[TowerTalk] US Tower 72 ft crank up grinds to a standstill

[n6sj at earthlink.net]

I would vote for replacing the 20-year-old motor starting cap.  I have to do
that on my water well pump every so often.

73,
Steve
N6SJ



-----Original Message-----
From: TowerTalk <towertalk-bounces at contesting.com> On Behalf Of Ron WV4P
Sent: Tuesday, May 26, 2020 5:47 PM
To: FritzOAQ <fritz at k4oaq.com>
Cc: towertalk <towertalk at contesting.com>
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] US Tower 72 ft crank up grinds to a standstill

If another neighbor is an AC Guy... go get a Run Cap for your motor from
him.
Ron, WV4P

On Tue, 26 May 2020 at 19:38, FritzOAQ <fritz at k4oaq.com> wrote:

> Many tks to you all fer all the suggestions & help.
> Facts I shud have included in my original post:
> Tower is 20 yrs old.
> The only maint I've done is to change the belt that started slipping.
> The rotor is a Yaesu G-2800DXA.
> The suggestion that seemed most likely to be the problem was that the 
> oil had drained out of the gear box.
> So, I did some reading & learning abt gear boxes.
> I discovered I had to get my neighbor who runs a machine shop to grind 
> 1/8 inch or so off an Allen wrench so it wud fit in that little small 
> spot to loosen the gear box drain.
> I tried spraying PB Blaster on it the best I cud. Apparently I shud 
> have waited a few days before trying to loosen it.
> I now have an Allen wrench a very artist twist and the opinion there's 
> no way to get the drain loose.
> A hammer rather than a paint brush was needed to perform my art work.
> I'm anxiously awaiting suggestions of how to turn the tower upside 
> down to drain the oil out of the top hole.
> So, moving right along, I assumed the oil didn't need to be drained & 
> filled the oil to the top. I saw no holes on the side to determine 
> when it was full, so I assumed it was full when it ran over. I'm not 
> sure how much went in but I wud gess between 1/8 to 1/4 of a cup.
> I wasn't all that hopeful that that wud fix the prob & sure enuf, prob 
> not solved.
> It occurred to me to take the belt off & see if I cud turn by hand.
> To my surprise I was able to - it was hard to turn it in the direction 
> of "up" but I cud see the tower going up as I turned.
> I turned it up & down a number of turns thinking that the oil needed 
> swishing around in the gear box.
> So, back to raising the tower & to my surprise, it started going up. I 
> had to stop it abt 3/4 of the way up to untangle the coax.
> When I restarted it on up, back to the same prob. I got my wife to 
> flip the switch while I prodded the pulley wheel with a piece of wood 
> to start it moving.
> After 4-5 "shoves" it started on up & is now sitting at 72 ft ... shud 
> I leave it there til I die??? Sorry, that's a bad joke these days.
> After all this I noticed oil had come out of the top of the gear box. 
> I did have the cap on tightly.
> One of you suggested a weight issue & provided me with the following info.
> "From what I understand, UST rates the 72 foot crank up towers at 200 
> lbs of antenna(s), rotor and mast, bearing etc weight with 22 lbs of 
> cable weight, 222lbs max vertical dead weight.  The DB36 weighs 165 
> lbs and the tilt plate about 60 lbs. The mast, rotor, bearing, cables 
> etc would be additional."
> So, is it the gear box or is it the weight, or both. :) Fritz K4OAQ
>
>
>
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