Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2011 17:23:35 +0000 (UTC)
From: w8zn@comcast.net
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] guys vs falling limbs
I live on a small mountain outside D.C. and it is HEAVILY wooded. Just this
spring I came home to find my 70ft tower laying across my roof. A 90 ft tree
that seemed to be in perfect condition fell and took out my guys. I am now
putting up a new tower and have adopted the "scorched earth" philosiphy. If it
looks like it could even come close to my guys or tower, it's chain saw time.
It takes too much time and money to have a tower and have it taken out by
trees/limbs. If you even have to think about the choice between tower or tree,
I suggest you find a different hobby or put up wire antennas. BTW, in 2003 I
lost another tower by THREE trees falling on guys as a result of hurricane
Isabel that came up the coast. Where's Paul Bunyon when you need him!!
Terry Price - W8ZN ex K8ISK
## A friend had a 160' rohn 45 tower, guyed with 3/8" polygon rod at 4 x
levels. The bottom 20' was just 1/4" EHS. In a 45-50 mph wind one night,
a 110' tree came down.... and the top 30' of the tree nailed the bottom 30' of
the polygon rod !
That tree was a LONG way away from the base of tower too. The tree hit the
polygon rod...then slid down, forming a "U" as it slid down. Ok, once it
got to the junction of the 1/4" EHS, the EHS won, and the polygon rod lost.
Tree sliced through the top 2 x sets of polygon rods. Then the SINGLE bolt
that hold the back end of the equalizer plate, snapped off. Then you have NO
guys at all, and the tower came
crashing down, fully loaded with yagi's, 4 x tic rings, etc. A real
mess...at 2AM. I saw pix of the bottom end of the 2 x polygon rods [ top 2 x
guys]. It was in a thousand super fine strands, for the last few inchs !
Before the new tower went up,I strongly suggested he figure out what other
trees could hit any of the 12 x guys. Either cut em down full length or top
em, or a bit of both. The kicker was, the root system under the fallen tree
was no where near as big as one would think. Bottom line is, you can have a
tree that's say 260' away from the base of the tower..and easily bring the
tower down. Top 20-40' of a tree hitting the bottom 10-30' of any guy wire is
bad news. That 3/8 solid fiberglass guy rod has a heck of a lot less shear
strength to it VS
1/4" EHS. If that had been 3/8" EHS, with eggs in em, it may well have
been a whole different outcome. The solid 3/8" polygon rod has loads of
tensile strength, but way less shear strength. I suspect that phillystran
is no better for shear either.
later... Jim VE7RF
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________
TowerTalk mailing list
TowerTalk@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/towertalk
|