Over a year after completing Phase 1 of the tower project - I am now ready to stick a HF beam up in the air.

Thanks to Mike VE3PBE for the donation of the TH-5 beam to the VA3GY antenna farm.  The beam is in excellent condition, having been well looked after by Mike.

When I put the existing antennas up I left a nice space just above the thrust bearing where an HF beam could fit nicely.
 

 Paul VE3EU working on the TH-5

The first job was to lay out the boom and all of the elements.  Then we got everything bolted together, attached the feed line and water proofed all of the joints.  Then at the top of the tower I attached the mounting bracket and drilled the mast pipe to hold the securing bolt. (This bolt will prevent any twisting of the antenna on the mast in high winds)

Everything is ready to go for tomorrow morning,  Paul VE3EU will come around and we will hoist it up the tower.  We will get at it nice and early before the wind gets up.

The TH-5 gets hauled up the tower

The morning went right on plan.  We started at about 7:30 and using Paul's nice new pickup we towed the antenna up the North side of the tower.  We had a 300ft rope attached from the antenna, up to the pulley at the top of the tower, run down via a block at the bottom, then attached to the truck.  I followed it up the second half of the way, and when resting on the top plate Paul came up and we lifted it straight onto the bracket.

We had the whole works up, coax installed on the tower and connected into the shack by 9:30am

A thing of beauty !!!

The first contact made was with my friend Les GM4XKG over in Inverness Scotland.  I called him on the landline and we had a 51/3 QSO on 20 meters.