Topband: Outdoor rope suggestions

[Joe K2UF]

I use 3/16 dacron rope to haul my wire antennas to the top of my tower.  I
don't use pulleys because the real good ones are very expensive.  I have a
piece of 1-1/2 fiberglass pipe sticking out from the tower about 2-3 feet.
I have a stainless steel eyebolt near the end of the pipe and one near the
tower.  I use the Dacron rope through the eyebolts.  I have used this set up
for several years and the rope shows no sign of wear.  I have a homebrew
contraption at the end of the fiberglass pipe that supports the wire antenna
when it is in use so the rope does not have to support the weight of the
center insulator, choke and 75 feet of feed line.  Dacron is great stuff.  I
am sure some of the engineers out there will say the eyebolt method is bad
design, but it works!!

73  Joe K2UF    

-----Original Message-----
From: Topband [mailto:topband-bounces at contesting.com] On Behalf Of Jim Brown
Sent: Tuesday, September 02, 2014 1:07 PM
To: topband at contesting.com
Subject: Re: Topband: Outdoor rope suggestions

On Tue,9/2/2014 7:47 AM, Carl wrote:
> Im going to be needing 500-1000' spools of polyester double braid rope 
> for supporting some more wire antennas in the harsh enviroment up 
> here. The 5/16" is rated at 3400 tensile and the wire will be about 
> 50#. ID likely tension it to about 200-250# to reduce sag 

Hi Carl,

I'm supporting high dipoles fed by RG11 up 120 ft with the 5/16-in stuff 
that DX Eng sells. They are run though top-grade pulleys, tied down at 
the base of one tree, 100# of dry sand at the base of the other tree. 
The major issue with the rope is wear -- the pulleys must be first grade 
to avoid abrasion, which WILL eventually break the rope.

My longest span is about 250 ft. Something like four years ago, I bought 
a 500 ft spool of 7/16-in and had the climbers put it on one end. Never 
got around to doing the other end. They climb every 4-5 years, and each 
time I have them examine the ropes. So far, no reports of wear.

73, Jim K9YC


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