The tower was located in Lake City, Fl. In a camp ground RV park. It was in the back yard of the owners
house. Since most everyone now has Sat TV the tower and TV antennas were no longer used. The owners wife wanted
the lightening rod as she referred to it as out of the yard for safety and other reasons.
They had several hams and others who wanted to take the tower down but none ever did. When I
told my friend and klub member Don KE4HDG from Bell Tronics in Bell, FL. about it he said lets go and take a look at
it. After meeting with the owner Dave and doing some negotiations and paper work signing we were set to take it down
the following week.
Don agreed to do the climbing and tower work while I would supply all of the
tools and equipment needed plus I would be the ground crew for him while he was on the tower. This was a 110 foot Rohn 25G
tower guyed with 3 sets of guys.
The first day was the hardest and slowest. All of
the TV Antennas wires coax W/pre amps , rotor with mast pipe all had to be removed and striped from the tower before we could
start taking it down a section at a time. There was also some other Misc. WIFI antennas and a yard light that had to
come down first. The first day was about 6 hrs. long that included stripping the tower and taking down the first set
of guy wires and the first 3 sections of tower. This first 6 hrs did not include the aprox 1 hour lunch break we took
in between. This was all on a Tuesday and the next day Don was really soar from using muscles that are seldom used.
It rained most all that day and he needed the rest anyway. We went back on Thursday and put in about another 6 1/2 to
7 hrs with 2 rain showers in-be-tween to finish the job.
73 , K8RAG >>>
|