[TowerTalk] Tower, rotator and antenna maintenance

[Doug Renwick]

My friend your facts of life seem to apply to someone who is over weight and
out of shape.
This summer I rebuilt three towers from the ground up and reinstalled eight
antennas.  I must have climbed these towers more than 50 times during
removal and install.  I am in my early 70s and I don't expect to stop
climbing any time soon and I still 'free climb' to boot.

Doug

-----Original Message-----

The older you are, the less you'll do it!

If you're in your 40's (or younger): No problem, you do it just for fun and 
exercise! You like to go looking for problems and challenges. You are 
disappointed if everything works perfectly. You regret that your tower is 
the only place you are able to do "technical climbing".
If you're in your 50's: You can still do the work but are tired of it, the 
risk, and the unexpected. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you go up the 
tower, you pray you don't find the unexpected and hope for a miracle. You 
are tempted to ask people for help.
If you're in your 60's: You have a motorized tower and lower it to the 20' 
level and do the work using ladders and safety equipment. You still don't 
enjoy it and it is still a lot more difficult than it used to be. You 
occasionally pay the high price to rent a bucket. You hate doing the work 
and hope & pray you can avoid it. You are no longer ashamed to ask other 
people for help. You especially hope it is only routine maintenance and not 
something seriously broken.
If you're in your 70's: You hire young guys to do it all, or you have 
already moved to a non-ham-friendly condo location. You are probably happy 
with a dipole in your attic and are actively looking into stealth antennas. 
DX is now a 300 mile QSO on HF.
If you're in your 80's: You have made friends with some younger ham who has 
a remote controlled station and you operate his station using Skype + 
TeamView.
If you're in your 90's: You mostly read the SK section of QST. You show off 
your WAS certificates made when there were only 48 states. Your DXCC and 
other award certificates have two-digit certification numbers. 85% of DXCC 
contacts are on the "deleted" list.

No disrespect meant towards the young or the old on this spectrum....it's 
just the facts of life!

73
K0DAN