[TowerTalk] E-Z Way Towers

[ABowenN4OO]

At 12:21 PM 8/22/2001 -0400, you wrote:

>I am getting a used foldover crank up tower.  From the research I have
>done on the net, it seems to be an EZ way tower.  It has a round base
>pole maybe about 4"-6" in diameter also the tower sides are in a Z 
>pattern.  I belive
>it is in two sections and has two winches.  Also as I was talking to
>the seller, they said it has two sets of large Fins that get buried 6-8
>feet deep.  He has had this tower up for a while, but it seems to be
>in good shape.  We are not sure about the exact height of the tower,
>maybe 50'-70'.  He mentioned that it was possible to add another
>section on the tower to go higher, but he didn't have any info on
>that.
=============================================
If the tower is an E-Z Way:

E-Z Way made 6 models of tower that had 2 sections. They were the HD 40, 
RBS 40, CRS 40, RBX 40, RBS 50 and RBX 50. The extended heights were 
40,41,41,42,51,52 feet respectively. The retracted heights were 
23,25,25,27,30,32 ft respectively. The ground posts for all the "40s" had a 
hinge height of 6 ft and the others were 8 ft.

They are a reasonably good tower if not rusted or bent, especially the 
heavy duty "X" models. Getting the ground post out of the ground is a 
daunting project. Consider an old style wrecker truck or a large tractor 
with hydraulic lift arms, a draw bar and a stout chain. Otherwise, be 
prepared for a lot of digging and grunting. The post assembly may need 
repair because of rust, but it could be done by most any weld shop. It is 
likely that the raising cable will need to be replaced. Ditto for the 
winch. It is a fairly simple job.

None of these towers were ever designed to have sections added. You could 
possibly extend the height 2 - 5 feet with a sturdy mast, but the added 
height would not be worth the extras stress.

E-Z Way published allowable loads but the numbers would not stand up to a 
modern day engineering analysis (obviously done by someone in Marketing). 
About the only thing to be said is that they were safe for the smaller 
tribanders and quads as long as you got them cranked down before any 
significant storm. Those who had them, usually kept them partially cranked 
down in case of the sudden storms and squalls we see near the gulf coast of FL

E-Z Way went out of business sometime in the 70s as I recall.

INK N4OO



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