Cellular towers?

[speed]

Hmm they just put up a cellular tower up in the country across the road from my parents house. This really could give a new meaning to the holidays!!

It looks to be about 300'. And has a few wire dishes off the side about half way up. Does anyone want to share any experience with cell towers. It has a ladder on the outside of the antenna. There seems to be guide wire attachement point near the top but below the top antenna stuff.

How close should I get to the top of a cellular tower? Is there any rule of thumb to follow.

I guess I need to break down and buy me one of those range finders. Does anyone use them. Do they they work well enough?

Thanks in advance

[imported_Tom Aiello]

>Does anyone want to share any experience with cell towers. It has a ladder on the outside of the antenna. There seems to be guide wire attachment point near the top but below the top antenna stuff.

My experience has been that they are basically just low towers. All the same rules, all the regular hazards.

>How close should I get to the top of a cellular tower? Is there any rule of thumb to follow.

There really is no rule of thumb. It's basically totally dependent on the object. Generally, I'd make the decision based on the shape of the tower, wind, landing, etc, rather than fear of radiation. On that score, I think you're just going to be hosed, especially if you're making repeated jumps throughout your vacation.

>I guess I need to break down and buy me one of those range finders. Does anyone use them. Do they they work well enough?

I use one quite regularly. They are quite exceptional. When I got mine, I played around with lasering things, then using a tape measure to check. It really is accurate to + or - 3 feet. Just remember that the most accurate reading is usually from the exit point down (since that's really your fall line). Lasering from the ground up introduces all kinds of weird innacuracies (funny angles, things in the way, etc).

If you're going to buy one, I recommend supporting this web site and buying one here at:

http://www.blincmagazine.com/store/m...de=Electronics

Have fun with that tower.


--Tom Aiello
tbaiello@ucdavis.edu

[guest]

Regarding the radiation of cell toweres and radiation in general.

I've spent a few hours wading through the fcc, epa, and osha web sites looking for info. about various devices placed on towers. This is the skinny: dont hang out next to equipment on the object. The only published studies are those concerned with "thermal" (aka heat) effects of radiation. The first things to cook are the eyes and the balls - because they have the least amount of blood flow, thus cooling ability. So, if your nuts or your eyes start feeling funny then climb up, down or dump your package.

cheers
MB

[guest]

Yo Bob, waasup? Catching up with Matt in AZ next weekend. If the Bella video is finished I'd love a copy. Could you pass it to him? I really want to see his tree landing again at Moab.Any costs and I will settle up with him. cya

[guest]

As far as Cellular towers go. They typically put out about about 1200 watts of current. that is dispersed between all of the antennas on the platform or antenna boom. This is very little compared to the 50,000+ that are put out by the FM and TV transmitters. I have personly had hours of exposer while working on them. The main thing that everyone need's to look out for are the dishes. Shouldn't be a big deal on a tower. But on Buildings you will find a lot of them. They can cook you even at lower power settings. Also with the Microwave signal's if you are in front of them they can see that something is disrupting the siginal.

Have fun!!!!

[crwper]

Could you say a bit more about the dishes on top of buildings? I've seen lots of warning signs going to the roof, but I didn't take them too seriously. When you say "they can cook you", what exactly do you mean? Where can I not stand in relation to the dish? I read somewhere that on a transmitting dish, the dangerous place is directly in front of the dish, but that on a receiving dish, anywhere in the vicinity of the dish could be hot. Is this true? How can you tell the difference?

On FM antennas, I've seen big cylindrical covered dishes, wire mesh dishes, groups of (usually 3 I think) short antennas arrayed around the main structure, and even some little circular antennas made up of overlapping semicircles made to look like a section of a screw. Any idea what danger is associated with each of these structures?

Locally, there are lots of 300-foot antennas with just an array of 3 shorter antennas at the top. What kind of antenna are these?

It sounds like you might be able to answer some of these questions... Or maybe someone else can?

Michael

[guest]

About cellular towers:

I live in europe, but they are generally the same, I heve serviced lots of transmission systems, including cellular stuff.
I've been on radio-tv towers, cellphone sites.
I went there in most of the cases with radiation meters at my hand.
Some simple guidelines I learnt, and still use are the following:
All frequenties above plm 50MHz can fry you up, depending on the power.
The higer the frequencies get the more they can be beamed on a small area(dishes). Those are the most dangerous. They can have a narrow beam where all the energy is concentrated. Also, Higer frequencies don't penetrate your body that much, causing more severe damage on shallow parts of your body.
Those array of tree sectorized antennas, or sandwich toasters I call them, are typical cellphpone antenna's. They communicate with your cellphone. They operate in the 900 or 1800MHz bands.
Most of the time they are acomopanied with one or more dishes, which are the microwave-link antennas which connect this cellphone site to the rest of the network.
I noted also that I can feel the radiation level with my eyes, or sinuses. It gives me a headache. That's caused, like someone said before because ot the lack of bloodcirculation and they heat up.
I could 'calibrate' that feeling with the radiation-meters: they told me that the max. eposure time is 5 to 10 minutes.
For those dishes, the actual transmission power is mostly a few watts, but because the beam is concentrated and has a very high frecuency (10 GHz or more), the ERP levels (effectively radiated power) can easyly be 1kW and fry you up. So DON'T STAY IN FRONT OF THEM!
Those cellphone antenna's radiate also several watts (no need to use more power, your cellphone has also not more than a few watts and it is to 2-way communication), but they have beams of 120 degrees (if they are with 3) in a narrow vertical beam to the horizon, so the ERP will be much less. Still, don't expose yourself too long in front of these ones, it is no problem to stay behind them.
FM and TV towers are different: I still feel the power, but the power is much higer, from kiloWatts to hundreds of kilowatts, the frequency is lower, in the range of 90(FM) to 500MHz (TV) mostly combining several stations in 1 antenna system. This doubles, triples the power.
The the RF field is broad and everywhere in the near of the antenna's, so don't take a break in these antenna fields. If you feel headache, nauzea or dizzyness, climb on or go back.

For the rest... If the site is tall enough, Have fun!!

Erik

[guest]

CRWPER
In response to "they can cook you". Microwave frequencies can range anywhere from 2 GHZ on up. These are very isolated signals. These can act just like a microwave oven. They can radiate you from the inside. It would be impossible to determine weather this is a transmit or recieve dish. The only way is to know the design of the system. The comment about the Transmit is far more isolated than the recieve is true. It is critical that you don't take the chances with them. Over exposure to these fraquencies can have lasting effects on your health. The safest place around the "Drum" type dishes is directly behind them. As a rule of thumb. If you see a circular antenna on a tower or building pointing in a horizontal direction, use caution. When on an "A" be careful of the antennas that are in sequence verticly up the outsite of the sturucture. These are typiclly used as some sort of a lower power FM. By low power I mean 30,000watts or so. It all depends on the liscense for the station.
Your local towers sound like cellular. Actually it sound's like they are Nextel towers based off of your description. With any RF source I wouldn't suggest staying aruond them too long. But what the hell... We don't want to be there for the scenery anyway. :-)

c-ya
Jess