Another fun-filled, exciting week….up to Little Hocking Ohio, mostly driven by the long range forecast, which was predicted to be good weather, hoping to get N4REC’s installation finished. Alas, the weather did not follow the forecast. We got there amidst heavy rain, & the forecast only called for clear skies (locally) by the end of the week, Friday, the day we’d already scheduled the crane. The DitchWitch got stuck up to the axle in about 20 seconds, so trenching the coax cables & control lines went by the wayside. The antennas were all finished & ready to go by Thursday, however, so we used that day to drive to Cleveland to retrieve some K0XG hardware, destined for WK3W’s new station. Naturally, it was snowing heavily by the time we reached Akron, & the snow continued as we pushed Northward. Luckily, the hardware was loaded okay & we were back on the road in less than an hour, leaving the snowy conditions behind. Friday dawned clear & cold, & the crane arrived early. I’d purposely had them do a site survey because of the extreme slope to Peter’s driveway, which we knew would require considerable cribbing to level the crane. Alas, somewhere along the way, this information was lost, & the crane arrived with no blocking beyond the standard plates for under the out-riggers. So….Peter & the operator went back to the yard to retrieve some. The tower (a little Rohn SSV) went up in two picks (60 feet & then the top 20 foot section), very easy lift. The homebrew base plate worked perfectly, & the top section went on with no issues whatsoever. Ditto the VHF/UHF log periodic & then a F-12 Magnum 140 (40M dipole). Then the problems began to show up. The Tennadyne T-12 log periodic (HF antenna) simply would NOT balance. I had the slings rigged out over 4 feet away from the boom-to-mast plate. Serious unbalance. The antenna had LOOKED weird setting there on saw horses, but I assumed the offset was to counter-balance the much larger & heavier rear elements, but clearly, something wasn’t right. We persevered & got the damn thing up & on the tower. Ultimately, we simply man-handled the thing into position. Then we were faced with getting the crane (headache ball & boom) down through the forest of aluminum, all of which took far longer than anticipated. Maneuvering the crane was hampered by the operator’s unwillingness to add the jib arm because of the extensive cribbing under the crane itself, of course. Anyhow, we prevailed, but the daylight was fading, so another trip will be required to do the old “digging in the dirt” work & laying all of the cables.
Subsequent investigation & examination of KI4TZ’s T-12 proves the boom-to-mast clamp IS incorrectly mounted, using Tennadyne’s pre-drilled boom. So…we shall see what they are willing to offer in the way of helpful solutions. Dynamic balance is always a good idea–it lessens the load placed on the rotator, but obviously it means more expense to the client, considering the beam will have to come to the ground. We’ll try doing that the old fashioned way (tramming), so Peter isn’t saddled with another crane bill.
Home at 2AM…what a helluva way to make a living, as W2GD & I like to say~!
stay tuned…
