At 08:35 AM 9/25/03 -0700, you wrote:
After reading the testimonial from N0WY on his aluminum Universal Towers
15-50, I was intrigued at reading some of the spec sheets on this series of
towers. (See http://www.texastowers.com/b30.htm, for example.) I wonder,
however, if anybody here has had experience with aluminum towers in a
tropical, seaside setting? How well does unanodized aluminum stand up to
persistent salt spray in a high-humidity, warm-temperature setting? I can
tell you from experience that Rohn 45G does NOT do well in that setting! I
have a 45G tower that is about 4 years old now and doesn't look like it's
going to last longer than another 4 years unless I start taking aggressive
action to protect it. I know W2GD paints his tower at least once a year on
P4, and I've heard Jacky paints his twice a year. Plus, the story has made
the rounds that Jacky has been trying to devise an automatic sprinkler
system to wash the salt spray off his tower. Would an aluminum tower avoid
all that grief, or would it be even worse than galvanized steel?
I wonder how your galvanized steel tower would hold up if you painted it
with one of those products from <http://www.stoprust.net/>,
<www.por-15.com> or <www.zerorust.com>. The latter talks about their
product surviving 2000+ hours in a salt-spray test cabinet, in a standard
ASTM test. They appear to vary considerably in the amount of surface prep
required.
73, Pete N4ZR
The World HF Contest Station Database was updated August 30.
129 stations were added or updated.
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