Question about planting poles for big dishes

[JAS]

The attached shows what I had to do for my 12' dish in sandy soil, high wind (over 80 mph several times a year) and livestock. The dish is out in one of the pastures and cattle / horses love to use the dish as a rubbing post.

The first time I installed the pole I did it the normal recommended way. After two or three big wind storms the dish pole and cement all were rotated 25 degree to the East.

Better to over engineer than have to do it again

 

[toucan-man]

...The dish is out in one of the pastures and cattle / horses love to use the dish as a rubbing post...

Do you have any photos of this? Would enjoy seeing !

 

[Larobpra]

Using the anchor bolts like I suggested has a couple of drawbacks. One is expressly for northern climes with changing and freezing weather. Drilling the holes for the anchor bolts using a masonry bit and a hammer drill will leave an open gap or ring around the bolt where water can enter and freeze and eventually crack the concrete and loosen the bolts. So you would have to apply some concrete filler/sealant around the bolts to prevent this.

We used to use an epoxy for installing bolts into concrete when I worked for a contractor a few years ago. Takes care of any gaps.

 

[AcWxRadar]

Well, this is a start.

My dad found and bought some pipes for me.

I have for 100% dead certain, bitten off much more than I can chew.

Well, I guess I need to start asking around, there's just no way I can do this, for sure not alone and not even with help. This is just way too much for me. I'm going to have to pay a few guys to do this..

Dee,

Don't let this project overwhelm you. You can "git'er done"! Just don't think about the overall picture in one shot, break it down into the smaller steps and tackle each step as it comes up. The whole thing will be finished before you know it.

Research the project (just as you are doing) and decide exactly how you want to set up the whole assembly. Then make an outline in chronological order of what you will be doing first, second, third, etc. Definitely you are going to need help for many of the steps, just plan that out as you create your outline.

One of the biggest challenges will be digging your hole. Based on your soil conditions, it might be major work to dig it with a shovel by hand. See if you can hire someone (hopefully a friend that will give you a break on the price) who has a Bobcat with an auger attachment. Here, instead of the bucket in front of the Bobcat, they attach a hydraulic auger that can dig a perfectly round hole in minutes and easily up to 5-6 feet deep x 2 feet in diameter if needed. This would save you a LOT of work! But, it is also going to cost you something. This is something you can start researching now while you plan the other steps.

Take a look at the attachements in FaT Air's post. That should give you some good mental pictures of what you might want to do for the base. I think that his and my procedure will be better for you than sticking the bottom of the pipe down into the ground and into the concrete. With that long of a pipe, and that heavy, it is going to require you to be very diligent in keeping that pipe/mast plumb while the concrete sets up. The weight of the pipe will want to pull it over in the wet concrete, so you would need to brace it in a plumb position. This isn't all that simple to do if you want it to be absolutely perfect. If you make a mistake or if it slips on you before the concrete cures, your mast will be permanently leaning like the tower of Pisa! You absolutely don't want that! Then you will be fighting your dish and motor alignment forever and it will never be quite perfect for tracking the arc.

The picture that JAS posted is also a good item to take note of if you are in hurricane prone areas. Those supporting struts attached to the mast and to the concrete base will help considerably!

RADAR

 

[AcWxRadar]

We used to use an epoxy for installing bolts into concrete when I worked for a contractor a few years ago. Takes care of any gaps.

I would recommend that epoxy even for bolts that are set into the wet concrete as well as any drilled and set anchor bolts. The concrete will not adhere to the bolt and seal it perfectly, some moisture can still seep into a very fine gap and if it freezes, will eventually crack it. That epoxy will adhere and seal to the bolt (a clean one) and to the clean concrete as well making a better seal. If you set the pipe (mast) into the concrete instead of using some sort of base mounting pedestal, I would recommend applying such an epoxy around the base of the pipe, too. For the same reason.

It might seem to be a rather minor detail compared to the total project, but if you want your installation to last, it is important.

There is a quote I remember that sums this up nicely: "Water always wins, that is why we have a Grand Canyon".

RADAR

 

[AcWxRadar]

Yes that does help, thank you very much. I wouldn't have thought about the ears thing.
Frost? HA! What's that? No such critter here, we rarely even get a freeze and even more rare, snow. No worries there.

What I'm really worried about is the hurricanes. We took a direct hit from Hurricane Rita & Humberto in recent years and Ike gave us a good beating too, 14 hours of sustained hurricane force winds. Rita got us with 113mph gusts and 4+ hours of sustained HF winds. Humberto was a little f*rt poof but it was still an actual hurricane and a direct hit. I stood outside on the deck at it's height dodging shingles and twigs.

And OMG, that's a LOT of cement! I mixed to bags of the stuff and planted one pole myself and that was no fun. I don't think there's anyway I can do that many! I don't know what to do about that.. I can't afford to pay a big truck to bring it already made, besides, it's physically impossible for one to get any where near my back yard. I could haul bags to my back yard in the little trailer for my lawn mower but I don't have a mixing machine and even if I did, I can't lift the bags up into it. I've seen them and it looks like you have to lift the bags up like 4 feet high. No way... It's always something...

I guess I need to run all this past my dad and see what he can brainstorm up for me.

Thanks!

Dee,

Just for your knowledge, there is a means to mix concrete at your site that may be a little helpful in some cases. It is not intended for big jobs, but it might work out if you have a few of these devices and a few friends over for a concrete and BBQ party! LOL.

It looks like a mini beer keg (made out of plastic) with a wide, screw-on lid. You pour about half a 60 lb bag of concrete and the recommended amount of water inside it and put the cap on and then you kick it (roll it) around the yard with your foot to mix it in the keg. Then you open it and pour it and start over. This is not something to use for a BIG project, but if you have enough of these kegs and enough friends and enough "real beer and brats" for your friends, it would be a great party and it would get your job done! You could hold a Friday night concrete mixing party and have a lot of fun! Suprisingly, these gadgets mix the concrete very well! I used them at my cabin when I didn't have power or a powered concrete mixer and for small jobs and one person, they work really slick! Better than mixing concrete in a wheelbarrow with a shovel.

Yes, you could make it a really fun evening with friends and get your concrete base poured all at the same time. Like a soccer game with a really heavy ball! LOL!

RADAR

 

[JAS]

Do you have any photos of this? Would enjoy seeing !

No more pictures. I should have been clearer in my post. The reason that the concrete pad is 10" above the ground is to keep the livestock away from the dish and pole. For some reason cattle / horses will not step up on the pad. But, they did use the pole as a rubbing post before I redid it.


DEE

Radar has given you some good advice and as he stated it's not as hard or complicated as it looks.

 

[LocutusOfBorg]

I'm trying to figure out how long the poles need to be.

If the 10 footer is a movable dish then a pole 5-6' above ground should be good but you'll need to move the dish to a satellite that'll give you the clearance to get under the dish. I point my 12 footers to true south when I mow my lawn since this gets the bottom lip of the dish high enough for me to actually walk under the dish (even though I have to bend over a bit).

So then there is the problem of below ground. I'm thinking that 5' of pole in the ground with an 18" hole full of cement is just barely going to be enough, considering we get a lot of hurricanes here. We've had some BAD hurricanes too.

You won't have much luck preventing a hurricane or tornado from damaging your dish. That said, I would recommend at least a 4 foot hole. I'm using a 4-1/2 foot deep hole and it's holding my 12 footer very well. I used fiber-mesh concrete for my pad even though it cost more but it rivals the strength of a concrete/rebar pad. It'll be best to have a concrete delivery rather than mixing that much concrete. And you'll need a wheel barrel to get the concrete to the hole unless you don't mind having the concrete truck messing up your lawn. Concrete deliveries have a minimum charge so it's likely that you'll overspend for concrete but, believe me, it's worth it.

Be sure to use the correct diameter of pipe, also. My Paraclipse mount is for a 3-1/2" OD pipe while my KTI uses a 4-1/2" OD pipe. Both antennas are 12 footers. So, it's something you need to consider BEFORE pouring the concrete.

 

[whatchel1]

OK I've read the whole thing and I used to install commercial & residential dishes. The Pad is the better way to go. Forget about putting a deep hole in the ground for clay soil it just doesn't work in the long run. You will only need about 4 1/2 ft at the max for a 10ft dish. They used to make commercial poles with the flanges like FaT Air is showing in his pictures. The only dishes that I ever had to have really larges pads for were for solid dishes and that is due to the weight. The wind loading on is almost identical on solid and mesh. BTW no matter what you do in a hurricane the mesh dish will be destroyed. They are just not designed to take extended winds of over 70 to 80 mph. And if that isn't enough the hail will take the panels out. Only perforated dishes can handle the elements in a hurricane. I don't think that anyone even makes the perfs anymore. But everyone I put in service in the mid nineties are still in service at hospitals, schools, motels, & radio stations. Hope you have a good time with them once they are up & running.

 

[Cham]

Just another idea to throw in the mix...
I made three 10" holes 8' deep (frost, for S TX 4' would do) at 30" radius. Poured concrete I mixed in wheel barrow with water & gravel. Used "sono-tubes" to raise the concrete about 1' above the ground. Inserted one 1/2" X 36" bolt (threaded rod) in each pile bent about 6" from the bottom so they can't twist, and leave the bolt sticking out at least 2". Then I fabricated a mount for the 6' mast using 3/32 angle iron to match the bolts in the concrete piles. Three pieces of angle iron lie horizontally between the piles and mast, welded to the bottom of the mast. Three more pieces are welded to the mast about 3' from the bottom angling down to the first piece and welded there about 2" before the hole for the mounting bolt. The mount looks kind of like the bottom of a rocket (not nearly as aerodynamically functional though I would suspect) but is very stable. The mount/mast can be leveled by installing shims between the piles and the angle iron bracket.
I would take a picture but it's -40 out here the camera would freeze before i get back to the house!

You could borrow a post digger for the holes and maybe not so much concrete to mix?

My 1.5 cents worth. Works for my 10' solid dish.

C-band is best!
-C.

 

[whatchel1]

Just another idea to throw in the mix...
I made three 10" holes 8' deep (frost, for S TX 4' would do) at 30" radius. Poured concrete I mixed in wheel barrow with water & gravel. Used "sono-tubes" to raise the concrete about 1' above the ground. Inserted one 1/2" X 36" bolt (threaded rod) in each pile bent about 6" from the bottom so they can't twist, and leave the bolt sticking out at least 2". Then I fabricated a mount for the 6' mast using 3/32 angle iron to match the bolts in the concrete piles. Three pieces of angle iron lie horizontally between the piles and mast, welded to the bottom of the mast. Three more pieces are welded to the mast about 3' from the bottom angling down to the first piece and welded there about 2" before the hole for the mounting bolt. The mount looks kind of like the bottom of a rocket (not nearly as aerodynamically functional though I would suspect) but is very stable. The mount/mast can be leveled by installing shims between the piles and the angle iron bracket.
I would take a picture but it's -40 out here the camera would freeze before i get back to the house!

You could borrow a post digger for the holes and maybe not so much concrete to mix?

My 1.5 cents worth. Works for my 10' solid dish.

C-band is best!
-C.

The thing is she is working in a clay soil. When the clay soil dries up this mount system will not be held in place well. Your mount will work great in loam, sandy, or combination soils that don't shrink so much when they dry.

 

[Cham]

Whatchel1,
I did the above in almost pure clay soil. I should have indicated that in my posting. The ground here is very damp/wet with and only the top inch or two ever dries even during a drought. My situation is quite different from the OP in that we only get summer here 3-4 months of the year.
Really the best way to determine a proper foundation is to enlist the help of a geological or civil engineer with experience in the particular area of installation. Trial and error comes in a good second and lots of great ideas in the posts in this thread.

 

[whatchel1]

Whatchel1,
I did the above in almost pure clay soil. I should have indicated that in my posting. The ground here is very damp/wet with and only the top inch or two ever dries even during a drought. My situation is quite different from the OP in that we only get summer here 3-4 months of the year.
Really the best way to determine a proper foundation is to enlist the help of a geological or civil engineer with experience in the particular area of installation. Trial and error comes in a good second and lots of great ideas in the posts in this thread.

Or someone that has done it like I have. I've put dishes in at places w/ clay soil ( Off the Caprock in TX) they have clay soil as they were the Ocean Bottom years ago. Up on the Plains we were the shallows or the beach back then. So it's either a loam soil or a sandy loam mixture. So it is best to ask what works like she has done. Your way will work in areas that don't dry out as her area does from the hot dry weather down south.

 

[AcWxRadar]

Dee,

Have not heard from you for a few days. Have you had the opportunity to discuss this issue and the options/ideas with your Dad? What does he think of the situation?

Just curious. Would love to see pix of whatever you set up.

Good luck and have fun, Dee!

RADAR

 

[yankee495]

Hi Dee,

I think the pad with bolts to adjust the mast is the best idea. I just obtained a 10' dish and across the street they have a pad with an old dish mast (no dish) that I have been going to ask about for a few years.

If there is any question to wind or soil...being able to adjust it makes sense.

Of course you could bury a semi trailer on end, fill it with concrete, stab a pole in it and forget about it....ain't going no where...But if it did move, you have to start over.

I've had to re-do a pole...SUCKS...because you KNOW how good you concreted it and it ain't gonna be easy!

I can have the pole with the dish...if I wanna dig it up (looks to be in concrete 20" x 20" and most likely 3' at least)...so I'm curious, where did your dad find the poles? I haven't looked in a few years but even the scrap yard (large recycling center) said they KNEW they didn't have anything...

Good luck!

 

[Dee_Ann]

Hi guys,

No, I haven't had a chance to talk over anything with my dad about this yet. We've all got a lot of family stuff going on so once again this project has fallen by the wayside.

I forgot to ask him where he bought the poles, he didn't mention the place that I recall but I will ask him Tuesday.
He did tell me to start digging the holes.

I think I'm going to try that myself. I dug a small hole or two for the other ku dishes and it wasn't so horrible.
It's just that it's been raining and my yard is a swamp so I have to let it dry out first.

It's my ~hope~ that I can at least get the dishes up within the next three weeks, after that things are gonna be crazy busy and I may not be able to get to it until summer. I would like to get these things working before the channels I really want, go away, as they so often do.

Like White Springs. I had h*ll getting that dish aimed right and just after I finally got it perfect, POOF! they vanished into never never land.
And Equity.. Those dummies! I loved a lot of the channels on that. Bye bye again...

It's all about the money.... Thou shalt make a profit and covet it above all other things. That's the corporate covenant of America..

Free = bad...

 

[Phottoman]

I'm not really surprised that you haven't found River Broadcasting Net with your dislike for religious and "foreign" programing, but if you would scan 97W KU, 11966 H 22000 and it's DBS-2 so any FTA receiver should find it.

Good luck

Photto

 

[Mikey11]

a good general rule to go by is one bag of cement/concrete mix per foot of dish....so a six foot dish would require 6 bags....also make sure to put some type of rod or post through the pole underneath the ground so it can not turn in the concrete....

 

[pback]

Good infos here I could use when I raise one up this Summer, an 8 footer mesh that I finally scored after a long time looking. Too cold and too much snow to really take some pics, but, I am excited

What kind of cement/concrete mix should I buy from Home Depot for a concrete pad for say a 6'X6'X6" which I hope is enough, no sustained winds here but lotsa snow this year.

Thanks, Guys!

 

[eurosport]

I would like to get these things working before the channels I really want, go away, as they so often do.

Like White Springs. I had h*ll getting that dish aimed right and just after I finally got it perfect, POOF! they vanished into never never land.
And Equity.. Those dummies! I loved a lot of the channels on that. Bye bye again...

It's all about the money.... Thou shalt make a profit and covet it above all other things. That's the corporate covenant of America..

Free = bad...

I agree totally Dee Ann both about the profit thing AND having stuff disappear after finally getting a dish pointed at it.