Vintage Windmill and Wind Generator Forum

I was taking the three leg Aemotor tower apart and the horizontal angle iron and brace rods are held with bolts with round, screw type heads. First of all, they don't come apart easily without exactly the right screw driver, or sometimes, vise-grips, and because the nut is tucked tightly under the angle, it's almost impossible to be turned with a wrench.

#1: Did Aermotor use this kind of hardware on just the rod-type braces? I'm wondering if they might have done that so the "eyes" of the rods didn't get torn out when using square headed bolts. Is this what is used on modern/new towers or was this only used during a certain era?

#2: As in the photo, the horizontal angles are hanging on the outside of the tower and the brace rods are on the inside. Is it supposed to be this way?

Yes that was a common bolt on the trussed tripod 3 leg, prior to 1915. I refer to them as PIA Aer bolts, the only way to hold the head is with vise grips. Whoever assembled put them thru the wrong way, the nut should be on the split rod side

Ron

Thanks Ron....Are the horizontals in the pictures attached correctly? That is, on the outside surface of the legs?

The trussed tripod I think had "outies" on the top girts. Not sure about toward the bottom. So if that was a 30', the tripod would have started at the bottom of the 20' section.

The newer Aer "easy to build up" 3 leg had "innie" girts.

Ron Stauffer
Montrose CO

Thanks for the photos!! Is your pic of the tower laying down like this drawing? In my attached diagram, are the "X" shaped braces called trusses? There are a number of them in all of the parts I just bought and when I rebuild the 3 leg tower with an A702, I'd like to configure it like that.

All of the tower parts I bought were from complete towers that someone took down but are now all in a heap. I've found four leg AER parts diagrams online that are numbered but can't find a 3 leg diagram. There are stenciled part numbers on a lot of the parts I have so it would be good a good tool to help organize.
If something is missing, I won't hesitate fabricating new tower parts: I have the shear, punch, and materials.

Nope your drawing is a post 1915 easy to build up and picture is of a trussed tripod. The easy to build up 3 leg has the girts as innies and split rod braces are on outside

Ron

Easy to build up 3 leg was 13.5 and/or 7 sections same as 4 leg. The trussed tripod was 20 and/or 10 or 20.

Ron

27' Easy to build up 3 leg


I checked a better pic of a trussed tripod and the girts are all outies

Ron