[TowerTalk] supporting a 40 meter rotatable dipole with trusses

[Grant Saviers]

I second the "too small" opinion.

IMO spend the $40 for Yagi Mech from DX Engineering and design for the 
wind velocity expected.  Almost certainly some tube diameters will need 
single and perhaps double internal sleeving at spots.  From my Y-M 
modeling experience, the center probably needs to be around 0.120" wall 
by 1.75" od for 6'+ each side of the boom.  It is also a bit difficult 
to design full size 20 and 40m 80+ mph beams with only the 6' lengths 
from DX Eng, although I love their prices.  A little work with YagiMech 
will illuminate why popular commercial 40m yagis are linear or coil or 
Moxon loaded, and why full size 3L ones weigh 300# and cost $5k.  Think 
what 1/3 of that might look like. My 3L 40m came from an great Oregon 
ham builder and weighs 350# and is very experienced with wind and ice.

Unless you really upscale sizes, a truss will be needed for full size 
40m elements and while dacron is relatively low stretch, Phillystran is 
the standard for element trusses, essentially no stretch.

I don't use hose clamps for elements over 1/2" diameter.  Crossed 
machine screws keep elements snug in 2 planes with short overlaps, are 
strong, elements won't vibrate, and using nylocks they don't loosen.

Then the more guys used = more wind resistance and worse the more ice 
loading.

I think your dimensions will be easy to tune.  NEC not needed. 
Mechanically you have the biggest challenge, IMO.

124' is a long way to climb to unscramble aluminum spaghetti.

Grant KZ1W


On 8/14/2018 18:45 PM, john at kk9a.com wrote:
> In my opinion, this is very small tubing for a full sized 40m element. My
> homebrew 20m beams use 1 1/4 diameter tubing tapered to 1/2 tips.  I suggest
> that you start by looking at the element taper schedules in the ARRL antenna
> handbook.
>
> John KK9A
>
>
> To:	towertalk at contesting.com
> From:	terry burge <ki7m at comcast.net>
> Date:	Tue, 14 Aug 2018 13:11:18 -0700 (PDT)
>
> Hi Jim and group,
>
> Hell of a way to wake up in the morning. Anyway, here are the dimensions.
>
> DX Engineering aluminum tubing all 0.058" wall thickness
> 1.250" X 6'
> 1.125" X 6'
> 1.00" X 6'    Spit on the end allowing adjustment with 1/2 - 1 1/4" SS Hose
> clamp
> 0.875" X 6'
> 0.750" X 3'
> 0.625" X 3'
> 0.500" X 6'
>
> Truss 1" X 1" X 0.125" X 3' aluminum angle 'iron' from Lowes. Holes drilled
> to
> also add a muffler clamp on the vertical truss if necessary to the mast.
>
> Center 'boom to mast' insulating clamp from SSS Solutions for 1.25" element.
> A
> little small but I figure it will work for my purposes with the trussing.
>
> Comtek 1:1 Current Balun at feed point.
>
> Because of Jim's thoughts about horizontal wind load I will also add another
>
> horizontal truss like I did with my quad array of something like 6' long
> aluminum angle 'iron' with 3/16" Dacron truss lines. Hope this won't cause
> too
> much difficulty reaching the adjustment positions at the 1" to 0.875" slip
> joint when rotating the vertical. Will do initial resonance dipping in on
> test
> support lower to the ground to get the SWR near where I need it around 7150
> Khz. Not sure how much of a difference this will be at 124' versus my Comtek
>
> 4-Square ground mounted. Interesting experiment but since I have always felt
>
> lacking on 40 meters with 'knowing' I could work more stations in contest on
> 40
> meters with a better antenna system.
>
> I have not modeled this in Nec2 or whatever. Window 10 raises it's ugly head
>
> preventing that from operating. I know there are ways to deal with it but
> I'm
> not even sure the ARRL Antenna Book disk will run on my windows. And
> programming computers is not one of my great accomplishments to say the
> least!
>
> I have found when I build something like this I learn more in the building
> and
> seeing just how big and how much of a load things will be. Might say I try
> to
> go by feel and try to 'over built' to handle stresses like wind load. Not
> always of course but I do think this will work here in Oregon.
>
>
> Terry
> KI7M
>
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