>Bill, W6WRT, wrote:
>It's been mentioned here before, but a number of hams have gotten free
>towers by just driving around, finding a tower and offering to take it
>down for free. You might be surprised how many towers are out of
>service and just collecting dust, waiting to be removed. One fellow I
>know of has half a dozen towers on his property of various heights and
>never paid a cent for any of them. Something to think about.
While Bill is absolutely correct, I'd like to add a note of caution.
There ARE no free towers.
You may incur significant liability in removing a structure from someone
else's
property. Taking down old towers is far more dangerous than erecting new
ones.
How's your liability insurance?
Unused/abandoned towers are often unmaintained. There are a lot of rohn
25's around
which were put up to hold 150MHz business band antennas. They're overloaded
when freestanding, because they're often much higher than rohn spec for the
load.
When guyed, it's worse...typically they use whatever wire is available,
rather than
EHS. Marginal when new...when 25 years old, who knows? How's your life and
disability coverage?
By the time you're done thinking about that, you'll come to realize the the
purchase price of a tower may be a bargain. It certainly is, if you value
your time at all.
OH...and if you DO manage to get a 'free' tower...you'd do well to
completely
replace the guy system, just as you'd have to replace the foundation. Those
things typically double the cost of a new tower.
Free towers? Don't think so.
N2EA
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