Antenna Mast, Antennas, and CB Radio Install, NaNoWriMo

Right in the middle of the house is an old unused chimney. I believe it is the original chimney judging by the design of it and the fact it is not connected to anything in the house. It is 16 feet deep to the top edge of the chimney. I decided to use a 4 inch piece of schedule 80 pvc, part of an old well liner, that is 19 feet long for my base.

WELL, the scariest and seriously most dangerous part of this whole process was getting that 19 foot long piece of pvc lifted vertically and dropped down the 10x6 inch square hole. I leaned the pvc vertically against the chimney then climbed atop the chimney with a foot aside the hole and one on the lip. I then lifted the pipe vertically and with every bit of my strength was able to keep it in the air, me teetering on the chimney, long enough to be able to slot it in the hole.

I lowered it down to my wood blocks that hold the bottom in place and set it there while I calmed down my nerves.

Come to find out my block stack was too thick to fit in the chimney so I had to remove a 2x4 and the stick of OSB and replace it with a 1x2 strip. This made it 5.5 inches of spacer but it fit down the hole nicely.

With the block setup I dropped the pipe down the chimney and lodged in the bottom as tight as I could. I then mashed my block of rigid foam into the top of the chimney to lock the pvc base in place. It is super solid now and doesn't move at all.

After taking R to preschool I spent some time installing the cb into my truck. Since I installed the antenna yesterday I wanted to get the CB in. It took a bit of perusing the underside of the dash to figure out where to run the wires but I had more than enough power wire to reach the fuse panel and the antenna wire is gathered beneath the center console. This is just a simple cb without a lot of bells and whistles as I don't need that much since I will be getting my ham radio soon which will cover all the other frequencies.

After picking R up from preschool I got back to work on the antenna. I stated on the metal top mast by installing the bracket for the CB antenna. I have used bolts to attach them as I want to easily remove them where rivets would not make that very possible.

I rummaged in the tool shed and found myself a stubby 1/4-20 screw that attached the wifi base to the other bracket which got bolted to the top of the mast.

The arm out to the side is for the tv antenna. Over the years I have moved this thing all over the place trying to get a good signal. My goal has been to get it higher in the air to hopefully pull better signal past the hill to our south.

All three antenna installed and wired. I put a pvc cap on the top to keep rain and snow out of the inside of the mast. I also installed a ground wire to the metal mast below the antenna mounts that I am going to run to the metal roof which I will be grounding to the rod next to the house. Being in the middle of the roof it is very difficult to run the ground wire all the way to the ground rod so I am going to experiment. If it comes to it I can always change it if it causes problems.

It was a fairly simple thing then to lift the top mast piece into place and slide it into the base. My for-now completed antenna mast with the top being 28 feet above the ground.

So I ended up finding that the tv antenna is likely not going to remain on the top of the mast. When I came inside to test the tv reception I had lost all the channels with the antenna at full height. I went up and lowered the mast by letting it slide down the base and when I went inside the channels had returned so today I will be removing the tv antenna from the top and installing it on the top of the pvc base pole. For now I will use pipe clamps to hold the bracket and antenna on.

The mast is going to be great though as I will be able to mount my 2m-70cm antenna atop it and be able to get better height and visibility for it. Eventually I may have to put an antenna on the hill for better signal.

In the evening I spent a few hours doing word sprints for NaNoWriMo as I had gotten myself behind from the weekend. I managed 3200 words in under 3 hours and am now up to 64k total and 31k for NaNo. I did write myself to a stumbling block though and need to do some thinking on what direction I am going to go.

It is supposed to rain again today and I want to get the antenna placed right before it does. There is still time for my package to make it to the UPS depot in Spokane this morning for it to go out for delivery otherwise it will be tomorrow when I get my UV-5X3.