SARC Antenna Tower Project 2018 - Schaumburg Amateur "Ham" Radio Club
Ray, WA9BLP, is a long time Amateur Ham Radio Operator. He was having issue with his stations and needed help with his antenna tower. He has a very tall tower which have been installed over 40 years ago. It was determined that all coax cables were damaged due to age. On March 10, 2018, SARC (Schaumburg Amateur Radio Club) volunteers got together to help fix the tower.
Project Summary
The project stated around 8am and lasted for about 12+ hours. The weather was clear but the temperature was a bit cold at around 34 to 45 degrees throughout the day. Approximately 12 volunteers were involved.
- Replace 4 Feedlines with new 8U COAX and a Rotor cable
- 1x 3 Element Multi band Antenna
- 1x Rotatable Dipole (Multi Band)
- 1x 2 Meter antenna
- 1x Fixed Dipole antenna
- Rotor cable
- Terminate cable with PL259 outside and solder to connection plate in shack, incl. Rotor cable
- Replace SO239 connectors in shack
- Replace Matching network on 3 element Multi Band Antenna
- Visual Check of Rotor, replace junction box for rotor cable connection next to Rotor
- Drape 5x cables on tower, feed cables into attic then down wall into shack, with drip loop, extra in 2 feet in attic
- Verify operation when all ends terminated and tower raised again.
- Check AMP and AMP power supply, both replaced with spare. (see detail write up from Rob, below)
- Clean up yard and putt away ladders and supplies
It is not common for the us to get a real hands on with a large tower. It was a hard work, but we all learned a lot. Nothing beats learning by doing. Also Ray is now back on the air!
