Say Frank,
That's an interesting approach, and it sounds like an economical answer
to your quandry.
The only thing I can add is that, here at my place, we summarily drop
and tilt the hdx572mdpl to work on antennas whenever we like. We have
developed a method over the years of building the antennas and mounting
them FROM THE GROUND, so it is rare that we have to climb it.
I currently have installed a KLM 40M4 (40-el 40m) with 42 foot beam and
a KLM KT34-XA 16 feet above that. All installed from the safety of the
ground. On the few occasions that we've had to do some tuning or
maintenance, we simply lowered the whole thing, tilted her over, and
removed sections until we could get to the most likely source of the
problem. It's easy.
I remember during one contest when a coax line somehow turned into a
water hose during a heavy rainstorm. There was water all over the shack.
We took a break, ran out to get a new coax line from a local shop,
dropped and tilted the tower and easily replaced the line. Took 2 hours,
but we were done (and wet). You can't do that if you need to rely on
professional climbers. It was messy, but we did it, and were able to get
back into the contest without missing too many beats.
The only time we climbed to make an install was when we added the KLM
KT34-A (the little one) to the side of the tower, fixed to Europe. It
was an afterthought installation, but it could have been done while
standing on the ground too, obviously. I happened to have at the time a
good team of willing climbers, so we did it this way.
In sum, don't let the climbing issue dissuade you from the crank-up.
There may be other valid reasons to dismiss it, but not because you'll
have to climb it - because you really don't have to.
73 de Jeff K2KV
k2kv@netusa.net
------------------------------------
Frank T. Brady wrote:
>
> Friends,
>
> Just thought I'd share my latest thoughts about how I can afford a tower AND
> have enough money left to put antenna(s) on it.
>
> I'm very close to buying a Tryon Titan T400 or T500 series self supporting
> rigid tower. The prices are from (US) $1000 for the T400 56ft to $1700 for
> the T500 72ft. The T500 is more than husky enough to put a 20ft
> Chrome-molly mast with 12 feet above the top of the tower and stack two
> husky antennas.
>
> The T400 and T500 series have max wind load values @ 70mph of 34 and 45 sq
> ft respectively. Selecting the T500 more than compensates for the reduction
> in these maximums due to stacking above the tower top.
>
> The only disadvantage here is that I have to climb the tower to install the
> antenna(s) - but I would have to do that anyway with a crank-up ( it's just
> a matter of how high).
>
> I think I'm on to something here - the savings in tower costs (while
> increasing the wind load maximums) is about $5000 dollars over the HDX572 !!!
> With savings of this magnitude I can afford to have a professional climb the
> danged tower and install the antennas!
>
> If anyone sees any glaring errors - I'm all ears as usual.
>
> 73,
> Frank - W0ECS
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