[TowerTalk] Can motorized crank up's be manually lowered...when power is out ?
Jim Thomson
Jim.thom at telus.net
Sat Apr 3 06:33:43 PDT 2010
We just went through a big wind storm all last night [ thursday night/fri morning]. The commercial AC power flickered and dimmed
a few times. It eventually died for 2 hrs.
Ok, what happens with the HDX-689... when it's fully extended, and els all broadside to the wind.. and power goes off ??
Can these things be brought down manually .. safely.... by another method ?? [ hand winch, cordless drill, etc]
I'm seriously thinking of installing a wireless wind speed indicator on top of the new tower.
I can just see myself in the basement, with headphones on, totally oblivious to the wind outside. The usual deal is, when winds hit 35-50 mph,
trees come down across the power lines by the nearby park... and there goes the power for 2-4 hrs. Meanwhile the storm has not hit it's peak ..yet.
Local wx forecasts are usually accurate.. when they predict lousy wx.
Plan B was either add UPS power.. or a gen set. I don't have a clue what the start up current on the 1 hp motor is.. when retracting a HDX-689.
It has positive pull down featrure, but it's still gravity that's doing most of the work. A UPS that could provide 120 vac @ 20A CCS for 4 mins
might work. Starting a gen set at 3 AM... in the middle of winter... in the middle of a wind storm is no fun either...esp if it doesn't start.
IF the local forecast is predicting 'high winds after midnight, 110 kmh' then at least I have some advance notice... and either don't crank it up,
or only crank it up part way, etc.
What does everybody else do ?? This install will have a lot of weight on top.. and 4 x ants, and 2" OD x 3/8" chromolly mast.
Later.... Jim VE7RF
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