Thanks for providing the web space, Scott.
My father in-law and I were at Bill's in August of '03 when the big crane
lifted the top half of Bertha onto the bottom half and K7PN welded the
halves together. An impressive sight, as were many things going on at NT1Y
that summer and fall. My father in-law had never seen anything like Bill's
antenna farm!
The completed Big Bertha was 142' high. I helped build several of the HF
antennas. My recollection of the antenna compliment is:
2/2 Cal-Av 2D-40A @140'/70' (the only stack where I know the heights)
3-stack of OB16-3 Optibeam tribanders
11/11/11/11 6m beams
If I'm not mistaken, that comes to 9 booms and 96 elements.
All of the 6m beams eventually failed in the harsh New England weather. I
think the matching sections broke. The Cal-Av and Optibeam antennas held up
well -- they're built like tanks.
Scott, W4PA, won USA in the 2003 CQ WW CW SOAB HP from NT1Y, and the 2/2
Cal-Av stack on Bertha was key to his victory (1514 QSOs, 31 zones and 99
countries on 40m, compared with 1173 Qs, 32 zones and 93 countries for the
nearest competitor.) The Cal-Av beams are one of the great under-the-radar
products in ham radio (available only by special order, these days.) One of
the Cal-Av 40m beams is on my tower at 110', and the other is atop the 300'
tower at KC1XX, fixed on JA. I'm sure happy with mine, which runs rings
around the 40-2CD it replaced.
The station also featured a Rohn 55 RTS (167', I think), with a 3-stack of
M2 10-30LP8 LPDAs and a 2-el Optibeam on 40m (I think the 40m beam was there
-- that was the original plan). The RTS was topped with a Force-12 2-el 80m
yagi, which was an absolute killer on the band. I was there when that
monster antenna was trammed to the top and worked one of the tag lines. An
awesome sight. Unfortunately, the mechanical design wasn't what it needed to
be for this part of the country and the elements failed in an ice storm a
few months after the antenna was raised.
Additional towers included 90 feet of Rohn 45 with a 3-stack of 4-el
SteppIRs at 90'/60'/30' and an 85-foot US Tower crankup with an OB16-3. Bill
put up the first-ever 3-stack of 4-el SteppIRs. My main tower's compliment
of three 4-el SteppIRs at 96'/64'/34' topped with one of Bill's old Cal-Av
2D-40As was clearly inspired by the NT1Y station.
There was also a full-size 160m 4-square made of Rohn 25 towers with a
ground screen and elevated radials, and a full-size Array Solutions 80m
4-square with ground screen and elevated radials.
The antennas were fed with many runs of 7/8" hardline and one long run of
1-5/8" hardline, buried in conduit (imagine pulling several hundred feet of
that stuff!) 1/2" flexible hardline was used for the stack phasing lines.
The large termination panels at the towers and shack were built to
professional standards.
Visiting Bill's QTH in VT, which was about 45 minutes up the road from my
much more modest NH antenna farm, was always a treat. I was very sorry to
see Bill move away. In addition to being a heck of a nice guy and very
knowledgeable about everything ham radio, we don't have a lot of serious
contesters in the North Country of New England who are willing to go all-out
on the hardware. Sure wish I'd had the discretionary funds to buy his place!
73, Dick WC1M
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Scott Neader KA9FOX [mailto:scott@ka9fox.qth.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, April 07, 2009 10:31 AM
> To: towertalk@contesting.com
> Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] alternate location for NT1Y Big Bertha pictures
>
> OK, I have placed most of the pictures here:
>
> http://www.qth.com/gallery/v/nt1y/
>
> Hopefully this helps out those that cannot see the pics on
> Flikr. Bill, these pictures are very impressive, thanks for sharing.
>
> 73 - Scott KA9FOX
>
> P.S. Jack KZ4USA -- very inappropriate of you to post my private
> e-mail to you, to the whole list. Please consider not doing that in
> the future.
>
>
>
> At 08:44 AM 4/7/2009, you wrote:
> >Don't get your feathers roughed up.
> >
> >No Scott Im offering a FREE place to put the pictures.
> >
> >If you can offer the same place to put the pictures go ahead Scott.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >By not providing a direct link to the pictures, you are causing even
> >more confusion on this already confusing thread, and risking people
> >thinking you are just plugging your ham radio classified site.
> >
> >- Scott
> >
> >At 12:42 AM 4/7/2009, you wrote:
> > >Just put the pictures on my page and everyone can see them and they
> > >don't have to sign in.
> > >http://hamradioclassifieds.com/gallery/index.php
> >
> >_______________________________________________
> >
> >
> >
> >_______________________________________________
> >TowerTalk mailing list
> >TowerTalk@contesting.com
> >http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/towertalk
>
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________
TowerTalk mailing list
TowerTalk@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/towertalk
|