Category: w8

One of the features of the new QTH was the presence of several other buildings away from the house. One was an extra deep detached garage, and the other was a large building that looked like a house but had been used as a barn. Both had electricity and access to water but no plumbing. The main house had a very nice basement, but there were no windows to the outside and no soundproofing to the main living areas. My wife ran a strong campaign for me to build my radio room in one of the outbuildings.

I decided to use the detached garage. The main reasons were that it was closer to the house, didn’t smell like horses, and already had a mini-split heating and air conditioner installed. The disadvantage was that it did not have 220V, but there was a path to solving that issue.

The garage was deep enough that I could create a 9.5′ x 16.5′ room and still get my car in the garage. It also had one window, but there was room to add two more. They would look east toward the sunrise and let me see the towers.

I shared this drawing with multiple contractors that I had found on Facebook. Chris Lovell won the project by saying he and his son could start on it immediately.

April 4, 2025

Work began on adding the wall to the garage.

April 5, 2025

The walls inside of the garage were some kind of rough plywood over Sheetrock. I decided to maintain that theme since it would be less expensive, and I would be able to nail things into the wall anywhere I wanted. As the wall and door were installed, it started to feel like a proper room.

April 6-7, 2025

My original thought had been to add two more windows that were the same size and style as the one that was already there. There must be some kind of a window supply chain issue, as the contractor had trouble even finding windows in stock nearby. The first set he found were smaller. That didn’t work at all since I wanted to be able to look out at the hills, sunrise, and towers. I suggested we go with something bigger ($$). He located two that were about 25% taller.

When he cut the wall out to install the windows, we discovered there was no plywood on the outside of the walls. It was just a vapor barrier. That required another change order to remove the siding and add some plywood.

The bigger windows turned out great for adding both light and a view.

April 10, 2025

A simple dryer vent was added to a corner of the back wall to facilitate the entrance of the coax and control cables. He installed it a bit lower than I had specified, but it will work.

The garage remodeling was completed, and I am very satisfied with the result. Just need some carpet so I can operate while barefoot.

The next project will be to get 220V into the building, add an electrical sub panel, and then put all the necessary outlets on the walls.

Combined with the tower concrete project that was running in parallel, this was a great week of progress!

March 31, 2025

I arrived at the house in Ohio after a two-hour drive from K3LR, following the CQ WPX SSB contest. The weather was good, so I headed out to the field to finalize the location of the towers.

I spent some time in the preceding weeks with a plot plan and the HFTA (terrain analysis) software to determine what antenna heights might be the most advantageous. (That will be another blog post.) I decided that two 80-foot towers should be sufficient, but I wanted the guy anchors out far enough that I could go to 100 feet later if needed.

I spent a lot of time tramping around the field with a tape measure, some posts stuck in the ground, and some string.

I started by hammering in a post at the proposed tower base locations. Then, I measured 80′ in three directions to estimate the probable anchor locations. The last step was to run a string from the base post to each anchor point. It eventually resulted in the strings being 120 degrees apart.

I then marked the size of each hole using some bright orange paint.

The base holes were to be 3′ x 3′ square and 4′ deep. The anchor holes were 3′ x 4′ by 4′ deep. All of them ended up slightly bigger during the digging process.

April 1, 2025

I had found a contractor on Facebook who was available to dig the holes. We agreed on Tuesday, April 1, as the day. That turned out to be the best day of the week as far as the weather. It was sunny and springtime warm.

The holes showed about 6 inches of rich black topsoil on top of a very firm clay. After years of dealing with the rocky soil in New England, it was amazing to see so much digging and only a few rocks!

He had all 8 holes dug in about 3 hours! It was well worth the expense.

April 2, 2025

The next day, the weather started to turn. It rained almost non-stop overnight. I came out to find all but one of the holes filled with water.

Because of the clay, the water did not drain out either. It just stayed there. How does 3″ of rain fill a 4′ deep hole?! Runoff from higher on the hill…

The guy I bought the house from stopped by. As we were talking, he mentioned there was a spring on the property next door. “Really?” I asked. We walked down into the pasture, and one guy anchor hole was right in line with the runoff from the spring. Argh! I had been wondering why the water in that hole had been so clear.

More water was flowing down the hill so I did my best to cut a trench and divert it away from the hole.

I can’t believe I did not notice any water in this area during the survey and hole marking. I don’t think it will be a problem, but I could have easily reoriented the guy points to avoid this area.

April 3-4, 2025

In the weeks before, I had identified several concrete contractors on Facebook and contacted them. I sent them the Rohn drawings and some text of what I was looking for. Once the holes were dug, they each came by to look over the job. I think they were all a bit curious about my unusual project.

I had considered doing the concrete myself, but the number of holes, the distance from the mixer, and the amount of concrete for each hole would have made that impossible. Once again, for speed and access to materials, it was worth it to hire professionals.

I told the contractors that I would like to get the job done while I was in town, but would drive back from Boston if needed. Only one contractor said they could move some jobs around and accommodate my schedule.

They did ask for extra money to pump out the holes. Anything to avoid the 10-hour drive each way!

April 7, 2025

Josh and his team from Stone Brick Construction showed up on Monday to pump out the holes.

With the water mostly removed, we could see how much cave-ins and erosion into the holes had occurred.

I donned my waterproof boots and waded into some of the holes to muck them out. The composition of the clay was amazing. It was super sticky and yet acted like quicksand. I would put my foot down, thinking that the sediment should only be 6 inches deep, and my foot would keep sinking. At times, it was almost impossible to pull my boot out of the mud. The clay would stick to the shovel, so getting it out of the hole was not easy. Once I thought I had done enough in a hole, I had to find a way to get out. There were a few times when I thought I might have to call someone to come pull me up!

This photo does not do justice to how messy and difficult the bottom of the holes were!

April 8, 2025

The rain had stopped, but the temperature had really dropped. It was about 25 degrees Fahrenheit at sunrise! Brrr. The Stone Brick team had said they would be back today to do the forms. They arrived about 9 am and had things ready by 11:30 or so. They called the cement company, and 45 minutes later, it was time to pour!

The key to this job was the buggy. It took a lot of trips from the truck to fill the holes. Even with that, it still took more than 2 hours to get everything filled.

It was above freezing by the time the truck had arrived, and it turned out to be a perfect day for working outdoors.

The final step was setting the pier pin for each base.

We confirmed that all the guy anchors were aligned and pointing at the pin for their respective bases. Job done!

April 9, 2025

Stone Brick returned in the afternoon to get their forms. The suggestion had been to wait a few days before doing the backfill of the holes.

With the amount of water that was filling up the “spring” anchor hole and the forecast for a lot more rain, I decided to backfill that one. Once again, the wet clay presented a challenge. It didn’t help that the backhoe operator had left the pile about 5 feet from the hole…

The rest of them will have to wait for the next trip.

When I arrived 9 days earlier, I never expected to accomplish completion of the concrete portion of the tower construction. Nothing to do now but give it 30 days or so to cure.

March 18, 2025

After a day of rain, it was time to get back to work. Three 40-meter beams on the ground in the backyard are an embarrassment of riches. I started with the one that had been up 32 years. This antenna had all of the W6QHS modifications and was very stout. The only issue with the antenna over time was with the feed point… and when lightning destroyed one of the loading coils. It needed to be broken down into the shortest possible pieces so it could be shipped down to V44KAI in St. Kitts.

The center joints of the two elements were not going to come apart. With a lot of hammering, I got the boom apart in the middle.

The original Cushcraft hardware was showing its age.

March 21, 2025

Another day, another 40-2CD to take apart. This one had only been up for 2 years and came apart very easily.

More cable rolling. I had not fully appreciated how many coax and control cables were heading up the hill. The pile of aluminum and wire continued to grow.

I also spent some time tensioning the temporary guy wires at 10′.

March 22, 2025

Saturday morning was another perfect weather day. Mark KW1X and Martin AA1ON arrived before 9 am. The first order of business was to finish tower #2. We positioned the gin pole.

I came down and we then loosened the remaining set of guy wires. With a little help from the tower jack, the sections came apart easily and were soon on the ground. We had a 10′ tower with a 12′ steel mast inside.

Other than being heavy, the mast did not present much of a problem. With it out of the way, we could lift the section and base plate off the pier pin. Mission accomplished!

The total work time from 40′ to zero, including some work on the temporary guys, was 1 hour 30 minutes.

We moved on quickly to tower #1. It was still at 60′ with two sets of guys. The wind came up a bit, with a few gusts, but not really a factor with just the tower to work on. We installed the temporary guys that had been moved from the other tower.

Once again, there is nothing like that feeling of being 4 sections above the last guy wire.

This tower had been up for 32 years. The Rohn galvanized nuts and bolts usually came apart without issue. There were a few sections where the bolt holes were not perfectly aligned and required a few hits with a wrench to remove. We needed the tower jack to help free every section.

Removing guy wire wires had one small surprise. These anchor points were all above grade 32 years ago. Now the bottom bolt required some hand digging to access.

We had a decision to make when we reached the section with the guy wires at 29′. The steel mast was 20′ long. We did not have enough manpower to lift it out of the tower. Do we stop and wait for another day? I used the ‘phone a local’ option and texted N1PGA to see if he was available. He showed up 30 minutes later just as we were at the 20′ level.

We needed him for the next task! We put a U-clamp around the mast at the 11′ level. The gin pole pulley could get to 10′ above the tower. The ground crew lifted the mast until there was no more rope available between the pulley and the clamp. The mast was still more than a foot inside the tower. With some maneuvering, I was able to guide the mast through a gap in the side of the tower. It slid through and the mast was on the ground. Whew!

We lifted the bottom section and plate off the base. Another bittersweet moment (for me).

Thanks to John N1PGA for coming over to help us finish the job!

It was now around 3:30 pm. A lot had been accomplished and we happily headed to lunch at the local drive-in.

I came back later and started carrying things down from the tower. There were guy wires, cables, and other bits and pieces that all needed to come down the hill.

When removing guy wires, I had been pulling them out of the guy brackets and then throwing them off the tower. I know this was probably not ideal, but I was aiming away from the rocks. As I was cleaning things up, I discovered this torque arm from one of the guys at 90′. I can’t imagine the forces needed to bend one of these. Lesson learned – don’t throw stuff you want to use again off the tower!

The second bone pile was starting to grow as well.

March 23, 2025

I took apart the last 40m beam. And doing more cable rolling.

I also spent some time packing things up inside. The station was disappearing before my eyes.

Next is a trip to K3LR for WPX SSB and then to Ohio, where I have an appointment with a contractor to dig the holes for the new towers.

March 13, 2025

A nice weather day. I started working on liberating cables from the shack and rolling them up. Then the call to play golf kicked in so not much progress.

March 14, 2025

Another very nice day. I continued working on rolling up cables.

The weather was so nice – sunny, warm, no wind – I just kept thinking I was missing out on getting some tower work done. Martin AA1ON called about then and I asked if he could come over. He brought his son Owen and we were able to work on removing some tower sections.

Nothing quite like being 100′ up, with the top set of guy wires loosened, and feeling the tower sway a bit. Luckily there was just a tiny gentle breeze at the top of the tower. It truly was a perfect day for this part of the project.

We were able to get the tower down to the 40′ level. Need to put on some temporary guys to go any lower so it seemed like a good place to stop.

March 15, 2025

This was the next scheduled big work day. The goal was to get the 40-2CD and 205CA off of Tower 1. It was a nice, New England “Spring’ day with temperatures in the 40s, forecasted to go to 60. There was very little wind. Perfect!

The crew arrived at 9 am. We had Mark KW1X, Martin AA1ON, John N1PGA, Ken WO1N, and Joe KM1P.

Since we had extra manpower and I needed time to get up the tower, Martin and Joe took on the job of rigging temporary guys on tower 2. That will save some time when we get ready to finish it.

As I worked my way up the tower, the first project was to remove the 20m stacking switch and its phasing lines. Then remove a metal box that was the container for the previous 20m stacking relays and some other splice points. The stacking switch was easy. The metal box not so much. The screws that hold the cover closed were completely rusted. It took all my effort with the channel locks to move them.

I was so intent on getting the job done that I forgot to take a picture of the inside!

The 5-element 20 was at the top of the tower. It had a boom truss that was held up by a very rusty U-bolt about 4′ up the mast. I was lucky that the u-bolt was not so far gone that I could turn the nuts and loosen it. I cut the coaxes leading to the 20 and the 40 meter antennas. I hate to do that, but it was old enough that it would not be a candidate to reuse. I also removed the first director that was closest to the tower. This converted the antenna into a 4-element, which created a lot more room for rotating around the tower on the way down. I rigged a couple of straps and were ready to go.

Once the antenna was loose from the mast, it was a matter of getting it down through the guy wires. With the element removed, there wasn’t a lot I could use to twist the antenna. It took a few tries and some back-up and do-overs, but we made it. Only one bent tip end of an element!

I immediately headed back up the tower to remove the rotator. The rotator was the same model as on Tower 2, but this one was 20 years older. The hardware was metric so I didn’t have the right wrench or socket size. The 1/2″ just barely fit so I used that. The hardware was rusty, which didn’t help. And it looks like one of the mast clamps was cracked…

While it was headed down in the bucket, I started removing the rotator plate. Didn’t want it to hang things up when we lowered the mast. Of course, this meant undoing 6 U-bolts. And yes, there is always one that doesn’t want to give up easily. I had a second rotator plate already inside the tower that was keeping the mast straight.

We lowered the mast 4′ at a time. This mast is 20′ long, 2″ OD. and 1/4″ wall. It weighs more than 100 lbs! I rigged a couple of safety U-bolts to catch it if we lost control.

Things went well and soon we had the 40m beam sitting just a few inches above the top of the tower.

One of the lessons for the day was the value of stainless steel for nuts and bolts. See how shiny the stainless is compared to 30-year-old steel? This made taking the beam off the mast an easy job. I only dropped one saddle in the process. Whoops.

This antenna was fairly well-balanced and easy to corkscrew down the tower. The biggest challenge was not having anything to grab when I wanted to tip an element down to escape a guy wire. Unfortunately, there were no pictures during this process as we had all hands on the rope.

When an antenna would get to the ground, the crew started disassembling it. Once again, we saw the value of stainless vs other metals when it came time to take things apart! Their efforts will save me a lot of time later.

It took about 4 hours to get the two antennas down. Time for a short break. N1PGA took this photo of me while I was getting psyched up to climb the tower again.

Back to the top of the tower, I went. I was cutting tape and tie wraps on the way to free the coax and control cables on the tower. I had missed a few tie wraps, so we couldn’t get everything removed until I was on the way down at the end.

The mast was waiting for me. We had to lower the mast another 4 feet so I could reach the top. I dropped a rope down the inside, climbed down, and made a knot, then back up to loosen the U-bolts that were holding the mast in place. A half-turn of a nut and the mast started to slide. It went down the inside of the tower to the bottom without catching on anything. The ground crew had a challenge trying to lift the mast inside the tower so they could remove the knot!

I was very happy to see this part of the project reach a successful conclusion.

I wanted to remove the top plate to get some idea of how much this tower was going to resist coming apart.

Next lesson: Always use Rohn galvanized hardware on your towers. I must have run out of hardware and used whatever I had in hand at the time. The small bolts were very rusted and it was difficult to remove the nuts. Two of the large-size bolts were frozen and resisted all efforts to turn the nuts. After wasting a bunch of time, we decided to take down the top section with the plate attached.

This meant we needed to remove the guy wires at the 95′ level. I climbed down to the guy bracket at 65′ while the guys loosened and then unhooked the top set of guys. Nothing like that feeling of climbing up a tower that feels wobbly. You have to keep telling yourself it is not going to fall over…

I removed the guy wires from the bracket and tossed them down. The bolts on this first section were easily removed and it was a great relief to see the legs moving inside the section. It took a little help from the tower jack to get it started, but the first section popped off and was on its way down. We took down two more sections to get to the next guy bracket and called it quits for the day. At one point, I looked down and saw the full ground crew all in a line on the rope.

Total work time was from a little after 9 am to 3:35 pm. A very successful day and all goals were exceeded.

We headed to the drive-in for some R&R time.

Here is what the neighbors across have seen for the past 30+ years. And what they see now.

Continuing the story of the antenna takedown at K5ZD/1.

March 12, 2025

I was joined today by Mark KW1X, Martin AA1ON, and John N1PGA. We started around 10 am and the winds were relatively low with the forecast predicting they would become calm in the early afternoon (the forecast was correct!).

Here is our starting point for the day. A side-mounted 40-2CD at 70′, a 6-element 10m at 100′, and another 40-2CD at 110′.

The lower 40-2CD was on a bracket with a small mast. It was easy to pop the antenna off the mast and we engaged gravity to help with the rest. This tower has fairly narrow guying, plus a large pine tree that is too close, so it took some twisting and turning to guide the antenna down through the guy wires. I always seemed to get hooked on something behind me that I couldn’t see!

Next were the antennas at the top of the tower. We rigged up the gin pole and tied the rope to the 6-element 10. Of course, one side of one U-bolt holding the antenna galled during the removal of the bolt and had to be twisted off. A 6-el 10m doesn’t seem that large when you look up at it, but it was big enough to hang up on the 40-2CD above it and every guy wire on the way down. Again, gravity was our best helper, making it unharmed to the ground. I did have to climb down to help work it around each guy wire.

It took 2 hours of working time to reach this point. The wind had dropped to almost nothing there was no time to take a break. I headed back up the tower (again).

The mast on this tower is a 12′ long piece of 2″ OD steel tubing with a 1/4″ wall. It is HEAVY! My biggest fear is losing control of the mast and having it crash down the inside of the tower causing injury or popping the 40m off the top. I always add some safety u-clamps so the mast can never slip more than 3 or 4 feet. This took some time to set up. The gin pole rope was rigged to hold the mast.

Luckily, the mast was not sitting directly on the rotator. (Not really lucky, I always try to install them that way.) This meant I could remove the Yaesu G-2800 rotator completely without maneuvering the mast.

With the rotator removed, we were ready for the scary part. With the ground crew holding the rope, I loosed the bolts in the thrust bearing. With no wind, it was just a matter of moving the mast and it started to slide down. I tried to keep my feet out of the way and my hands away from the mast. When we hit the first safety, we stopped, rerigged, and repeated the operation. Once the mast had dropped through the hole in the rotator plate, I was less worried about keeping things straight and just worried about not dropping it.

With 3′ of mast sticking out the tower it was easy to attach the rope to the 40m boom and then pull it off the mast. With no other antennas on the tower, it was a matter of winding through the guy wires until we reached the bottom. There was a lot of waiting time for me to reposition on the tower and figure out which way to turn or twist the antenna.

Since the gin pole was already well positioned, I claimed back up and we removed the top plate from the tower. Since this tower had only been up for 2 years, it was relatively easy to pop off (with a little pushing on one side and then the other…).

The weather was perfect, but I was reaching my limit. Taking on the next tower section would require removing guy wires, which meant coming down anyway. I stripped the cables from the tower on my way down.

Total time was 5 hours. Amazed and happy that we were able to get so much down so quickly.

I hate leaving the gin pole outside in the elements, but no rain is in the forecast until our next planned work session on Saturday.

Here is the crew after chowing down their “pay” at the nearby drive-in.

March 6, 2025

I went up into the woods and started lowering the wire antennas. I also untied the various radials on the elevated 160m vertical that were tied to trees.

March 7, 2025

Mark KW1X came over to help. It was a blustery day in the low 40s and the wind was howling. We decided to start on some easy projects close to the ground.

First was the removal of the two tower sections that were holding up the feed point of the elevated 160 vertical.

Then we moved on to removing a Cushcraft A-3WS that was side-mounted about 30′ up a tower.

That went quickly so we started looking at the stack of 4-element 10-meter beams at 30′ and 60′ on tower 2. Before we could remove them, we needed to remove the shunt feed for 160m. That was a 65′ piece of aluminum tubing. I tied the shunt arm off to a rope and was able to lower it down. It was windy but didn’t seem too bad.

On to the 10-meter beams. The first one was only 30′ up. It took no time at all (gravity is very helpful when removing antennas).

The wind seemed to slacken so we were emboldened to work on the one at 60′. When I cleared the tree line around 55′, I realized how much the wind had increased. There had to be gusts in the 40mph range. I was holding on afraid to unclip to reposition the belt. Then my glasses flew off and landed 100′ down range…

The antenna came off and was easily lowered down to the ground. We both decided that was enough for one day. Amazing how much we got done in just 3 hours.

March 8, 2025

I took apart all of the antennas we had lowered and prepared them for the move. A 20′ U-Haul truck has a 16′ bed.

The goal was to have all the antenna pieces be shorter than 16′ 10″ or be positioned into the extra area over the passenger cab.

This was another 3-4 hours of working time.

March 9, 2025

Mark KW1X returned on a day that was not as cold or windy. The goal for today was to remove the side mount antennas on Tower 1 and take down the 80m dipole that was strung between the towers.

First up was the 5-ele Hygain 155CA at 33′.

That didn’t take long at all. Well, except for the rusted bolts that took forever to remove the nuts. I learned the value of stainless steel hardware multiple times this day – especially for things that have been in the weather for nearly 30 years!

We removed the lower Hygain 205CA that was at 50′ without issue. You don’t realize how big a 20 meter mono-bander is until you have it in your hand trying to maneuver it around a guy wire.

We took a bit of a break to lower the 80 meter dipole. Of course, the rope caught on the top of the tower on one side so we rolled up what we could. Mark is a professional electrician and a master at rolling up cables!

Next was another Hygain 155CA at 66′. It was on a side mount, so it didn’t take long to loosen the bolts and lift it off. We managed to get past two sets of guy wires without bending it up.

We then removed the swinging gate rotatable side mount. One bolt refused to loosen or break off, so Mark had to send the electric saw up to cut it off. The side mount was obtained from W8JGU more than 40 years ago and it is a great design and has worked well.

The last item for the day was to remove the 30 meter dipole at 80′. That was easy compared to the rest of the antennas!

Once again, an amazing amount of work in just 4 hours.

March 11

The weather felt like Spring. Temperatures were in the low 60s, with plenty of sun, and almost no wind. Of course, no tower climbing projects were planned for the day. But, it did give me a chance to take apart some antennas and start to remove the cable runs. This station has 8 separate coax/hardline cables plus another 10 control cables. Tower 1 is 275′ from the house and Tower 2 is 250′ away.

I had to take advantage of the nice weather. I climbed to the top of Tower 2 to free the rope for the 80 meter dipole. While I was there, I removed all the catenary ropes that had been holding up the 80 meter 4 square. Of course, the wind caused two of them to get caught in the top of trees.

Back on the ground, I removed all the remote coax relays and the box containing the 160 shunt-feed capacitor.

All of the coaxes back to the shack were run on messenger cables to keep the critters from chewing them up. I started liberating cables and pulling them down the hill. Lots more to do to get everything pulled and coiled.

It was another good 4 hours of progress.