Towertalk
[Top] [All Lists]

[TowerTalk] Tower Foundation (was Concrete Prices)

To: towertalk@contesting.com
Subject: [TowerTalk] Tower Foundation (was Concrete Prices)
From: W7ZZ <w7zz@wavecable.com>
Date: Thu, 02 Jan 2014 19:41:07 -0800
List-post: <towertalk@contesting.com">mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
I'll add my experience, for what it may be worth. A number of years ago, I purchased two new AN Wireless freestanding towers, an HD70 and a LD60. The HD70 requires a foundation that is 10'x10'x5' and the 60 footer requires a foundation 7x7x5. I had the holes dug by my landscaping contractor (the house was a custom and was under construction at the time). However, by the time I started getting the bids more than a year later, one hole had sloughed a bit and so some of the bidders put in some amount for excavation work.

Bids for whatever excavation work needed tobe done, fabricating the rebar cage, hiring the concrete pump truck or line pumper (the holes are not otherwise accessible due to their location), the concrete and the labor to do the job ranged from a low of $9,000 or so to a high of $16,000, I think it was (gee, I didn't keep a copy of that one). One contractor was kind enough to explain why: The pump truck or line pumper was $1,000 (every contractor told me that; one had his own line pumper so that cost was built in); depending on when I got the bid (this went on over several years), the cost of the concrete was $85-110/yard (at the time, I was told there was a shortage of concretedue to some massive dam construction going on in China, sucking it all up); approximately one tonof rebar would be needed for the two foundation rebar cages. The contractor's men would have to carry that rebar from the front of the house, where it would be dropped off by the fabricator, to the two holes, a distance of 100 feet or so for the big tower and 300 feet or so for the smaller. Labor in each case turned out to be about 1/3 of the bid or less and every contractor told me it was a several day job. Every contractor expressed concern about the need for the buried tower stub to be perfectly level (so that, when attached to it, the tower wouldn't lean). One potential bidder told me after eyeballing the site, seeing the foundation plans, etc., that he didn't want the job.

The moral of the story is that,at least for a freestanding tower designed for big wind loads, the cost of the tower is just the tip of the iceberg. The foundation work and the boom truck needed to get the towers up in the air is a major expense. I've lived in the house for 5 1/2 years now. My towers consist of two very large holes in my back yard.

73 W7ZZ
_______________________________________________



_______________________________________________
TowerTalk mailing list
TowerTalk@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/towertalk

<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>