[TowerTalk] Cost of a medium big station?

Sun, 21 May 2000 22:36:48 EDT

k2av@contesting.com writes:
> 
>  $100k?  100% High End Retail. Only for the unimaginative and
>  unconnected. What a waste.

1. When we are young and hot operators, usually don't have the money, we have 
to scrounge, build, compromise, use "drive-in" stations.
2. When we get older (and slower) we manage to accumulate some $ resources, 
then one can afford shortcuts to building stuff, by just opening the check 
book and ordering the stuff.
History shows that those contesters that worked hard at acquiring the junk 
and operating skills (when young) will last longer, perhaps life time. (They 
worked for it, they treasure it, they enjoy it, they persist.)
We have seen some contesters that built (ordered) the superstation only to 
lose interest and fade away.
We have seen contesters (1.) who later in their radio lives managed to 
accumulate and build nice stations for Multi-Multi, opened it to others and 
enjoyed incubating followers and still rumbling on the bands. It is nice to 
see bunch of guys getting together and builing the station.
That's the beauty of this fantastic hobby/sport. One can do according to 
their means and capabilities. The reward is seeing one's callsign in the 
results or record tables. The real reward is learning to work towards the 
goals, strive for excellence, compete and enjoy the fruits. This is converted 
to real and professional life, where the money comes later on from. Happy are 
those who maintain reasonable ratio of devotion to family, radio and rest of 
the life.
Great station can be built with some compromise between ingenuity, work and 
$$.
My old "super station" in Toronto suburb was: house on 46x120 ft city lot 
($42k), Telrex Big Bertha 110' tower for price of scrap steel, delivered 
($1200) concrete base ($300) aluminum, wires, fiberglass for stacked Razors 
on 62 ft booms (abt $200), home-brewed 8877s amp (parts $400) Drake Twins 
used, modified ($350) countless hours putting it all together (free.) This 
was good enough for about 16 world records and staying married to the same 
XYL. Now that kids are out of colleges - hello radio, I am dreaming of bigger 
and better contest setup in my second radio life. 
The King of Scroungers (cheapest station) must be VE1ZZ who besides TS830 
didn't spend more than $200 on wiring and roping his hill 160 - 6m. Jack is 
currently #3 on Top Band DXCC ladder with 298 countries (#1 from the same 
QTH). Most was obtained from junkyards for free, like TV coax used for 
radials and hose clamps for "connectors". 
How about them "Team Vertical" 6Y4A whipping MM world record with bunch of 
verticals, when "Team Nokia" from PJ9 with containers of equipment,  towers 
and beams couldn't do it?
Fascinating hobby! Do it any way you can (afford)!

Yuri,  <A HREF="http://members.aol.com/k3bu/index.htm">K3BU</A>  <A 
HREF="http://members.aol.com/ve3bmv/index.htm">VE3BMV</A>  VE1BY P40A

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