Corbeil Contest Club/NBARC Tower Raising

BY: VE3MAF Drew Riddell

SANTA BE CAREFUL........

There is a new tower to watch out for in the North Bay area.  Actually, it is at the Corbeil CONTEST CLUB  out BC (Behind Corbeil).  The Corbeil Contest Club is on the farm of Ken Smith VA3SK's father-in-law, Bob Williams VA3RTW.  Ken promised Bob he could work the world on 80 metres if he was allowed to put up a tower.   Bob said OK. Notice that Ken didn't say how BIG a tower.  We're not sure Bob realized how far up it was going to go.

About 2 years ago CHUR AM 850 dropped its AM format and went to 100.5 FM.  When it did this its AM transmitting antenna array was taken out of service.  This array consisted of 5 - 240 ft towers, now just standing around doing nothing.  To Ken, a good Ham and avid contester, it was a dream come true.   First he put in a bid to dismantle the site, but that didn't work.  Then he investigated buying the site (we can always throw up some sort of shack to operate from).   It was out of his price range.  Ken then contacted the person who had won the contract to demolish the site and got a video of one of the towers coming down.  (It is fascinating to watch a 240' tower fall after the guy cables have been cut)  Ken approached NBARC offering the tower as a site for emergency communications as well as a repeater site.  The NBARC membership decided that this was a good idea and offered to help Ken with the tower.  Ken went ahead and made arrangements to purchase 12 sections that were in good shape.

Bill VA3WFS, Ken VA3SK, Paul VA3PC, Bob VE3RAA, Waldemar VE3SYN, Evelyn VE3MAA, Drew VE3MAF

The tower went up in a number of sections.  The first was early September, when a number of the members got together with trailers and trucks to pick-up the 12 sections and enough guy cable to support the tower.  These were then driven over to the farm and off loaded.  One or two went out a week or so later to dig out and cut off as much of the guy stations as possible.  The next stage was to get the tower base and guy stations ready.  There just happened to be a nice piece of granite to mount the tower to so Bob (with a little persuasion) built a form to level it off.   The guy station holes were dug and then a lot of concrete was mixed, poured and allowed to cure for about 3 weeks.

Do you remember how nice it was Thanksgiving Saturday October 10, 1997?  Well out at the Corbeil Contest Club it was just beautiful.  Bright Sunshine, almost no wind and great fall colours.  We assembled about 0900L and started.  Ken already had the first section up and bolted into place.

Ken & Mike VA3MW, were our professional amateur tower erectors and placed their lives in our hands.

The gin pole was a 10' piece of 2.5" Conduit that weighed about 80 lbs.

The bottom sections weighed in between 250 and 300 lbs. and so a crew of grunts (all?? brawn and little brain) were required.

By the time the sun set and we had to quit, the tower was 90ft tall with the guy wires at the 40 ft  and the 80 ft (not shown) mark. 

The next major step was to get ready for the CQ WW DX contest October 25 & 26.  Ken and Mike got 1 more tower section and an 80 metre array up in time for the contest.  With the 80 M array they were getting impressive back to front differences of S1 to S7 to the west coast.

November 30th was the final erection party.  A crew assembled and got the last two sections and the top set of guy wires on.  The tower now topped out at 120 ft with the 80 meter array attached.

The view from the top is grand.  The TH7 on top of a 68 foot tower looks small not to mention looking down on the barn.

There are a few winter projects to complete.  A rotator plate and thrust bearing plate have to be made.  VE3ERX repeater (145.15-) is going to be located on the top so about 250 ft of heliax have to be located.  Ken  is planning to put a monobander (BIG) or two (BIGGER) on top and they have to be made as well as locating enough aluminum pipe to gamma match the tower on 160 M.  In the spring we'll be having another party to help put all this suff up.  Hope the weather is as nice then as it was  in the fall. 

How does the 80 M array work you ask.  Well Bob VA3RTW is into VK land quite regularly.

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LAST UPDATED 25 Jan 1998.