Tennamast down!

Well things have changed since my last post. After all that effort I decided to go for the ground mounted mast instead, just for peace of mind really. Tennamast have been fantastic, they’ve gone out of their way to be accommodating and offered to exchange my 7.6m wall mounted mast for a 9.2m ground mounted mast. I just pay the difference in price. The mast is currently at the galvanisers, so not too long left to wait.

7.6 mast waiting to be returned.

So I’ve been digging the hole for the ground socket. To keep as close to the bungalow as possible to give myself maximum width (there are still some higher tree branches that are pretty close) I’ve under cut the paving slabs by about 400mm. Digging was pretty easy as it was into shillet, flat stones in a slightly clay soil. The hard part was what to do with all the spoil, which for a .5 cubic metre hole is considerably more than you’d think! I took two half full bags to the local recycling and they charged me £2 a bag and didn’t even help me lift them into the skip which was about 5 feet high, I nearly gave myself a hernia! In the end I managed to lose it in the woods at the end of my garden. Tennamast have sent me a ground socket in advance of the mast.

Now I need a day off to get the readymix in. It’s £100 for .5cm which sounds a lot until you work out how much to mix it yourself.  Hopefully I can get it finished before the new mast arrives….

The wooden post sticking out of the ground socket in the picture is for getting it level (as I don’t have a ground post yet). It was supplied and planed to fit by Robeda a local joiners for the price of a pint of beer. The chap in charge seemed to be quite interested when I told him what I wanted it for!