I have an old Ezway crank-up/tilt-over that was 72 ft tall when extended but
has been shortened to about 60 ft (I don't want to talk about that!).
It has two safety latches and the modus operandi is to crank it up until the
latches engage then back off on the winch so that the tower settles back
onto the latches. Then backing the winch off a bit more allows the cable to
relax and there is no weight on it.
I used this tower for over ten yrs. and electively replaced the cable once.
I guyed it three ways near the top and two ways at the top of section one.
It had the heavy duty ground post well imbedded in the Florida soil.
Incidentally, I led an ARES comms. team into Homestead FL a few hours after
Andrew went through. Any discussion using that as a comparison is
inappropriate when you consider that the huge power company reinforced
concrete power poles carrying the HV lines were either flat on the ground or
leaning drunkenly at various angles, also the big green direction gantries
on I-95 were flat on the ground and had to be bulldozed out of the way.
There were few if any towers still standing, including cell. phone systems.
In fact we even provided the only long haul comms. for the US army unit for
the first week since they did not have the capability.
The wind is not the only factor, A mobile home (or parts thereof) slamming
into your tower or guy wires at 100 plus mph is not a survivable situation.
I would still prefer the telescopic tower, cranked all the way down, tilted
over to the horizontal and secured with heavy duty tie-downs.
73
John AB4ET
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