The AM Forum

The wife and I are planning our escape from Long island, N.Y. to the greener pastures of Maine.
She wants a move in ready house and I want land to engage in nefarious radio activities.
I have a fantasy to erect one or two self supporting towers of at least 100 feet in height.
My question is, aluminum or steel? Is one better than the other considering that the climate in Maine
can be icy and windy in winter? The tower(s) will be used to support a beam and the associated
effluvia and also wire antennas. Perhaps I'll shunt feed the tower itself.
What say you?

Better be prepared to drag out the check book, a Rohn SSV 100 foot self-supporting is going to be pricey, just a regular Rohn 65G 100ft guyed tower will set you back around 17 to 18K not including installation. Most Hams just do a 25G or 45G sections and beyond forty or fifty feet guy them. I have a forty-foot 45G non guyed and that works for me.
Don’t think any serious towers are built of aluminum, that’s just for lighting trusses and things like that.
Certain others know more and are more experienced on the subject.
 

RolandSWL said:I think if there was any one person on this board who could answer your question it would be Tom, K1JJ. He lives up in CT and has quite the antenna farm!

 Actually, there are some serious aluminum towers available:
https://www.alumatower.com/products/towers/amateur-radio-operators/
  I can't personally vouch for them, since I haven't used one, but I've communicated with the company, gotten a quote, and been quite impressed.
  Not only have towers gotten obscenely expensive in the last twenty years or so—check out the U.S Towers prices—but where you'll really pay through the nose is in shipping costs, depending on where you live. My shipping quote from Alumatower was roughly $1000, which included $450 for the wooden shipping crate—a lot of money for something that will probably become firewood once its job is done. Considering that a steel tower would be vastly heavier, the shipping costs would necessarily be higher still.
 

I live in Maine.  I'm inland about 40 miles from the coast and we get ice, snow and wind.  I've had a Universal Aluminum 70 footer, 18 inch face, up for over 40 years.  Being a belt and suspenders sort of fellow, even though it's listed as self supporting, I bracket it at 20 and guy with Phillystran at 50 feet. The top 20 feet is self supported and I've had various yagis and various other things up there without incident.
I spent a lot of time as a field service engineer for TCI, all over the world.  We supplied, among other things, a 4 to 30 mhz rotary log periodic antenna, all aluminum on an aluminum tower. 100 foot boom and it was nearly 100 feet up, with a big hydraulic rotor in the head.  I once put one on 75M from Puerto Rico at 50 watts.  SWR was still OK and it was a real boomer.  These were in all environments, Puerto Rico, Azores, Japan, Romania and a bunch of other nifty spots .  Aluminum is fine for towers.
Check your local zoning office...generally the "code enforcement guy" in most Maine towns and ask to see any tower ordinances.  Aside from some subdivisions in suburbia, things are pretty reasonable up here.  Frost can go down as far as 5 feet when we have a real winter so don't scrimp on foundations and guy anchors..  And don't be too proud about being from New York.  We don;t have many prejudices in Maine, but that can be one of them.
73 de Norm W1ITT

Thanks for the information. I have seen used Rohn towers go for stupid money down here. Norm, Maine has been our happy vacation place for years. The first thing we'll do is stop at the D.M.V. to get rid of our N.Y. license plates. We are casting a wide net as to where we'll ultimately live. The wife was quite taken by Skowhegan.
Roland....

Here is a company in Canada that makes self supporting towers.  I believe the tallest is 68 ft. but you can look if you please.  They are made like the Rohn DBX series and is very sturdy.  The last time I looked the prices weren't as bad as Rohn.


https://wadeantenna.com/product-category/towers/

Timmy land...WA1HLR

Funny story. While in Skowvegas I asked several random people if they knew a Tim Smith. Cue the crickets. To a person they said 'you mean TIMTRON' !

In the early 80's I was manager of the ham department in a large electronics store in San Jose, CA. Long gone now. We were a Rohn dealer and carried 25 and 45 series sections.  At that time a 10 foot section of 25G was $ 65 and we would loan you the gin pole.  I had any number of customers who would come in and complain that Texas Towers sold 25G sections for some $ 20 cheaper and there was no sales tax. I would try to explain that the shipping would kill all of that, but they would have none of it.  They were sure there was free shipping and would not be talked out of the idea.

California has pretty mild weather other than right on the ocean so towers last a long time.  You can usually get a free 50-75 foot one out here but the devil is in the details.  I have a friend in Long Beach who just had his 65 foot Rohn 45G taken down two days ago as he is moving out of state, and it is headed to the scrap yard.  He just doesn't want to deal with it.  The crazy situations are where there will be an ad on Craigslist where it says "Free tower, grandpa died and his house is sold and we need it out of here. You take down and haul away."  I cringe when I see this. The liability issues are massive.

The age of nice towers in residential areas is coming to an end in most of the country.  Neighbors, HOA's and city codes are all against it.  Not that it would affect you in the country, but the law of supply and demand means towers will get more expensive and harder to source.

Smart dealers won't sell caged crank-up towers. Too risky, some fool will try to climb one.  But those usually are 50 feet or less and don't fit your plans anyway. 

None of this really answers your questions but the topic jogged my memory.

Not at all Geoff. It is food for thought. Free usually means the lower lumbar pays the check.

Quement?

--Shane
WP2ASS / ex KD6VXI

Yes indeed

South Bascom Avenue, San Jose
Been there in 1984, even got the T-shirt

Good, knowledgeable people, fair prices, unadvertised bargains.  The internet vendors can't compare with old-school brick and mortar suppliers like this, and many others of the day.

What bands are you mostly active on?  What is the surrounding terrain elevation like?

I ask because tower height is most important for line-of-sight frequencies and for low-frequency verticals.

You don't need much height to support an HF beam as it's not hard to "see" the ionosphere even from a 50' tower in a valley. Being 100' closer to the sky isn't going to do much for signals travelling hundreds or thousands of miles.

Alternatively, if you're into VHF and UHF and located in a valley, all the tower you can afford will be worth it.

LOL!

Went to high school 'over the hill' in Santa Cruz...  Damn valleys!

Spent a ton of lawn mowing and other money at Quement.  Was a great place.

--Shane
WP2ASS / ex KD6VXI back in W6 for 2 weeks.

Having visited a couple of retired hams during this spring it finally dawned on me.  Towers are great, until you can't climb them or find someone who will.  Both hams had tower problems so one leaves his 70' telescoping tower nested down at 30' and accepts the dead rotor pointed towards the far east.  The other ham has a 100' guyed tower that's now shaped like a violin bow and the beams are useless U-shaped wreckage from an ice storm 10 years or so ago (New Hampshire).  They are both done with working on their antennas and that limits their radio play- a lot. Just something to think about.
Our building inspector had one requirement - need to be able to lower the tower for a hurricane.  I was lucky to get a 50' tubular telescoping tower that shrinks to about 20' and it's rigged with a support that allows it to lower horizontally.  No climbing, ever and the whole shebang has been down for a number of storms including Sandy (which still twisted things a bit).  Just something more to think about. 

I live in Midcoast Maine, about 8 miles inland from the cost.
Because I was retired and did not want to face climbing in 10 year from now I waited for a crank up. One came up on Craig's list, a US Towers 55 ft. The guy I bought it from said he had owned it for 8 years and never installed it. He had all the paperwork from the 1st owner which indicated it was built/sold in 1980.
I called UST and worked with a great guy there. I ordered all new cables, hardware, and bushings. He was very helpful and asked for pictures. He assessed that in its life the tower had never been installed or used. The lack of any scratches in certain areas led him to that conclusion.

Anyway, I ordered the extra parts so I can lower it down to about 12 ft high vertically and then to the elements horizontally. Makes life easy and no worries for the future, The building official was very helpful. His only requirement was it be set such that if it ever come down it would not land on the adjacent homeowner's property.

   Unfortunately, my experience with my crank-up tower's manufacturer didn't go so well. The nameplate is long weathered away and illegible, but as I remember, it was made by Teletower. After buying it used in the mid 80's—being able to read the nameplate back in those days—I called the manufacturer, seeking replacements for several of the pulleys, which were badly worn. When I gave the guy the model and serial number, he immediately told me that since the tower was over ten years old, they wouldn't support it in any way, neither with replacement parts, documentation, nor advice. He did say, though, that since I was a current owner of one of their products, he'd give me a great deal on a brand-new tower.
   What a wonderful inducement to buy their products—we don't support our products, but please buy a new one!

On the question of aluminum v steel, I have owned both. I prefer aluminum. 10 years ago I bought a used AlumaTower from an estate auction of a SK in Cocoa, FL. Paid 12 Franklins for it. It is a 40 ft crank-up, tilt over which eliminates the need for tower climbing. It had spent its life near salt water in FL, but didn’t have any serious corrosion. A few hours with a few tubes of Flitz and a few bags of 000 steel wool and it shined like new. Still does. Two years ago I was able to find exact replacement pulleys from an online marine supply store and have replaced the stainless steel wire ropes every couple of years from McMaster-Carr. I put a Harbor Freight 12 v electric winch on it for the crank up and down and a Northern Tool heavy duty braking manual winch for tilt over. It has been a great tower. Never have had a problem with it. For the first 7 years I owned it, it was within a half mile of salt water and had no problems with 60 mph tropical storms. Now it’s residing in TN. The only downside is that the outer section has PVC rollers to facilitate raising and lowering the inner section, so they are not electrically connected for shunt feeding, but hanging a wire off the side would solve that. Bottom line: don’t dismiss aluminum towers. Mine is built very strong, is over 25 years old, looks and works as it did new, and I would buy another in a heartbeat.

I put a Harbor Freight 12v winch on my tower, also; perhaps the same model. It's worked well for years now, but it howls like a banshee—especially since the tower is mounted to the side of the house—and wakes my wife if I raise or lower it while she's in bed.

Harbor Freight sells a 120 volt winch which works very well.

  This one, maybe? https://www.harborfreight.com/1500-lb-capacity-120v-ac-electric-winch-61672.html
I will have to take a ride down to my local Harbor Freight and take a look. There's a very good chance that the AC motor will be a great deal quieter. My 12v winch has two advantages: since it's an ATV/off road winch, it's weatherproof, and it has a wireless remote, which is nice because it reduces the need for control wiring into the shack. There's still wiring, though: I've got magnetic reed switches on the tower, to indicate height, and a box on the wall of my shack with LED's and a beeper. A few more wires won't hurt.
  I took a look at the manual for the AC powered one, and it does say "use indoors only," but that's largely an electrical safety concern rather than indicating anything about the unit's water-tightness.
  Thanks, I will check this out.
 

I have had one on my tower, exposed to weather, for 10 years and it is fine.  The planetary gears will hold the tower anywhere I stop it.

  Fine business—thanks for telling me about that. I don't know if you have, or have had, a 12vdc winch to compare it to, but is it quiet?
  If it's quieter than my current winch, I will likely wind up raising the tower more often than I do now; I typically raise it only for our local Wednesday evening 6 meter AM net.
  Our nearest Harbor Freight, about a half-hour away, shows that it's in stock; I might just take a ride down there tomorrow.

I saw another post where you worked d at HP.

Did you know an Elmer Hawkins?   He was in PALO ALTO, I believe.

--Shane
WP2ASS / ex KD6VXI

W5JO said:It might be interesting to have a winch like that for moving some of my 'boat anchors' around. I still work out with weights and benches. But it is getting more and more difficult to move some of the stuff I used be able to move with ease!

No, Shane, I never met Elmer Hawkins.  While I spent some time at HQ and HP Labs on Hanover St in Palo Alto, most of my bay area time was spent at the Computer Systems Division in Cupertino.  That site has since been razed, and built up by an unmentionable firm.   In all my time in California, the only ham I met was Bill Orr, W6SAI.  We spent quite a bit of time discussing RF amplifier technology, and high fidelity vacuum tube amplifiers.  

I did find pleasure in operating from the top of Twin Peaks, with my Icom 2AT and Pac-Comm TNC, digipeating up and down the coast.  I was actually able to download files from an amateur AX-25 BBS system in San Diego, but I don't recall how many hops were required in the digipeater link.  That was all back in the early 80s. Digital hamming today I find quite mundane, compared to AM voice.  

My last six years were spent in Colorado Springs at the Agilent Technologies (HP Spinoff) instrument site, until retirement in 2006.  Hard to believe that was 18 years ago.  Time flies when I discovered retirement was the best job I ever had!

  Yes, absolutely. At sixty-eight, I still do heavy workouts several times a week; still do thirty mile bike rides, but when it comes to lifting heavy equipment, it becomes not a question of can I do it, but rather, should I do it. I have no back or knee problems, and I want to keep it that way!
  I've considered employing one of those inexpensive winches to construct something similar to those "stair glide" things, but with a platform rather than a chair, to bring heavy stuff from my downstairs workshop up to my upstairs shack.

Anything to avoid lifting such heavy boat anchors is a wise and prudent attitude, whether or not you already have back problems.  It only takes one wrong twist, and you will pay dearly for a long time.

Instead of a winch, for lifting heavy objects, may I suggest a hoist instead?  They cost somewhat more, but they are designed for heavy lifting, and will not unspool like a winch might, releasing the load with disastrous or injurious results.  Harbor Freight normally carries both.

I am lucky that my home sits on the side of a hill, so there is only one step up to enter the living level at the west end, but on the east side a full-size garage door admits unlimited boat anchors into the basement workshop and shack.  Even so, I have recently let go of a pair of R390s, a 32V2, SX-28, and I am considering release of the Valiant as well.  I get a backache just thinking about moving them.  Most of my heavy metal is in full-size rack cabinets on casters, and plate or mod iron sits in the bottom.  It is very easy to move those transformers with a heavy-duty hand truck with small, hard-rubber tires.  I never try to lift those hunks of iron and copper, but with the proper tools they can be jockeyed into place with no lifting at all, just leverage.  Some of the transformers weigh between 150 and 240 pounds each!

[/quote]

I have never used one of the 12-volt winches, so can't compare.  I have a Wade 68 ft. tower that is hinged at the base.  The winch handles is quite easily and, I would say, is not all that noisy.

  Okay, I just got back from my local (well, not much is really "local" to me) Harbor Freight, where I bought the AC winch.
https://www.harborfreight.com/1500-lb-capacity-120v-ac-electric-winch-61672.html
  I won't be doing the project immediately, but the tower is due for a lay-down before the weather gets unpleasant; new coax runs, antenna cleanup, probably a new rotor, and maybe new pulleys and cable for the tower, so the new winch will be part of the project. I'll report back on how it works.

  Walk-in ground-level-entry basements are great. I've put a 1200 pound milling machine in my shop—single handed—as well as a lathe. The only problem I've got is that it's just a standard size door, not a garage door. I've had opportunities to pick up a Gates transmitter, but it won't fit through that door.

I win't derail this topic on someone else's tower, but some of the comments about towers make me want to comment.

My 50' tower was all fine and dandy until a storm broke the ladder line off the dipole spacer. However, this may be able to be fixed without a climb. It was before. The ham club originally sold me the sections and put it up, maybe 10 years ago.

What can't be done without a climb is to add a discone and a VHF/UHF ham antenna. - which has been put off way too long.
It would also be great to have a TV/FM antenna or a small 6 meter beam and rotor up there to top it off, but mounting it all and doing it the right way - maybe it is too much to ask of the tower too have something that large up there, or just too big a job.

I believe it's a Rohn 25 (or a slightly smaller Rohn? -because a HAM-IV rotor just barely wont fit between the legs to be placed inside, but this thing is way overkill for a TV antenna tower)  It's built with foundation for self supporting but also has guys similar to the Rohn instructions for a guyed tower -just some extra safety insurance mainly to keep it in my yard not the neighbors if it ever fails.

Well I've got too old and decrepit to climb on it, and the folks in the ham radio club, none of them do it as far as I know. It was the older gentlemen and they have passed away. They'd always do it for club donations, LOL stuff isn't free but I assumed it was somewhat less than calling a company.

The only option I may have any more is to call a professional/trade and let them have a look at it, because I have no idea what it will cost.

I have one tip to offer on digging the foundation hole. It's always hard to get all the loose dirt out of the bottom of the hole, but a large shop-vac will do it quick.

Pat

Get a man lift.

They make some that tow behind your truck

Easy peasy!

--Shane
WP2ASS / ex KD6VXI

KD6VXI said:Yeah, they have some that painters use. Pretty light duty but some of the better ones have outriggers for stability! The only problem is they usually only go to about 30' max. You may have to go with a Genie or Hi-Reach that will get you there. We used to have a 60' Genie with an articulating boom. That would be the ticket for you!