BY N5GE

 

My rotor is acting up so I ordered a new one along with a digital control. The new rotor will sit on a platform inside the tower at about chest high.

Last week I started getting aluminum tubing ready to push up through the center of the tower. There are two, two inch OD ten foot tubes and one two inch OD 6061T6 ten foot with a .25 wall that will be pushed inside the tower, the bottom one will be clamped in the rotor and the other two will be clamped together with another 8 inch tube split on one side with u-bolts, making 30 feet of mast at that point.

We will then remove the antennae from the tower and send a two inch OD 6061T6 with .25 wall  14 foot down through the bearing race and the vacated by the old rotor and secured.

After all the antennae are re-set on the mast and tested for a couple of weeks of use, we will bring the antennae switch box down and mount it at the bottom of the tower.

After we re-rout all of the cables down to the bottom of the tower they will be run through a conduit and be covered with dirt.

That should keep us busy for a while.

Tom, N5GE, is a ham friend of mine I met through membership in Navy Mars. He’s one of those hams who always has something cooking - sometimes on all burners.  Right now it is a reconfiguration of all his antennas and how they will be controlled - with advancing operator age a away by a project like this and I thought you might enjoy what he is up to as well. Above are some notes on his intentions - the “we” in his narrative is a young fire-fighter who helps Tom out.

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