Mounting in trees?

[valenti]

I did a search and didn't turn up any discussion of this:

Any thoughts on mounting a customer radio in a tree?

I'm fighting with another install, I just get a poor signal from the rooftop. But the house is surrounded by mature trees. One of them looks like a good candidate to mount the radio about 50' up.

Thanks for your advice.

(conveniently, one of my other customers is a bird researcher and climbs trees to examine nests...)

[luke541]

I have probobly 200+ customers with client units in tree's. It presensts no problems for me, however I would recomend you always use good hardware as it can become expensive to pay a tree climber to climb up on your dime to repair your problem. I don't pass that on to the customer myself. The WAR-1 is treating me very well and its all I'll put in a tree
anymore.

To mount them, I use antenna moutning brackets from Radio Shack. Two come in a box, and if you mount them both, and then the cpe to a pvc pipe between the two brackets, you'll be able to rest knowing it aint going anywhere.

I also have several repeaters in Tree's that treat me Very well.

Only problem I have had is with Grid's in the tree, if you have snow. The snow can collect on the feed horn extension and you'll loose the link once
it gets bad enough.

As far as climbers go, I have about 4 of them and I pay 50.00 per climb assuming they are only in the tree to mount, point and come down. You'll likely be able to find a local tree service with some boys that need work.

[wwalcher]

I have probobly 200+ customers with client units in tree's.....

To mount them, I use antenna moutning brackets from Radio Shack. Two come in a box, and if you mount them both, and then the cpe to a pvc pipe between the two brackets, you'll be able to rest knowing it aint going anywhere.


Over 200 tree installs? Wow!! Can you provide a part number for the mounting brackets you use? A picture of an install would be great, if possible. Also, how do you get the cable from the tree to the customer's house? Do you bury it? Inside or conduit or not?

[luke541]

You Bet!

150' pine tree's can be your best friends!

Attached are some pictures of the mounting brackets I use. I think the 4" clearance "smaller ones" cost about $6.00 and the larger ones cost about $11.00

Radio Shack Part Numbers are:

4" clearance: 15-883
8" clearance: 15-666

I don’t' have any pictures right close of one mounted in a tree, but I’ll have a climber take a picture of an install tomorrow and post it.

I use insulated gel filled direct burial cable for the tree installs. I have the climber staple the wire "carefully" as he comes down the tree. Depending on the situation we either run it aerially over to the eve of the house, or bring the wire right to the ground and trench it to wherever it has to go. Sometimes its a pain but the new customer is always worth it. I rarely use conduit unless its something they want to pay for, and you can See the conduit, but you can hardly see the black cat5 on the back side of the tree.

I do my tree installs with someone "besides me" on the ground, while i'm at the noc. This way I can talk to the climber on his cell phone and we can get a perfect point while I run a ping From the AP and read off dbm levels to climber.

Works like a charm everytime, provided we do a site survey and RM map to make sure were not wasting time.

[valenti]

Thanks for the comments, Luke541.

I got an OK from the customer to use his tree. Stopped by Radio Shack on the way home. Picked up a box of the 4" ones, it was $12.99 here (pack of two). Please do put up more pictures!

Oh, do you run a ground wire to the radio, or not worry about that?

[0ldman]

Thanks for the comments, Luke541.

I got an OK from the customer to use his tree. Stopped by Radio Shack on the way home. Picked up a box of the 4" ones, it was $12.99 here (pack of two). Please do put up more pictures!

Oh, do you run a ground wire to the radio, or not worry about that?I'm curious about that as well.

I figure you still need some sort of surge suppression, but in the case of the pine trees around here, the root ball is about 10ft in the ground. The tree *should* help keep static buildup from frying the diversity chip. I'd love to hear a more experienced opinion.

[handyman]

We put CPE in trees too. We also have APs mounted on trees. Just think of a tree as a large, sturdy pole. We use the same hardware we use on houses, such as the large or small mounting arms that are common. We usually only put them as high as our ladder will reach. We don't bother to ground them. We don't lose many CPE to lightning.

[0ldman]

One of my test links is about 60ft up a 75ft pine. I've got a ground run down the tree, but don't have a ground rod yet.

This is all temporary just to get highspeed to my home/office. I've got a 100ft tower sitting in the yard, but I am wondering how well the tree would help with static buildup.