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 ghost6
 
Location: R'lyeh, North Carolina
Gender: Male
 |  | Re: Typical Thursday night tower climb
<Reply # 20 on 6/22/2013 6:27 PM >
|  | | | btw, any tower with panel antennas is a busy place right now. everybody is upgrading to 4g technology, new installations are going up, and all the new shit that just went up is breaking. smart smart move climbing an empty tower, otherwise chances are you will have visitors during the say.
The nightmare corpse-city of R'lyeh…was built in measureless eons behind history by the vast, loathsome shapes that seeped down from the dark stars. There lay great Cthulhu and his hordes, hidden in green slimy vaults. |
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Therrin
   
This member has been banned. See the banlist for more information.
Location: North of Chicago, IL
Gender: Male
*Therrin puts on the penguin-suit
| |  | Re: Typical Thursday night tower climb
<Reply # 21 on 6/22/2013 7:14 PM >
| | | | Posted by ghost6
Good luck using that safety cable. Its 5/16" aircraft cable, contrary to popular belief, perfectly legal under osha to use, however everything else these days uses 3/8 wire rope or 7 strand cable. That too was quite impressive for its day, back when most else was either a cramped safety cage, this bullshit involving sliding up a pipe with notches, or nothing at all.
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I've climbed both 3/8" and 5/16" for work in modern construction towers, as well as "avanti" rails. One LadSafe is only for 3/8", the other fits both 3/8" AND 5/16".
The large concrete tower in my second pic used 5/16" cable, 350' tall.
That tower was a BITCH to climb. With the ladder set 1' off the wall, you didn't get to wall-slide with your back cuz you're climbing the other side of the ladder, and since the tower diameter decreases in size the higher you go, you reach a point where it's angled and your weight wants to pull you right off it.
When we first climbed it they didn't even have the safety cable in yet and we had to use lanyards (lobster claws) alllll the way up.
Nothing worse than having to clip in a lanyard every few feet, unclip the last one, climb a few rungs, clip that back in, rinse/repeat; especially with that backward angle you're fighting against, and with 30lb of tools hanging off you.
In the first pic you can see the rail.
Climbing with rails absolutely blows. Every 20ft or so the rails butt up next to the next piece, but they never are perfectly aligned. So you'll be climbing and then suddenly just jerk to a stop when it gets hung up. They don't slide as well as the cable devices, a real PITA.
I've got a set of pipe climbers as well, just haven't had the opportunity to use them.
[last edit 6/22/2013 7:15 PM by Therrin - edited 1 times]
Give a person a match and they'll be warm for a minute, but light them on fire and they'll be warm for the rest of their life. =) |
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ghost6
Location: R'lyeh, North Carolina
Gender: Male
| | Re: Typical Thursday night tower climb
<Reply # 22 on 6/26/2013 11:58 PM >
| | | | that bar on the safety climb sucks. wait till you go up an andrews tower with the cable permanently affixed to the tower and try and slide it past the attachment points. i didnt realize the new sliders were also for 5/16, or maybe you got a special model. come to think of it i did once have a slider for a 5/16 cable, it was tower treasure and i think it was 5/16, it was real simple, no rolling parts or nothing like that, but none of my biners would fit the hole and i never used it
i tried the rail thing (like in your picture) once, 40 feet up a tank, then i said the hell with this and kinda hooked the rest of the way it was crap. that rail shit was not what i meant by "pipe with notches", its literally a pipe, with upward pointing notches cut into it. i saw it once on a an ancient tower, an old microwave hop and i am not even sure it was at&t, kinda think it was not, used round hollow pipe for bracing but angle or rolled flat for its legs.
btw, At&T also made a guyed version of the beast, i think they had a few models. I got to audit and blueprint one. Weird thing, went from like 4 foot face to 8 foot face at 200', guyed off both faces and legs, and guyed off the corners of the top platform, about the size of half a basketball court. 4 giant horns on top and 2 or 3 more smaller horns below the top. somewhere i got pictures of some of this stuff, probably not this, was 10 years ago but i know i got some cool pics maybe i find them this weekend..out
The nightmare corpse-city of R'lyeh…was built in measureless eons behind history by the vast, loathsome shapes that seeped down from the dark stars. There lay great Cthulhu and his hordes, hidden in green slimy vaults. |
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Therrin
This member has been banned. See the banlist for more information.
Location: North of Chicago, IL
Gender: Male
*Therrin puts on the penguin-suit
| | | Re: Typical Thursday night tower climb
<Reply # 23 on 6/27/2013 5:36 AM >
| | | | Yeah the cables *usually* have those rubber cable guides that they snug into that you just pop them out of while you're climbing with a LadSaf and slap it back in when you pass.
That Iowa job didn't have any of that though, just a cable dangling free-hanging down the tower. And in some spots you had to switch from one cable to another.
I know what you mean by the pipes, I have a set of the pipe climbers. They're not here at my place they're in my storage unit, I'll have to take a pic of them next time I go up there.
The LadSaf's by DBI Sala are typically 3/8". That seems to be the "normal" size. When we got out to that project though we had to order some that were rated for both 3/8" & 5/16". You'd think they'd just make them all that way.
Those rails are such a pain, easier to climb disconnected than to use the things (and probably safer too!) We call them Avanti rails just cuz the device that clamps on them is called/made by Avanti. Whoever designed that system was a pure idiot.
We've actually had situations on-site where ladders sheared off and went falling a few hundred feet down-tower and left guy's hanging on the safety cable though.
Kinda makes you pucker a bit, also good that no one was standing down below.
100% tie-off doesn't do much good when 5 tons of ladder go hurtling down at the ground.
**EDIT**
The whole concept of tower treasure is pretty funny, and it's completely universal too. I've picked up some pretty niffty items. haha.
[last edit 6/27/2013 5:38 AM by Therrin - edited 1 times]
Give a person a match and they'll be warm for a minute, but light them on fire and they'll be warm for the rest of their life. =) |
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ghost6
Location: R'lyeh, North Carolina
Gender: Male
| | Re: Typical Thursday night tower climb
<Reply # 24 on 6/27/2013 4:26 PM >
| | | | Speaking of tower treasure just found a rusty binder this morning. Should start a thread for tower treasure. One last thing is real hilarious when that cable is held up by tape and rope or wrapped around pipe. Sometimes they put it in the shock absorbing mount.....without the spring and rubber danpner.... safe as working fast food a former employer used to tell us
The nightmare corpse-city of R'lyeh…was built in measureless eons behind history by the vast, loathsome shapes that seeped down from the dark stars. There lay great Cthulhu and his hordes, hidden in green slimy vaults. |
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Therrin
This member has been banned. See the banlist for more information.
Location: North of Chicago, IL
Gender: Male
*Therrin puts on the penguin-suit
| | | Re: Typical Thursday night tower climb
<Reply # 25 on 6/28/2013 8:58 AM >
| | | | Posted by ghost6
Speaking of tower treasure just found a rusty binder this morning. Should start a thread for tower treasure. One last thing is real hilarious when that cable is held up by tape and rope or wrapped around pipe. Sometimes they put it in the shock absorbing mount.....without the spring and rubber danpner.... safe as working fast food a former employer used to tell us
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HAH! I've gotten to the top of the ladder and found the damn thing held on with zip ties! They get up there and install it and then forget to bolt it on. And you climb it *thinking* it's all good.
I never really TRUST a cable till I've been to the top of that tower at least once before. Which is pretty sad.
I got a pretty nice 1/2" ratchet and a DeWalt angle grinder and a chain-fall and some other nice widgets, just last year alone. 
**EDIT**
Oh, and speaking of shock absorbing mounts.... That's if there's even one there in the first place!!!
It's always "comforting" when you get to the top and find this:
[last edit 6/28/2013 10:26 AM by Therrin - edited 1 times]
Give a person a match and they'll be warm for a minute, but light them on fire and they'll be warm for the rest of their life. =) |
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