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Man Builds 60-foot Tower to Get Highspeed Access
Matt Russell writes "A church was blocking the only high speed signal in town, so he decided he needed to go higher. This is the story of one man's quest to build a 60-foot reception tower in his yard and retire his modem once and for all." From the article: "Well, if you want to have a tower, you need to find one. Buying a new tower is not a good idea, since there are plenty of used ones. In my case, I was in need of a tower that was at least 50', which would cost around $1,000 USD for a new one. The way I searched was pretty simple. I spread the word around town that I was looking for one, and I drove around to see if there was a house with an old TV tower or something like that. If a 30' tower would be enough for you, go to a small town and look for TV tower. If you find one that looks to be in good shape, just go knock on the door and ask if you can buy it. At least 90% of people don't use them anymore, so it's a good place to start! "
I didn't see the protocol (was it wifi?) in the article, but why not ask the church to put a repeater in their tower in exchange for setting up their computer to access the same ISP?
Another case of over engineering the solution to the problem.
I want you slobbering wireless fanboys to listen carefully.
Used towers are dangerous. You can get stitches and broken bones handling one 10' section of new Rohn 25 if you don't have competent help. A fall from 6' can be fatal, a 'lucky' fall from 20' is still going to leave you with a lifetime of disability. Towers are not a permanent fixture. Even with care they rust and they get metal fatigue if they're not properly braced or guyed. No professional will reuse tower components without a careful visual inspection and most will just say no unless its the smallest cross section segments like Rohn 25 (12" face) and they're not going back up in a large configuration.
If you get it down and home with all of your toes and fingers intact you've still got to get it erected. A proper base is an art - see a prebankruptcy Rohn catalog for details. You need to calculate the wind load for the size of antenna you'll use and make sure you're using appropriate guying or bracing for the given load.
The tallest building I've ever had to service was 634'. The tallest facility I've ever had to manage was 485'. The tallest tower I've ever personally climbed was 300'. The tallest I've ever specified myself and helped install was 60'. The tallest water tower I've ever worked was 135'. The most I've done in the last year was an install at 55' on a 185' Penrod 30. The only experience I don't have is dealing with cylindrical cellular type towers.
Stating my experience should shut down the cantenna artists who just became tower recycling gurus by reading that article twice, but I'm at a loss as to how to say this so that I won't get someone saying "Aren't you special?". I am special in the scheme of Slashdot, because I talk about things I do rather than things I fantasize about doing.
So much for my resolution to never, ever respond here again.
I am very easy to get along with, but I don't have time to waste being nice to people who are being stupid. -Theo
we do this on a regular basis for customers with lots of foliage and who are desperate to get broadband. this is actually very common.
we found that it's cheaper and safer to have someone (e.g your power company) plant a wooden pole. we've had customers that buried a 60 ft (and a couple of times 70-ft) wooden pole 10 feet in the ground, with some concrete around it, and they've never moved since. you can get a set of pegs to do about 3-4 poles for around 90 bucks, with a tool to drive them in. it helps if you know what you're doing and have some climbing experience, of course.
we also have a couple of customers that have guyed and non-guyed masts and tri-poles up to 70 ft.... people will do strange shit for high speed porn.
the worst part is having to do routine maintenance and realignments, just cause it's time consuming and wears you out.
another neat tower design is the kind that "breaks over" close to the ground, and has a counterweight. you can fold it over, install your gear, and straighten it back up.
--- sig moved for great justice.
This guys tower is going to come down the first time it is iced over and the wind blows strong. The weak point of the tower is the welded base plate. The place where the tower meets the ground will have the strongest amount of stress on it. It will be stress pushing in one direction. If he uses guy wires it will be even worse. It will be a twisting motion at the base. As far as I can tell, the site was not slashdot ready, he never used rebar to make a cage for the base. If he never took the tower completely apart there could be other weak points he does not even know about. His story should be a primer of how not to erect a tower.
I had a 48 foot rohn tower I used for Amateur radio use and it was a tad overloaded. My hole was more of a polygon than a square and besides a very strong rebar cage for the base and the tower legs which were sunk 3 feet into the concrete, I used a little over two yards of concrete. This may sound like overkill but with the tower load I wanted it strong. Good thing. We had some of the strongest pacific storms after that tower went up. It took winds in excess of 100MPH. That wind uprooted orchards in our area and knocked over a few towers. Mine was hardly moving.
Erecting a tower is serious business. You have to know what you are doing, and know it well. It's not a simple matter of throwing it up and climbing it. You WILL kill yourself if you do not know what you are doing. You MUST have your tower installation inspected, and in many cases, you must get a building permit to put one up and have a civil engineer sign off on your pad and guy wire plan. You must also have a registered PE inspect and/or tension your guy wires if you are to be able to obtain liability insurance on your tower. If you do not do these things, and something happens, YOU ARE SCREWED. Towers are heavy, fragile, and wimpy. If your tower falls and kills someone, you're looking at a manslaughter charge unless you can demonstrate due diligence.
Do you remember kindergarten physics? Remember the machine called the lever? A 60-foot lever has a tremendous mechanical advantage. 20lbs of wind force at the top has 1200 lb-ft of torque at the bottom unless you are guyed properly. It's not uncommon to see wind forces of 100lbs or more during severe storms.
Putting up a tower is no joke.