[CQ-Contest] use of a crane

[Rick Dougherty NQ4I]

Hi all...well there has been some talk in the past few days about use of a
crane for antenna work...I recently had one of the linear loading wires on
my 2 el KLM 80 break during a hail storm...the antenna had a 3.0:1 swr and
was virtually unuseable ....time was of the essence..I did not want to
lower it to the ground as I would have to also dismantle the 20m stack 5/5
that was on tht tower also...only two options were available...either fix
it in place using a pendulum method to swing the antenna around or get a
crane in here...the pendulum method would require two experienced tower
climbers, myself and WP2A who is my tower working partner...my xyl placed a
moratorium on tower work last weekend, and we had to go to the mountains
for the weekend...

that left the only other possible method to fix the antenna, so we could
use it in cqww cw...the crane method...
in the words of a great southern gentleman  "I never had as much fun, since
the hogs ate my sister".....it was a real kick in the pants...the crane was
a 35 ton unit with a man basket...it had a reach up to 140 ft and was
really a snap to extend it up to the broken linear loading wire and repair
it...took about 45 minutes and I was at the site , and it was so
stable..the crane operator was a real professional...he could put that
basket where ever I wanted to be...I highly recommend this method if time
is critical...it is really imperative that you be prepared with all the
proper tools and that you have a game plan available to effect the
repair...

Now the antenna is fixed and ready for the cqww cw test...see you there de
Rick NQ4I


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