My 'next-door' neighbor

[W7TFO]

Actually, Roy lived across the road and West a bit.

He has a rather neat blog about his antenna farm.  Roy was a communication tech in the USAF, and Sterba curtains were his thing.  He is 85 now.

He has since pulled down the towers and moved away to Bisbee, AZ.

The pix give you a pretty good idea of our landscape out here.

http://w7yrv.blogspot.com/

73DG

[KA0HCP]

Great story.  Interesting to see a big setup.

[KL7OF]

"Takes more than a normal amount of perseverance"... The bases of the towers and the bends and welds of the towers are interesting to me in that they are not what most engineers would call proper construction......But this guy obviously knew what he was doing....This stuff stayed in the air for many years...The only thing that is scary about this whole deal is the gain on that Sterba curtain...What a powerhouse antenna!

[W7TFO]

During it's last iteration Roy ran an unknown ricebox into a HB 4-1000 linear.

He also used heavy fence wire for guys.

73DG

[Steve - K4HX]

Home brew towers! Impressive. The 9 dB gain claim seems high.

[K1JJ]

Roy certainly is a man's man "Do-It-Your-Selfer" if I ever saw one.  Improviser to the core.  

Raising a skinny, non-tapered 197' tower on a hinge with all sets of guy wires in unison is no easy feat!

There's a lot of dangerous practices and questionable materials there, but this guy knew what he was doing. His practical on-the-job-knowledge, experience and instinct alone probably saved him from disaster.

His Sterbas, as he has them set up, are bi-directional antennas. (no reflectors)   On 40M that 150' height would have been a great performer.   However, on 75M at 197', it is a little low and should be more like 250' to take full advantage of a stack on 75M. Still, a killer antenna system.  

Sorry to hear that all his towers and antennas are down.  His adventures sure are cool. We are witnessing the end of a unique era of real hams like him.... [sigh]

T

[W1RKW]

All I can say is WOW!  Homebrewed 200 foot towers and raises/lowers them all in one piece by hand using basic materials. Amateur physics and mechanical engineering at its best. Then climbs the beasts too.

I like using the VW as ground anchor insurance.

Incredible.

Tom, imagine trying to pull that off here in CT even with 100 acres without some local government official or NIMBY raising a stink.

[K1JJ]

Tom, imagine trying to pull that off here in CT even with 100 acres without some local government official or NIMBY raising a stink.

Hola Bob,

Tell me about it.

As you may know, here in CT it is state law that any tower 60' or higher has to be approved by not one, but TWO civil engineering firms.  The collapse of the Ambience Plaza killing a dozen construction workers years ago made it so.

I had to submit my tower drawings to a firm in Chicago, get it approved, ($$)  and then a local engineer had to review it, inspect the site and give it his stamp too. (more $$) And that was 15 years ago. Not to mention the local zoning board requiring a presentation for a variance.  Just imagine how hard it is now with the  cellular tower green paranoid f**ks out there these days.

T

[KL7OF]

Tom....Your perseverance is amazing..You have erected an antenna farm in spite of the red tape that seems way more difficult than the engineering and construction ...I like living out west,........

[W7TFO]

When Roy was in his antenna heyday, building Sterbas from the Arctic to the tropics for VOA and the USAF, he had an almost unlimited source of brainpower and funding at his disposal.

After retiring, the funding was limited, but the knowledge base was still intact.

I saw him working DX several nights, and his bargain-built system really did punch a hole in both QRM & N.

He may not have been on Walt W2DU's level, but close to it when this type of engineering was needed.

If he said it was 9dB gain, it was derived from measurements, not abstracts.

Currently he runs several beams and a 4-square.
 
We met when he came over one day to get acquainted.

The proximity of our homes was happenstance, as my criteria was someplace where I could dance nekkid around a bonfire shooting a .45 and nobody would even know, let alone care.

73DG

[W1RKW]

 Just imagine how hard it is now with the  cellular tower green paranoid f**ks out there these days.

T

I would imagine all those with their smart phones who live in a fringe area wouldn't give a crap so long as they could get on facebook or download porn and get their other useless internet garbage. ;-)  But all it would take is one tree hugger to squash it.  

There's a solar farm going in down in Lyme. Local government pretty much approved it but one or two are fighting it complaining of water run off or lack of and construction noise.  Good thing a wind mill isn't going in.  

I have a brook that runs along the back corner of my lot. It's undermining a bank and I asked the town if I could put a barrier on top of the bank to keep people (curious kids) from walking on it for fear of collapse and getting hurt. Town said no but to put up signs. Let nature take its course. I put up a sign but the kids like to look for frogs and fish and there's no stopping them. Got the town suggestion in writing.  I told the town if anyone gets hurt the town will be responsible. Got that in writing too. They frowned upon dropping in a big rock or two to dampen the flow against the ox-bow. I dumped a couple of the rocks in anyway.

A lot of the regs are laughable.

[K6IC]

Dennis!

First,  that is great looking terrain for the QTH that you are building.   A bit different than I had imagined.

Worked Roy twice on 75 M.  Quite the memorable guy.  This was probably about 2004 or 2005.  May have logged the Qs because he was SO memorable ...  will have to look,  but it is all on paper.

Recall being amazed that he would weld up these towers from scrap that he said that he got at the scrap yard.  Was also amazed that he welded them as a single unit,  and used a Gin Pole as he called it to raise them.   He mentioned that he would use a 30 foot (or so,  I forget the exact height) GP to raise a  60 foot pole and that to raise a 110 foot pole,  and that was used to raise the almost 200 ft tower.  These "Gin Poles" may have really been Derricks ...

He mentioned using his VW Rabbit PU to do some of the raising ... Perhaps it was just the poles.

Somehow,  thought he mentioned that his wife was a helper ...  has been a long time.

Felt that it was a real treat to meet a guy who was so matter-of-fact about just going out and doing this amazing (to me) feat.  No big deal,  just go do it.

Thank you for posting that link to all the pics and info.  Will always remember those QSOs.   Vic