Tower Rebuild Update #3

[TomW]

Folks;

Well, I spent a lot of time since March dismantling the tower, straightening the steel, wire brushing, priming and painting the parts.

Here are some pictures of the pile of painted steel. Sorry, my camera is pretty cheap but there had been some requests for some pics.

The posts in the background will support the tower they are 6 feet deep in holes that are wider at the bottom than the top then 4 sacks of concrete mix in the bottom, the ties have bars driven through holes in the lower end to key to the concrete.

A little better perspective on the steel. Believe it or not this is pretty much the entire 45 foot tower in pieces. The only parts not shown are the crossbrace rods which are in another pile hidden in the brush somewhere I haven't exactly figured out how to prep them for paint just yet as well as a small pile of girts for top sections still on the sawhorses from painting. Those pieces of angle iron across the tops of the posts are parts from another partial tower i salvaged and are not attached or part of the current tower. They are there for leveling the top of those posts. The post are used railroad ties and i selected these from a huge pile for quality and they are all 7" by 9" oak and well saturated with creosote so should outlast me plus a few decades.

There are some pieces from the second tower I salvaged laying around the base just so you don't wonder if I missed painting them.

Enjoy!

Cheers.

TomW

[Jerry]

Hi Tom W.

Looks like our towers are going up at about the same time. I'm going to wait 2 weeks for the concrete to cure befor the tower gose up.

Good luck tom keep us posted.

                         JK TAS Jerry

[zubbly]

looks great tom!

since you did a fine job on the painting, can i hire you to paint mine  

have fun

zubbly

[TomW]

Here are some more pictures of the very first parts going up. Yeah even at hi resolution my camera only does these low res pictures. Not much detail but only 50 kilobytes or so very easy on a dialup user I hope.

First pair of legs sticking up in the air with 2 girts.







Some detail on the connection between the top of the railroad ties base to the steel.

Now it should go up pretty quick. But I work alone so things go slow and sometimes very slow.

Actually Buddy helps but he isn't good on ladders.

Cheers.

TomW

[Jerry]

Tom hows the tower going? Mine is half way there.

                     JK TAS Jerry

[TomW]

Well, jerry, I am about 25 feet in the air with over half the steel up. Ran into some snags installing brace rods but got it figured out.

Here are some up to date pictures. Ivan is causing some really unsettled weather so the lighting is poor and they are not the best pictures in the world.

A shot showing the way i did the brace rods which had all been cut before i got the tower. Each railroad tie leg has a length of #8 braided copper buried along its length with a coil on the bottom for lightning protection on each corner. They will be extended up to the apex and have sharp copper rods extended out to encourage lightning to follow them to ground and hopefully bypass the equipment.





















Ladders and some of the upper girts painted and ready to install.

[Jerry]

Hi Tom

Its lookin good. Be carfull up there. Your 5 feet ahead of me.

I've grounded the tower to the 1" water main that goes directly below the tower.

This pipe takes water to iragate a 1/3 acer lawn area. This makes for a bunch of pipe uderground.

We don't get much lightning here but just incase. I've used 4 ga. welding cable for grounding. Is that large enough? Its about 3ft long.

I've also installed a large electric panel box on the shop about 2 feet away from the tower.

This will be a junction, distrobution and rectifier center for up to 8 windgens.

Pics next week?

PS look like you could put a big one on yours. You know size maters?

           JK TAS Jerry

[TomW]

Folks;

Well, Made some progress on Monday.

Just thought I would toss in some more pics to document it. Takes me about an hour to assemble the 4 legs and 4 girts on each section. Thats about my limit on standing anyway so its a fair match.

This is our dog, Buddy. He is my only help and he is not much help at that.

Here is a view from the west at about 50 yards or so.

View to the East from the 35 foot level

I tried to add a couple more pictures that I uploaded but anything i add beyond these just do not display.

Maybe try another comment.

Cheers.

TomW

[TomW]

View to the North from the 35 foot level.

Arghhh, now I can only put one picture in and they all seem fine accessed directly. Must be a board problem.

Wasted half an hour trying I give up.

You can see all my files here:

http://www.fieldlines.com/user/TomW/files

Cheers.

TomW