Anybody here good at carving?

[Nova]

Anchor a short section of 4" steel pipe to the tree trunk and use that for the mast of the dish.

-- Jack Novak Buffalo, NY - USA (Remove "SPAM" from email address to reply)

[Doug Miller]

Maybe I'm missing something... but is there a reason you can't use treated

4x4s from Home Depot? Even if your setup has mounting brackets to fit a 4" round post, there must be some way to adapt the mount to a square post.

-- Regards, Doug Miller (alphageek-at-milmac-dot-com)

Get a copy of my NEW AND IMPROVED TrollFilter for NewsProxy/Nfilter by sending email to autoresponder at filterinfo-at-milmac-dot-com You must use your REAL email address to get a response.

[Dave W]

[Tom Quackenbush]

I don't know anything about mounting a 10' satellite dish so take this with a grain of salt.I also don't think that you included enough specifics in your question. How long is the post/pole that you're talking about?

Not knowing anything about proven methods of building a dish mount, I'd be inclined to pour a concrete base, probably using a Sonotube, to a depth below the frost line.

If you need to use a wood post, with a 4" cylindrical end, why not start with a 6x6 PT post (or PT landscape timber)? If you only need one, shaping the end by hand shouldn't be too hard. What is the length of the portion of the post that needs to be a 4" cylinder? You could do it with a:

1. Spokeshave 2. Drawknife 3. Knife (preferably large - Ka-Bar or similar) 4. Hatchet 5. Busted Coke bottle or anything else sharp - we're not talking brain surgery here. 6. You could also mount a cutter in a fixture to turn the piece more precisely, but that seems like overkill for your purposes.

If you want to use an existing tree trunk for your post, that will probably work, too. Use black locust or something equally rot-resistant. Inquire further of the group for other approprate trees.

If you want to use the trunk of a non-rot-resistant tree, it gets a little trickier. I've heard of people doing their own "PT" treatment, but I've never tried it myself.

I suppose I don't really know what you're asking - how to mount a satelitte dish, how to turn a round tenon on a log/timber, or ?

Can you describe the fitting with will clamp (?) on the pole?

Have you checked with the local scrapyard?

R, Tom Q.

[Michael Shaffer]

Ok, I have this 10' diameter mesh satellite dish that I would like to anchor. The only problem is 4" diameter poles cost about $170 from the local metal yard. I want to save a little money and use a tree trunk. The only thing I would have to worry about then is rotting. I have a lot of unused deck sealant, would that work? Also, any tips for making the end of the pole straight? I don't have a lathe unfortunately. It has to be 4" diameter..

Thanks

[Charles Spitzer]