Well after 30+ years of having a freestanding tower and talking about their virtues while at the same time expressing my distaste for guyed towers and vowing to never own one, I find myself contemplating putting up a guyed tower. :headbang I don't want to mind you but it all boils down to basic finances. At this stage in my life I want to make any major tower and antenna purchases something that will last pretty much the rest of my days or at least until I am unable to climb any more. I also want something that is going to perform decently as well.Both of these requirements mean $$$$. To that end I narrowed the antenna selection down to either a Hygain Thunderbird series TH-11DXA for the five bands from 10m-20m or a Hygain Explorer-14 for 10,15, and 20m with a Hygain DB-1217 stacked above it for 12 and 17m.I'm leaning towards the two antenna option right now as the price is almost the same and the wind loading is nearly identical. Either decision will require the purchase of a new heavy rotator and an equally heavy duty tower to support everything. I priced the Trylon Titan series towers and choked at the price tag of over $4000+ tax and shipping for the bare minimum tower that would hold everything at 56 feet.I then turned my sights on the sixty feet of steel lattice tower I have over by the barn. It was originally an AM radiator at one of the sites I used to look after and is part of the original 220 foot tower. This tower is 24 inches on a face and each ten foot section weighs about 175 pounds and is made by Trylon.It is galvanized steel and has solid rod legs not hollow tubing. Three sections are 1 inch solid legs and three are 3/4 inch solid rod legs. Each size has 1/2 inch solid steel rod bracing. I just checked the specs for the Trylon 18 inch face towers and they are speced at being able to handle a 95 MpH wind while supporting 50 square feet of antenna at 60 feet high,more than twice the specs for Rohn-65G. I can't imagine what my 24 inch tower is rated for.Using what I already have will save me many thousands of dollars so I have decided to go with what I have right now. I will need to have a couple plates made up to support the rotator and top bearing but that is a no brainer. I may even top out the 60 foot Trylon with either one or two tapered 8 foot sections of Delhi DMX tower sections which I also already have, and are about 22 inches on a face.This will top out at about 75 feet with two sets of proper EHS steel guy wires,one at 30 feet and the other at 60 feet.The top 8 or 16 feet will require no guys as it is the bottom sections of a freestanding tower and is super strong. I figure with this tower arrangement I should be able to park a small sailboat at the top and not worry. 
The only thing I have not quite yet figured out about this whole thing is how to deal with the guy wires while erecting the antennas. There are a few different ways to deal with them, one involves assembling the antennas on the tower which is truely a pain in every essence of the word. Another involves making a special boom/mast clamp that will allow the antenna boom to be rotated to a vertical position which still means assembling the antenna on the tower but making it easier to do so. Yet another way involves using a catenary as a tram line to haul the assembled antenna to the top of the tower. This is often a guy line if the line does not have any insulators inline. Mine will have. The last option is the most expensive one and involves a crane truck to lift the fully assembled antenna to the top and is not one that I am considering at this time but I may have to eventually.The big problem of course is that the guy wires converge at the top making it difficult to maneuver a large ungainly antenna around them. Even if I go with the smaller dual antenna arrangement each antenna will still have a 14 foot boom and 30 foot long elements and weigh in around 35+ pounds each making for some serious grunt work trying to get the antennas past the guy wires. If I have to go with the crane truck I will have to get everything ready and have the antenna(s) fully assembled before the tower goes up and may as well have the truck stand the tower up as well and as soon as the guys are secure have him lift the antennas up. I suppose that way I would get the best bang for my buck in rental fees.What method have you guys used to combat the guy wire problem?
The only thing I have not quite yet figured out about this whole thing is how to deal with the guy wires while erecting the antennas. There are a few different ways to deal with them, one involves assembling the antennas on the tower which is truely a pain in every essence of the word. Another involves making a special boom/mast clamp that will allow the antenna boom to be rotated to a vertical position which still means assembling the antenna on the tower but making it easier to do so. Yet another way involves using a catenary as a tram line to haul the assembled antenna to the top of the tower. This is often a guy line if the line does not have any insulators inline. Mine will have. The last option is the most expensive one and involves a crane truck to lift the fully assembled antenna to the top and is not one that I am considering at this time but I may have to eventually.The big problem of course is that the guy wires converge at the top making it difficult to maneuver a large ungainly antenna around them. Even if I go with the smaller dual antenna arrangement each antenna will still have a 14 foot boom and 30 foot long elements and weigh in around 35+ pounds each making for some serious grunt work trying to get the antennas past the guy wires. If I have to go with the crane truck I will have to get everything ready and have the antenna(s) fully assembled before the tower goes up and may as well have the truck stand the tower up as well and as soon as the guys are secure have him lift the antennas up. I suppose that way I would get the best bang for my buck in rental fees.What method have you guys used to combat the guy wire problem?
