Installing the SteppIR 3el Antenna
Preparation
Trimming the trees
Last August (2003) we had to have a tree removed and I contacted Beeler Tree Service to do the job. While the crew was here I asked them to trim back some of the limbs that I thought might interfere with the antenna as it was going up. The boom is 16' long so I needed a clear area 16'x36' (with the antenna pointed East) to raise it above the trees. It looked to me like the 8' between the tower and the trees had a number of limbs in the way.
The crew was amazing! Though there was a language problem (none of them spoke English well and my Spanish.....) we were able to communicate well enough to get the job done. What was really cool was watching the "up-the-tree" guy swing from one tree to the other without climbing down!
But, since I didn't think to raise the tower all the way I couldn't be sure that it was going to clear the tree tops on those two trees. Sooooo....
I had them back out on February 13th (no leaves to obstruct the view) and raised the tower all the way so they could see if they were winning.
Here's what it looked like before today's cutting:
Today's objective is to top those two trees at about 50' to ensure plenty of room for the antenna to turn w/o damage.
Safety involves getting your lines in order. There was a climber and two ground helpers:
The "up-the-tree" guy had no trouble getting up there:
This piece is coming down first:
..and here it comes:
Now this piece:
..coming down:
Leaving tree #1 like this:
Remember how I said the guy swings from one tree to another? Here he is moving (it's a controlled move) to tree #2:
BTW, those cutoff limbs on tree #2 to his right were trimmed last summer.
The next piece coming down:
Almost done now:
And, so, it's over:
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