New antenna tower:

[W9GC]

Here is a photo that I took today of the top of my 70’ antenna tower fully assembled and ready to be lifted… It contains an Imax2000 10/11/12 meter antenna at the top, a Diamond X200A dual band VHF/UHF ham antenna on one side and a Scantenna2 all-band scanner antenna on the other side. It will be 99 feet tall at the tip of the Imax2000, and is 10.5 feet wide at the arms.

It's base is set in a yard of concrete 4.5 feet deep on a 3/4” steel hinge plate so the tower can be easily raised and lowered with an electric winch.

It will have two sets of guy wires, one set at 30 feet and one set at 60 feet.

Once it's up I'll post a follow-up with a photo of the completed project.

 

[kirka127]

That is one nice antenna set up.

 

[N8DRC]

Great set-up, can't wait to get mine up in the air..

 

[JohnSPWD]

That looks awesome.I hope to get one up soon.post a pic of the base.

 

[OpSec]

What feedline is being used?

 

[W9GC]

Here's a pic of the just-completed install. There's still a few guy wires that need to be attached, but it wears the hell out of a person climbing that thing... I'll finish after my break.

I am using the factory-supplied RG6 to the Scantenna2, RG8 to the IMAX2000 and LMR400 to the X200A Dual bander.

I will post a pic of the concrete base soon.

 

[W9GC]

Here's a photo from a couple weeks ago just after the first base was poured. There is now a second square base 2"x3'x3' that caps this one, it's more for cosmetics than anything...

The concrete base doesn't appear very big in the photo, but it flares to nearly 3 feet wide at the bottom of the hole.

Notice the custom identifier welded into the hinge plate - that's so nobody can steal my tower in the middle of the night.

 

[N467RX]

In case of a thunderstorm do you take it down?

 

[W9GC]

In case of a thunderstorm do you take it down?

Could... but I hope I can trust my guy wires enough to leave it up through anything short of a tornado.

The hinge plate is there so I can easily lay the tower down to work on/replace the antennas without climbing to the top of the tower.

 

[Junior08]

That's some nice work. Enjoy, and hopefully no storms or lightning find you anytime soon!

 

[mfuller1950]

That is quite an awsome setup. I am jealous especially at that height. Good Job.


Fuller - K5QO

 

[W9GC]

One final pic showing the height... keep in mind this photo cuts off about 15-20 feet from the top of the IMAX.

 

[tonsoffun]

Great job on the tower!. What kind of electric winch do you have to lift that puppie?
Again, awesome job
Take care

 

[mancow]

So, how does it perform? Are you pulling in all kinds of new stuff?

 

[W9GC]

double post... see below

 

[W9GC]

Great job on the tower!. What kind of electric winch do you have to lift that puppie?

The winch belongs to a neighbor, I have no idea what the make/model is, but he says it will lift up to 1300 lbs.

So, how does it perform? Are you pulling in all kinds of new stuff?

My scanner antenna went from 25' to over 65' and I am now able to hear ISP District 6 ISPERN dispatches (I am in the center of District 13), their tower is over 100 miles away.

VHF ham repeaters that used to give me 1/2 scale on the RX meter (Yaesu FT-8900) are now nearly full scale, I have not yet experimented with HF/UHF or 800 MHz.

So far it's performance is exceeding my expectations. I can't wait for a band opening!

 

[MB]

Nice setup!

What make and model of tower are you using? Did the hinge plate come with the tower? I am looking to also purchase a tower.

Is your neighbors electric winch mounted on a 4 wheeler?
I just can't picture how you would raise or lower that 70ft tower with a winch. Could you explain the process?

How high do you attach the winch and what is the winch mounted to?

 

[W9GC]

Nice setup!

What make and model of tower are you using? Did the hinge plate come with the tower? I am looking to also purchase a tower.

Is your neighbors electric winch mounted on a 4 wheeler?
I just can't picture how you would raise or lower that 70ft tower with a winch. Could you explain the process?

How high do you attach the winch and what is the winch mounted to?

The tower is Rohn 25G, it was pieced together from several sources. The hinge plate was designed/fabricated by my neighbor, a welder. As you can see in the above photo of the plate, he added my callsign to it. (I guess this keeps thieves from walking off with my tower while I'm sleeping. )

The electric winch is mounted in the bed of a pickup truck, it was attached with a hook which was wrapped around the tower at about the 45 foot mark. The cable wasn't long enough, so we had to add a load strap to extend it as you can see at the right side of the attached photo. The winch wouldn't lift the tower until we had it lifted by hand a bit, as illustrated below. Three guys had to lift it about another 5-7 feet above the 8' ladder in order for the winch to be able to pull it at the proper angle.

Once the winch took hold and started raising the tower it was all they could do to keep up with it and up it went. In fact it went up too fast for me to grab my camera and snap a photo of it being raised.

Once it was up, I simply slipped the pin back into the loose leg on the hinge plate and attached the guy wires at ground level.

 

[daleduke17]

Sharp looking tower, man. Don't be listening in on us up here in District 6. Seriously, that is pretty good. Have you picked up any ISPERN (or whatever they're called locally) dispatches from the surrounding states?

 

[fez_uk]

Nice mast mate, One day I hope to have the same sort of thing. A man can only dream.