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Re: [TowerTalk] Wire antenna in trees? (Patrick Greenlee) (Kelly Taylor)

To: towertalk@contesting.com
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Wire antenna in trees? (Patrick Greenlee) (Kelly Taylor)
From: Jim Brown <jim@audiosystemsgroup.com>
Reply-to: jim@audiosystemsgroup.com
Date: Sun, 6 Aug 2017 13:23:10 -0700
List-post: <mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
I use water jugs (don't remember capacity, only weight) filled with dry sand. They weigh 95 -100#, which is my estimate of the tension on a centerfed horizontal wire. I use CMI rescue pulleys and mostly 5/16-in Synthetic Textiles rope. On the longest run that's under the greatest tension, I use 7/16-in rope. Both ends have pulleys. On each antenna, one end is tied down, the other end has the weight.

In my 11 year experience with antennas in these tall trees, the failure modes are

1) Wire connection/tie-off points (solder is bad, loops through eyes that double back on the wire and split bolt connectors to secure both electrical and mechanical connections are good. A good rule is to never solder a connection that will be stressed -- eventually the stressed wire will break at the soldered connection.

2) Wear on the support rope where it goes through a pulley. That's why I use 7/16-in for the longest, highest antenna.

3) Poorly made center insulators. Even with the best, I've learned to add rope across the insulator so that the dipole doesn't hit the ground if the insulator fails. (Getting two ends of a dipole up that high costs at least $800 for a day's worth of a guy in the trees and a helper on the ground. The last thing I want is for them to come back for something in the antenna that broke, releasing one or both support ropes so that the pulley must be re-strung. Ask me how I know. :)

73, Jim K9YC

 On 8/6/2017 12:44 PM, Clay Autery wrote:
Roger that, Jim.  Until I can get my ENTIRE loop path clear of
vegetation, I will have to accept the trade-off and continue to use the
insulated stuff.  (Maybe this winter, fingers crossed).  Since I can
pull the entire loop down in about 10 minutes, keeping it pruned to
tuned length isn't much of a task...  Mine aren't nearly as high up as
yours.  :)

I'd love to give the bare solid stuff a try...  How much weight do you
have to use to keep it tensioned in the air?  280+ feet of #8 would be
some bit heavier...
And I'd definitely have to come up with a bigger diameter pulley.  :)

______________________
Clay Autery, KY5G
MONTAC Enterprises
(318) 518-1389

On 8/6/2017 1:40 PM, Jim Brown wrote:
The problem with using ordinary copper wire for antennas where the
wire is under tension is that it stretches. Mine high dipoles are
under about 100# of tension (up 140 ft, fed with RG11), so every few
years, I have to let down my 80/40 dipole that's built with #10 THHN
stranded and circumcise it to keep it on frequency. I've since
migrated to using #8 bare solid copper that I've stretched by tying
one end to a tree and the other end to the trailer mount of my SUV and
pulling slowly until it breaks.  The result is close to being hard
drawn, roughly AWG #9, and about 15% longer. Antennas that I've built
with this seem not to stretch.  Over the years, W6GJB and I have done
this with at least 2,000 ft of #8.

73, Jim K9YC

On 8/6/2017 10:44 AM, Clay Autery wrote:
Correct...  THHN is not intended for use as exterior antenna wire, but
it surely does work well...  I can get it in any color I want and in a
2500+ foot spool, et al.

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