3

I have a 190 foot tall am/fm radio tower I need to take down. Taking it down with big enough crane and manlifts and a torque crew will be quite expensive. It is a guyed lattice tower that if necessary I will let fall over by disconnecting one of the guys. Then of course the tower will be scrap. Any other ideas?

slipperyhill
  • 31
  • 2
  • 7
    You need construction and safety advice, not radio or radio technology advice. – Zeiss Ikon Mar 03 '21 at 13:10
  • 2
    Can't agrue with that. Thought perhaps someone here may have had a experience with this type of situation. Also thought the tower may be of interest to someone before I let it fall and scrap it. Maybe this isn't the right forum. – slipperyhill Mar 03 '21 at 13:37
  • I also have the transmitter and translater and will scrap them I guess. – slipperyhill Mar 03 '21 at 13:41
  • 2
    Seeing as, in the US, the license exams have several Qs relating to tower safety, I think this is an appropriate question. – webmarc Mar 03 '21 at 14:22
  • Moving a 190 foot tower pretty much implies bringing it down in sections, the way it was put up originally. Seems like quite a job. – Zeiss Ikon Mar 03 '21 at 14:30
  • I once had a system on a commercial guyed 180 foot tower. A storm blew the sheet metal roof of a building into the tower, buckling it about halfway up. The safest thing was to cut the guys and let it fall, no-one was going to go near it to recover any equipment. – tomnexus Mar 03 '21 at 15:11
  • If I end up falling this tower I thought I'd make it an event. Not everyday a struture that big comes crashing down :) I have thought about adding a guyline at the 100 foot connection and removing everything above 125 foot fifth section and then mounting a Bergey wind turbine. The three legs of the tower are 2 3/8" OD so it is pretty stout. Heavier than the towers sold with the turbine. – slipperyhill Mar 03 '21 at 15:43
  • 1
    And then you (or someone) is up a tower that's got 90 feet unsupported, trying to take off sections. Not me, thanks. – Zeiss Ikon Mar 03 '21 at 16:44
  • 1
    There is an existing lower guy at 75 feet. Should have included that info. The upper guy is at the 150 foot mark. Would have to manlift a welder to the 100 connection to add eyelets for the guys. Connect the new guys. Get a crane to latch onto the tower at 190. Disconnect the upper guys. Then have a guy with hydralic torque wrenchs unbolt the connection at 125 foot. Great caution and attention to detail would be needed. – slipperyhill Mar 03 '21 at 16:58
  • 3
    There are companies and individuals that specialize in tower work; you should contact one. BTW cranes and helicopters are used to erect such towers, but there is also a fixture known as a gin pole. It gets bolted onto a tower section, and it has a vertical pole with a pulley on top. To take down a tower one could be bolted to the second-highest section, and then a cable goes over the pulley and gets attached to the top section. The other end of the cable is attached to a winch on the ground. The bolts attaching the top section are loosened, and the section is winched to the ground. – rclocher3 Mar 03 '21 at 16:58
  • Thank you rclocher3. – slipperyhill Mar 03 '21 at 16:59
  • 2
    Have you considered becoming a ham operator and repurposing the tower for your antenna(s)? (Would also work for Short Wave Listening hobby). – Phil Freedenberg Mar 09 '21 at 20:43
  • 1
    I have not. It sounds interesting. Right now all my attention is cleaning up the doublewide the radio station was housed in and refurbishing it into a dwelling. They walked out of there and left everything. Ten office desks, Nineteen computers, a wall of reel to reel and recievers, amps....Thank you for the suggestion. – slipperyhill Mar 11 '21 at 12:58
  • 1
    OMG, you have all that equipment that they left? A dream. Can I have it? And I agree you might want to keep the tower. Or did some insurance company tell you to take it down? – Gunther Schadow Mar 17 '21 at 01:19
  • +1 for not scrapping things that don't need to be scrapped - if you can't find anyone who wants it then it's excusable - but if someone does want it, why scrap it? – user253751 Mar 17 '21 at 14:29
  • Gunther and 253751, I ;have been busy cleaning out the station. Unfortunately all is gone now except the tower and the transmitter. The transmitter is encased in a 42" x 42" (approx) 5 foot tall metal housing. There looks to batteries and I don't know what else in there. It probably wieghs around 500 lbs. Why its the last. I can send pictures if you'd like. Via e' – slipperyhill Mar 18 '21 at 11:19

0 Answers0