A Saturday evening project

Now that I have set up all my VHF, UHF, and Packet gear, I’ve come to realize that I need to make a better effort to get my antennas mounted properly. I currently have two antennas mounted on the side of my front deck and another on the clothesline pole in the back. Not one of the antennas sticks up above the peak of my house. When I first put them up, I only wanted to get on the air and work the local repeaters and the packet digipeater. This did the trick initially, but now I want to start working some friends via simplex and need a bit more height to get a good signal.

So today I started making a home brew mast that I am going to mount on the side of the house at the peak. It’s made out of 2×6 that is about 4 feet long and a steel pole that is 6 feet long. The pole is fastened to the 2×6 with two u-bolts. I also put a piece of wood under to stop the pole from sliding down and two small screws through the center of the pipe to stop it from turning side to side.

To fasten it to the house, I am going to use another 2×6 mounted horizontally that will be bolted to the fascia boards. There should be plenty of support there as that’s where the support for the hydro connection is also fastened. Then the mount will simply be fastened vertically to this support.

It’s far from ideal but it’s basically a free solution made from stuff that I had laying around the barn. It should be quite sufficient to mount my vertical fiberglass antenna, that I use for my packet rig, and my folded dipole that is my main 2m antenna. I’ve attached a picture so you can have a look and poke fun. Someday I will have a proper tower but until then this will have to do.

73 de VE1DCD