On 1/8/2011 7:48 PM, Rick - NJ0IP / DJ0IP wrote:
Filling your tubing with foam is the biggest nonsense I've ever heard.
Oh... come now... not the biggest....? ! ?
SOMETHING else must take the cake... ;-)
Jim, it took me several years to figure out something that should be
obvious.
"If something is worth doing, it's worth doing right."
After watching a few flimsy antennas break and fall down I developed the
following strategy:
UNDERSTOOD ! My wife calls me "Mr Overkill" because
I tend to overbuild everything. Good tools are worth good
money. Good results usually come from good effort.
That big bag of snakes is often disguised as an ever-loving
blue-eyed bargain.
Actually it wasn't the beam, it was the Spiderbeam 60' vertical dipole. She
doesn't understand the difference.
I am the luckiest guy in town. My wife does a pretty good
job of listening to me rage about the hobby, and is supportive
of all my antenna projects. The only constraint she has
imposed is that I cannot put any holes in the roof. She
even helps me put the antennas up (provided I stay within
her approx 1 hour attention span... if it takes more than an
hour, she tends to wander off leaving me to finish on my own. )
It could be worse.
Not much you can do when an entire tree falls down and hits your pole!
Murphy is alive and well.
1) Some forces are bigger than we are.
2) Understood. Murphy lives with me when he is
not out bothering you other guys.
As I said in an earlier post, because it was telescoping fiberglass, it only
cost me about $30 to repair, and it was again straight as an arrow.
A fiberglass solution is now the leading contender.
I have two 30-foot fiberglass poles similar to the
Spiderbeam type poles you like supporting a
medium aperture Wellbrook active loop receiving
antenna and they hardly sway in the wind.
Now, I am thinking those Spiderbeam poles (using
only 17 +/- feet thereof) and thick gauge stranded
wire (either inside or attached outside the poles) for
the radiator. My local friend suggested a way to
terminate the radiator with a short stinger that can be
adjusted for tuning for resonance and low SWR, etc.
This notion seems more workable than his foam
dampening idea. (Parenthetically, I think he derives
a certain amount of vicarious pleasure in helping me
with my antenna projects... his XYL won't let him have
any outdoor antennas... so I think he has fun pitching
in to build mine... which is OK by me. )
The good news is I have the 40-6 meter OCF dipole and
10 meter aluminum dipole ready to deploy -- just waiting
for a really heavy snowfall or ice storm so I can install them
in sufficiently inclement weather to assure they work well.
;-)
Thanks loads for your input !
================= James -K8JHR ====================
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