Topband: NA activity + Inv-L corner insulator

[Pete Smith N4ZR]

I had to laugh - I'm sure that the couple of box wrenches I lost in the 
trees behind my townhouse in Reston, VA are still there - or if not, do 
you suppose people thought they grew there somehow?

Re the Flexweave, I didn't recognize the name so I googled it, and who 
knew...?  It sounds like it might work very well for the whole inverted 
L, and these days it's not appreciably more expensive than #14 THHN.

I got a very nice-looking pulley from Amazon 
(https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07GWLH7WS/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1) 
for $13, which is made of 304 stainless with a nylon sheave which has a 
very large and deep groove.  It's hard to imagine a scenario where the 
rope will hop out of this sheave.

73, Pete N4ZR
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On 9/25/2021 7:32 PM, Guy Olinger K2AV wrote:
> In the pulley snag conundrum, I found that the small marine grade stainless
> steel, ball bearing pulleys would handle the black sheathed 3/16 in
> parachute cord style rope and never a snag. They also pull very easy as the
> bearing never freezes up from exposure to merely (vs. salt) water.
>
> I also have a pair of insulators at the bend, one to the vertical wire,
> another to the horizontal wire with a loop of "Flexweave" wire from the
> horizontal to the vertical. That way in the wind there is no way for the
> forces to be flexing a hard connection from the vertical to the horizontal.
> After 2 or 3 (or was it 7 or 8) failures at this point with wires on the
> ground it finally dawned on me that the wind constantly varied the angle
> between the two wires, and fatigue at the joint was inevitable and
> frequent.
>
> YMMV but I'll never again have a "hard joint" at that point. I started this
> in 2010, and have gone 11 years without the L coming down for that (one
> dumb rope thing, though).
>
> 73, and long in the future may your heirs have to figure out how to get it
> down out of the trees.
>
> Guy K2AV
>
> On Sat, Sep 25, 2021 at 4:23 PM <W3HKK at roadrunner.com> wrote:
>
>> . Here in Ohio we are still having moderate QRN especially in the
>> evenings. When I get on at our SR, the VK/ZL boys are often coming
>> through fairly well with much less QRN.
>>
>> My INV-L has a ceramic insulator at the apex, which is held in place
>> by 3/16" black synthetic rope of some kind ( Home Depot source) thrown
>> over my 52 ft tall black walnut tree tied off to another tree. I dont
>> use pullies since so often the rope slips off the roller and into the
>> crack between the roller and the U-bracket. So I just tied a rope to
>> the other side of the insulator and hoist.
>>
>>
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