What to do with a 100' tower?

I'm thinking of buying a property that was once the sight for a local dish satellite system. My first concern is liability, although it seems very well built and there is no rust through the galvanized tubing. It's 100' tall in 5 20' sections with three cables at 3 places around the tower, total of 9 cables. A view from the top would look like a triangle, each side about 3' and it appears to be the same size from the top to the bottom.

I did just find a fairly close sign company with a 120' crane, but today is sunday so I can't call. I don't know what the tower would cost, maybe someone would take it for free if they take it down? Maybe it's worth more?

If it gets expensive I think I could topple the thing one direction where it is far from any buildings or trees. It actually looks easy using the cables but that also sounds like a story for the Darwin awards.

Any suggestions appreciated. I thought of renting out antenna space but I figure it would already be done if anyone was interested.

Looking for suggestions of things to ask or research that I may not think of. I guess i could leave 20 or 40 feet there and put a TV antenna on it!

Reply to
Tony
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if its well enough built a wind generator.

although toppling it and selling for scrap might be better if no one will buy it......

steel scrap is going for about 10 bucks per hundred.

Reply to
hallerb

If your local paper has free adds you may put it in that for free. Maybe some ham radio operators would take it down if given to them.

Reply to
Ralph Mowery

Craiglist!! Or check the local ARRL hamfest groups, you could make a ham so happy

Reply to
hallerb

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has classified ads.

"Perce"

Reply to
Percival P. Cassidy

Maybe they'd pay a little something to get the rights to stick a 2M repeater on it.

Reply to
krw

First thing, try to sell it. craigslist, ebay, whatever. It's free money. If no one will buy it, consider it, like you say, for your own TV antenna. If not, just drop it, and sell the steel.

Steve

visit my blog at

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Reply to
Steve B

Can they convert this tower into a Billboard (location, location) location?

Do it with no wind blowing. Do you know how much a 100' tower sways at the top.

Reply to
Oren

Put a wind turbine generator on the top and call yourself "green". Place your TV antenna a bit further down the tower. Place a netcam or two up near the top of the tower for some nice views.

Also, it should not cost very much to have the tower inspected by a tower service company in your area to ensure it is in good condition and the guys are properly tensioned.

Reply to
Pete C.

Why no put a tv antenna on top of the full 100 feet. Talk about great reception.....

Reply to
jameswaters

When I was younger, I could climb the darn things and would have loved to have owned an elevated piece of property with such a tower. I could have so much fun hanging antennas on something like that for all of my mad scientist RF experiments.

TDD

Reply to
The Daring Dufas

Might as well leave the whole tower up if you're going to leave up to 40 feet of it.

Reply to
Jeff The Drunk

Liability. Right now if it could possibly fall, it could land on a nice house next door.

Reply to
Tony

You still can relive your younger days! Come on, you know you want it.

Reply to
Tony

Liability. The house next door is less than 100' away.

Reply to
Tony

If a kid climbs it on a dare from his friends, and gets hurt, or killed, you are on the hook.

Reply to
salty

That's the key word here, indeed. If the surrounding property is now zoned for residential and there are houses within the radius it could hit your insurance agent will definitely have an interest in rates for that potential you'll need to consider.

One would, as you've alluded to, presume if there were any interest in the site for either continuing satellite or other usage it is highly unlikely a usable tower wouldn't be in use. I'd certainly want to find out whether there's even any possibility of it being used for that purpose; I'd suspect probably the reason it isn't being used now is that zoning regulations have changed that forced them to go elsewhere and that it wouldn't be allowed for cell or other use having once been abandoned. And, of course, even if it were potentially allowed, then you would be in a commercial venture and have that level of liability as opposed to simply a homeowner.

I'd think it could easily cost as much or more to re-rig the support guys for a shorter height as it would to dismantle it entirely and I'd also expect there to be no commercial demand for it or somebody would have already taken it. It's one of those things where the overhead in taking it down and moving it and re-erecting it elsewhere would be far more than new construction in very high likelihood.

Unless the land had real other value and can be got for much less than the removal cost or there is some other reason the particular site has other value I'd surely be thinking twice't and more and probably pass on this nuisance. It surely needs some expert research at a minimum on local conditions regarding the limitations in future use either personal or commercial and what, if any, maintenance obligations come with it that the current owner must pass on or are statutory by various jurisdictions. I've no clue, just cautionary. Unless I were certain I was going to have it removed, I'd want a current engineering evaluation of condition, not just a look-see of my own as can imagine such would be required for liability coverage as well as simply wanting to know didn't overlook something.

All in all sounds like trouble _I_ don't need... :)

--

Reply to
dpb

If the tower is guyed properly and in good physical shape I wouldn't worry about it crashing into the neighbor's house. I have a 65 foot tall TV tower with a large ham radio antenna atop that I put up in 1980 that is not guyed (cabled) and it has withstood some storms that have knocked down nearby trees. Funny though this tower is 10 foot sections with a 9 foot top section. I can't recall seeing TV tower with 20 foot sections. Even heavy duty tower for ham radio like what's available from Rohn is in

10 foot sections.
Reply to
Jeff The Drunk

First off, if it's an existing structure, it is grandfathered into any zoning changes.

The fact that it's not currently in use means little. Based on what is mentioned about it's prior use, it was likely a CARS band relay site for a cable system which has simply been obsoleted by a fiber optic upgrade of the cable system. A cable system I used to work for had two such leased sites, and retired both when they did a full system rebuild / upgrade which replaced the old CARS band microwave links with fiber.

The fact that some other use has not been made of the tower could relate to numerous things, such as the expiration of the lease for the site, the property owner not investigating a new lease with a different company, location, and cellular operators already having adequate tower space in the area. 100' is also pretty low for cell towers.

As for the possibility of the tower falling down, that is pretty unlikely unless the tower has been out of service and maintenance for a

*long* time. The cost to have the tower inspected by a qualified tower company is not that much and they can give an accurate report on any issues, and what future maintenance might be needed. Also guyed towers *do not* simply fall over unless they are deliberately sabotaged. If a guyed tower fails for some reason, they will fall within an area about 30% of the tower's height, which means for a 100' tower, it would not fall more than 30' or so from it's base. The tower manufacturer's engineers can provide documentation of this, and have done so for at least one person I know of.

You might investigate leasing tower space to an Internet MDS company if they are common in the area. They provide Internet service to consumers via short haul microwave links and often locate their antennas on water towers and similar lower structures. A lease agreement could provide for annual tower maintenance and free Internet service. You would also still be able to put up a wind generator, etc. if you wanted.

Reply to
Pete C.

Nope, too many health problems, too much pain.

TDD

Reply to
The Daring Dufas

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