one of the side brackets. I had originally planned to rent a 65ft lift but it has not been available and with winter coming I wanted to get the antennas up before the snow and ice arrives. I will probably rework it in the spring.
I mounted 4 antennas at this time.
1.) Opek UVS-300 Dual Band Omni-Directional antenna 2m/440mhz
2.)Workman T601 25 - 1300 MHz General Coverage Scanner Antenna
3.)AntennaCraft HDX1000 VHF UHF HD TV Antenna ( for OTA HD TV)
4.)Winegard HD6010 Omnidirectional FM Antenna
I also have a 900mhz Omni that I wanted to mount but ran out of daylight, having to return the lift the following morning.
I used galvanized unistrut for the brackets with 1" unistrut straps holding them to the tower. The masts are 1"and 1-1/4" rigid conduit. Coax for the scanner and dual band antennas is Times Microwave LMR-400, the TV and FM antenna used Quad Shield RG-6. All connections to the antennas were sealed with Liquid Tape and then wrapped with 3M Super 33 tape which was also used to secure the coax to the tower.
The finished product for now.
I have 3 -5/8"x8' Ground rods driven that will be connected to the tower and I still need to run the coax into the house which will occur in the next few weeks. I took a couple of radios out to test with today. The dual band really "hears" I heard traffic on repeaters I have programmed that I never heard before. The discone allowed my 996t to pull in system several counties away. I'll post more photo of the shack when the cabling is done. I would also like to put a weather station and a remote camera up there too.
I purchased two used towers from a farmer on Craigslist. They were on the ground so I did not need to unstack them. Only two sections were rusted to a point of being unusable. That left me with 4 ten foot sections, one eight and one five foot section to place in the ground.
I began by digging my base hole. 4ft deep, 3ft square. This took several days as down about 2ft I hit clay. Once dug, I built a form and set the 5ft section and 8ft section in and leveled then. I used 4 bags of gravel in the bottom for drainage and a re-bar basket for strength.
A few weeks later I rented a towable concrete mixer with a yard and half of concrete in it and towed it home and poured the base.
While waiting for the concrete to cure I set to work on cleaning up the tower sections. A light wire bushing removed the surface rust, then the sections were wiped down and sprayed with a rust stabilizing primer, then a heavy coat of Cold Galvanizing Paint followed by a coat of silver Rustoleum. They look almost new.
Stacking day finally arrived. I rented a towable 42ft articulated boom lift and borrowed a friends gin pole and began the stack. I was surprised how easy this was to do by myself. I would mount the gin pole bracket, slide the pole up into place, pull up a section of tower within about 6 inches of where it needed to be and tie off the rope and easily set the sections. All 4 sections were up in less than an hour.
A word about the lift. It was advertised as 47ft but it was more like 42ft. Consequently I was unable to get to the very top of my 48ft of tower. I had planned to mount my dual band 2m/440 antenna there but was forced to mount it on one of the side brackets. I had originally planned to rent a 65ft lift but it has not been available and with winter coming I wanted to get the antennas up before the snow and ice arrives. I will probably rework it in the spring.
I mounted 4 antennas at this time.
1.) Opek UVS-300 Dual Band Omni-Directional antenna 2m/440mhz
2.)Workman T601 25 - 1300 MHz General Coverage Scanner Antenna
3.)AntennaCraft HDX1000 VHF UHF HD TV Antenna ( for OTA HD TV)
4.)Winegard HD6010 Omnidirectional FM Antenna
I also have a 900mhz Omni that I wanted to mount but ran out of daylight, having to return the lift the following morning.
I used galvanized unistrut for the brackets with 1" unistrut straps holding them to the tower. The masts are 1"and 1-1/4" rigid conduit. Coax for the scanner and dual band antennas is Times Microwave LMR-400, the TV and FM antenna used Quad Shield RG-6. All connections to the antennas were sealed with Liquid Tape and then wrapped with 3M Super 33 tape which was also used to secure the coax to the tower.
The finished product for now.
I have 3 -5/8"x8' Ground rods driven that will be connected to the tower and I still need to run the coax into the house which will occur in the next few weeks. I took a couple of radios out to test with today. The dual band really "hears" I heard traffic on repeaters I have programmed that I never heard before. The discone allowed my 996t to pull in system several counties away. I'll post more photo of the shack when the cabling is done. I would also like to put a weather station and a remote camera up there too.
