Dismantling a TV tower - video

[Altair]

Dismantling the Willoughby TV tower in Sydney, Australia. 8:17 video.

Previously:

Demolishing a 300-foot electrical tower by cutting the guy-wires - GIF
1890 Swedish telephone tower - photo
Failed tower demolition - GIF
Cutting down a transmission tower with a torch - GIF
Imploding cooling towers - GIF
Welding on top of a tower - GIF

[mansworld]

Will the Aussies shed some light on their guy-wire tower crane?

[Bony]

I wish I could because it looks interesting, but I live a few thousand ks from Sydney.

[meyer77]

What is the reason for a tarp? Looks like a slow process, how long for whole job?

[Frank S]

I might be able to shed some light on a few of the questions.
Tower cranes, or any crane for that matter are limited in height in direct proportion to their base or foundation footings.
when it comes to a fixed tower crane a deep and substantial foundation must be poured or a platform assembled on site to support the weight of the crane and the loads being hoisted, additionally they are generally attached to the building or other structure where the work is being preformed every so many feet in height when there is no building to use as anchorage then guy wires are required. Again depending on the maximum height the crane is going to be working from these guy wires are placed anywhere between each 75 to 150 feet in elevation of the crane's structure.
Good jobsite rigging practice is expensive, and time consuming. Poor jobsite rigging can cost a 1000 to even a million times more than doing it right.
the reason for the huge tarp is to provide a work area for final disassembly in an effort to prevent loss of tools or hardware into the ground and to prevent what is known as location contamination.
That first 100ft or so section lowered might have seemed to have taken a long time to accomplish but you have to understand the crane operator could be a 1000 or more feet up in the air. If this was my contract the tower crane height would be reduced after every couple hundred feet of tower structure reduction doing this would actually save time and increase safety

[IntheGroove]

The foundation for the crane was probably already there from when the tower was erected...

[Frank S]

The foundation for the crane was probably already there from when the tower was erected...

maybe a small one to anchor a draw works winch. Towers like that one once the 4 lattice legs merged into a single would have been built piece meal with a single climbing jib going up 1 leg of the lattice structure.
A helicopter pilot friend of mine goes all over the world for the company he works for dong lifts such as erecting and the deconstruction or relocating communications towers, or lifting repair parts for wind turbines, a lot faster safer and cheaper than erecting a crane of that size for a short term job.

[nova_robotics]

Pfffft. Pansies. They should do it like this guy.