[TowerTalk] Ham Rotor Question

[Jon Pearl - Laptop]

Hi Todd.

Being a cubical quad user for many, many years I found myself folding over 
the tower with the boom aimed in all sorts of directions for obvious 
reasons.  Since the quad is an three dimensional I always found that I had 
to climb a ladder to reach a broken wire or to even approach the mast or 
rotator.  Large yagis are really no different in some respects, in that the 
longest element is always poking into the dirt - limiting how far down the 
tower lays.

Your current situation dictates that you either find a wiring problem and 
fix it with the tower in a vertical position or loosen the saddle clamps on 
the boom-to-mast plate and rotate the antenna by hand so that you can fold 
your tower over to get to the rotator as you've done in the past.  The 
reduction gearing of the Ham-M won't allow you to rotate it by hand.

Once you've gotten your rotator concerns out sorted out, the NN4ZZ Tilt 
Plate may be an option for you (for ground level maintenance, anyways) --  
http://nn4zz.com/tiltplate.htm.  Your boom will still nest parallel to the 
earth but upon tower tilting, the boom and elements will slowly rotate to 
maintain a horizontal position that should allow you to fold your tower down 
to a point easily accessible to you while you're on the ground.  No more 
ladders.


73,


Jon Pearl - W4ABC
www.w4abc.com




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Todd Coulter" <Coulter at bellsouth.net>
To: <towertalk at contesting.com>
Sent: Monday, September 06, 2010 9:37 PM
Subject: [TowerTalk] Ham Rotor Question


>I am presently having an issue with my Ham-M rotor. It is not rotating in
> either direction and I am probably going to have to take it down for
> repairs. I have eliminated the rotor controller as a possible problem by
> swapping the current controller with a known good controller and the same
> problem exists. It indicates the current direction, but will not rotate. I
> will next eliminate the cable before taking the rotator down, but I think 
> it
> is probably the problem.
>
> In order to make the lowering of the tower easier, I would like to 
> manually
> rotate the rotator by hand. Is it possible to push and hold the brake
> release button on the controller and rotate the rotator by hand?
>
> If this is possible, is the rotator fairly easy to rotate manually, or 
> does
> it require significant effort as I would like to do this with a stout 
> stick
> while standing on the roof?
>
> Thanks in advance for any help.
>
>
>                                               73's
>
>                                               Todd
>                                               N4JRZ


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