[TowerTalk] Rebar or no rebar

[john at kk9a.com]

The steel legs go pretty deep into the concrete. I put a minimal rebar cage
around the perimeter of the 30" base that I installed. On the smaller towers
I do not recall doing anything. My new sections came with zinc plated bolts
which corroded rapidly inside the tower.  This is very dangerous because you
cannot see that the bolt diameter has decayed so badly until it breaks and
falls out.  If Universal still supplies this hardware, I would not use it.

John KK9A


To:	towertalk at contesting.com
Subject:	[TowerTalk] Rebar or no rebar
From:	Mike Ricketts <mike.nd9g at gmail.com>
Date:	Sun, 14 May 2017 18:41:07 -0500
List-post:	<towertalk at contesting.com">mailto:towertalk at contesting.com>
I've recently acquired an older (mid 90s) Universal Tower, very similar in
specs to their current HD-21-60.

Looking at the plans, the foundation (5x5x6) calls for only the 3 base
legs, and no rebar is specified.
http://universaltowers.com/pdf/HD_models/05-model%23-hd-21-60.pdf

Knowing K7LXC's advice to not do anything the manufacturer doesn't say, I
would be inclined to leave out the rebar.

However, both the city inspector and my concrete contractor both suggested
to add some rebar. The city won't decline it without it, he just advised
it. I was thinking about doing a very basic cage using 4 foot pieces of
rebar. I won't need anything fancy like some manufacturers require. Since
this is the place with many experts, I wanted to see what you folks thought
about it.

Thanks.

73,
Mike ND9G