Albums: WA7DUH And WB7CNV Tower Construction
WA7DUH And WB7CNV Tower Construction
Photo essay of tower project at the station of Linda WB7CNV and Steve WA7DUH. They live just outside of the Richland and West Richland city limits in Benton County. Project is to initially erect a 65 ft guyed tower, but to design it for 75 ft or higher. Benton County has an ordinance controlling "communications facilities" (BCC 11.65) which includes "communication towers and antennas." Many of the requirements are exempted for amateur radio towers and antennas not exceeding 65 ft.P1020724.JPG
Steve WA7DUH; Peter's wife Tacy (on the end); Gary W7TYQ and Dave W7DJE trying to program a 2M handi-talkie; and Peter AC7SB.
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Many parts to each unit..
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Assembling an element housing unit (EHU) prior to installation.
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The interior of a SteppIR Element Housing Unit (EHU) with stepper motor that drives copper-beryllium tapes in and out of the hollow antenna element tubes. The tapes are the radiating/active elements of the Yagi beam antenna. This SteppIR antenna is able to be resonant anywhere between 6.5 Mhz and 54 Mhz by adjusting the lengths of the Beryllium tapes. The tapes are wound on the spools that are seen in the picture using the cogged wheel that engage holes punched into the tapes. Cogged wheel is driven by a stepper motor, which has absolute positioning capability. The computerized controller knows how far to position out the tapes in the driver, reflector and director tubes for any given frequency.
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Gary (W7TYQ) Dave (W7DJE) and Peter (AC7SB) attach the reflector Return Element Support to the boom.
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Peter Rosenberg (AC7SB) from Fall City WA joins the antenna assembly team. Steve (WA7DUH), Peter and Gary (W7TYQ) apply anti-sieze compound to the staddles that will be used for one of the Return Element fixtures. Liberal use of anti-sieze compound is critical because of the many dissimilar metals used in both the antenna and hazer (aluminum, stainless steel hardware and galvanized steel.)