[TowerTalk] Tower buried section legs -- Buried in Concrete orBelow the Concrete?

[Donald Chester]

> So, what's left that would make the buried base preferable over a pier pin?
> Saving a few minutes of time when stacking the bottom couple of sections is
> hardly a reason in my book :

> 73 --- Jeff WN3A

One thing I forgot to mention. With the pier-pin solution you normally don't have the problem of hollow-legged towers filling with water and the necessity of drilling a weep hole in the legs or making sure drainage is sufficient.  In the case of the buried-in-concrete method, the bottom section would need to extend below the concrete into a bed of  gravel that you KNOW FOR SURE will always have good drainage. Otherwise drilling a weep hole in each leg is a necessity - something that may possibly weaken the tower structure.  The tapered base or flat base plate leaves the bolt-holes of hollow tube towers above grade where they serve as weep-holes as well.  When I put up my 25G in 1981, I paid about $90 for my tapered base section, approximately double the price of a regular 10' 25G section.  Looking in the Rohn catalogue to-day, a regular 10' section costs about $100 but the tapered base section is over $800!.  The flat base plate is a lot cheaper.  I don't know why they don't make a short tapered base to add on to a regular section, but that would probably be almost as expensive.  The new company that took over Rohn charges incredibly more than did the "old" Unarco-Rohn for certain items. I use the tapered base section on mine to accommodate the base insulator, since the tower also serves as a vertical tee for 160.

Don k4kyv