Radio Towers

This was by far not my first antenna system, but is the first I can find any pictures of. This picture was taken in November 1977 which consisted of a 4 element tri-band quad at 80 feet and a 2 element tri-band quad at 30 feet. This was taken on Viking Drive east of the city of Jackson, MI.

After moving from Viking Drive to Allman Road near Concord, the 80 foot Heights tower was increased to 96 feet and the 4 element tri-band quad was reconstructed. Above it were 6 and 2 meter vertical stuff. After 10 years on Viking Drive we spent the next 11 years at this QTH with 18.6 acres. I played with long wire antennas and several wire strung beams for the lower frequencies. This picture was taken in the winter of 1978-79.

This was the peak of my Quad built antennas. 4 elements on 20, 6 on 15 and 7 on 10 meters. Was built in the early fall of 1979 and only survived until late January 1980. The picture on the right is somewhat strange, the antenna was covered with frost and made the elements look big and thick.

By the fall of 1980 I had put up a TB-6EM from Telerex at 100 feet, a Hygain 204-BA at 70 feet and the 2 Element quad went on a 30 foot tower. I had heard Telerex made the best beams, sorry I wasn't impressed. Never felt I was getting anything close to the gain that it was supposed to have. It was built solid but I found down falls in the trap construction, during the time I owned it I lost two different traps to lighting. This antenna system was used from summer of 1980 through the summer of 1982.

In 1989 after a few other 4 element quads were used on Allman Road we moved to the North East side of Jackson to Dalton Road, now only 2 acres to work with. A 4 element quad, and the 204-BA were installed on the reconstructed Heights tower, 30 inch sections were added to the bottom and a new height of 112 feet was obtained. Six and 2 meter antennas were added to the system and a vertical for 40. The tower was now guyed in 4 directions, this allowed me to use the top set of guys for Inverted Vees on 80 meters.

As time moved on a new tower was added, 185 foot of Rohn 25-G. Replaced the 204-BA with another 2 element tri-bander and most of the 6, 2 and 440 antennas were moved to the new tower. Finally everything got switched from 144, 220 and 440 DX-Cluster back bone connections to Internet. Only 2 meter RF link to USERs was still in use. By the end of 2007 even that was dropped. My ISP used my 185 foot tower to feed wide-band to the North East side of Jackson, my Internet became totally free. The CARS radio club used the top for their 146.28-88 repeater for several years.

In 1995 the last quad came down and a Hygain TH11DX was placed on top of the 112 tower giving me access to the WARC bands. Contesting began to call again and much of my time and thoughts were focused on more changes.

Being in the bottom of the sun spot cycle made things difficult to decide what was going to be best for an aging OM on ham radio, didn't want to stay up all night contesting on 40 or 80 so some concentration went towards 15 meters. In this picture you can see a 6 element 15 meter beam at 70 feet facing Europe. Another 6 element is pointed south at 40 feet which can not be seen. To the bottom right you can see a 42 foot tower with a rotate able tri-band beam. The big tower is getting work done to the 75 meter slopers coming off at 175 feet. There is also a 160 meter Inverted Vee just above that.

It's now winter 2007-8 and more plans are being worked on. Hopefully by the end of summer we will add more antenna pictures.