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[TowerTalk] Antenna & Tower Wind Load Ratings

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Subject: [TowerTalk] Antenna & Tower Wind Load Ratings
From: "Jim Thomson" <jim.thom@telus.net>
Date: Fri, 16 Jun 2017 07:53:24 -0700
List-post: <mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
The below url pdf explains the 222-G spec in detail. 
http://www.towernx.com/downloads/TIA-222-G_Explained.pdf


Vortex shedding is  well known.   Eles vibrate  up + down like crazy, like 6 
Inches in total,
in just a light breeze.  Ask anybody who own a 204BA or any wilson product.   
Those swedged eles are a pita..and so is 
having to put rope inside the eles..which is still in the current Hy-gain  
204-BA manual. 

Where the software falls down is when long eles bend at the tips.  In extreme 
winds, F12 el  tips will bend straight back, so
the ele looks like a U.  I call that...shedding wind.  If you side guy the 
elements, and or construct them so the horz deflection is far less,
then you also increase the load on the tower..and mast. 

Then there are other issues, like  Torque imbalance...which is my favorite pet 
peeve.  Easily rectified with  either a counter weight,
or a Torque compensation plate.   Why antenna manufacturers  dont incorporate  
TQ balancing  techniques is beyond me. 
Perfectly Torque balanced... and you dont need huge amounts of torque in the 
rotor.  Almost like dragging a parachute behind your
car, then having to up the engine HP  to compensate. 

Some other issues are how ele sections are joined, and how various boom 
sections are spliced or joined.   I fabricate my own
boom to mast plates  similar to the F12  easy on double plate concept, but use 
.375 thick plates, and DXE  hardware.  Then its dead
simple to install the yagi... plus it wont slip on any mast, not with the use 
of those DXE heavy duty mast clamps.  Muffler clamps with
the sheet metal saddles have been fubar since day 1...good riddance.   Other 
yagi issues include overhead truss lines
on booms,  typ they dont terminate high enough above the mast.   Putting a 
cross bar part way up the mast, with 2 x truss lines for
each half of the boom is another wasted effort, it buys you nothing..and wont 
decrease the horz deflection one bit.  

Most these days are using the sum total of all the projected areas  of the  
eles on a  HF yagi..which is typ greater than the projected area of the boom.
VHF + UHF  yagis are typ the opposite in some cases..with the boom having more 
area.   If you have something like a 80m rotary dipole stacked above a
3 el 40M yagi, then you have to calculate  the sum total of the 3 els.....  vs  
the sum of the 40m boom +  80m dipole.   Since the 80m dipole is oriented 
in line with the 40m boom,  you have to calculate both scenarios.

If you have a f12,  M2, mosely, hy-gain  product..they have used effective 
area, and not projected area.   Multiply X  1.5 to get reality.  Better  yet, 
enter
each elements taper into either  DXE yagi mechanical   or  Kurts  yagi 
stress.... to  do the calcs.   They can also easily be done on a calculator. 

Ice..and Ice + wind  never appears on any yagi spec..dunno why not...nor heavy 
wet snow.    You can enter  any amount of ice in the above software.    It will 
spit out the Vmax
for any thickness of ice.   DXEs  will also spit out horz deflection in any 
wind..with or without ice.  And also vertical sag deflection..again, with or 
without ice.   I have had
a few cases  where heavy wet snow fell off one half of the ele.  Meanwhile, the 
other half of the ele is still at least 6 inchs OD, weighs a bunch...and puts 
stress on any
ele to boom assy. 

I have seen pix or heard about almost 3 dozen bent mast horror stories since 
1970.   A partially bent or  folded over mast..with yagis mounted at different 
levels along the mast  is an absolute disaster....2nd only to the  tower 
falling over.   1.9 inch OD  sched 40, 36 ksi pipe does not work  with a big 
ant mounted
8-10 ft above tower.   But folks keep on trying. 

On contesting.coms  home page...under strays last week, is a pix of an old 4 
el, 40M KLM...where the boom had rotated  90 degs..so all 4 els were vertical.
Great, now the total windload is the els + the boom combined = disaster.   Seen 
the same thing happen on a F12  620 / 340   yagi.   Muffler clamps with
sheet metal saddles dont work folks.

222-G is one thing..but how the yagi is put together is another issue. 

Jim   VE7RF    
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