MAGNIFICENT VIEW FROM TE AROHA TRANSLATOR

Taupo Times, Volume XIV, Issue 42, 1 June 1965, Page 7

MAGNIFICENT VIEW FROM TE AROHA TRANSLATOR

Staff Reporter. Te Aroha On a clear day oue can see the Mount Te Aroha television translator tower from the Waitakere Ranges, vvest of Auckland. This is vouched for by the engineer-in-chief of the Italian firrn which is building it, Mr A. Aterini. From the 3126ft. peak of j the mountain,. if the weathI er . is right, one can see I Mount Egmont through field glasses. This was the experience of a worker on | the transmitter building 1 here on Thursday. But on Friday afternoon, ; when a Taupo Times rep-

resentative was there, the i summit could not be seen : from the streets of Te Aroha; and at the summit only the bottom half of the j tower could be seen through I the swirling clouds. Late on Friday morning all was clear on the moun-

tain, and Mr Aterini's team of 13 young Italian construction worker s were high up the tower. After lunch they were huddled round the fragile warmth of a fire in an old oil drum at the tower 's foot. Wind and rain beset the peak, and by mid-afternoon it was obvious that the best place for the team was down in the shelter of the town. That is Mount Te Aroha, at this time of the year at any rate. The weather can change quickly there, and temperature differences of 20 degrees between the summit and the town 3000ft. helow have been known

even in the last month. Mr Aterini estimates that 62 per cent. of the time on the job — which started six weeks ago — has been lost. It should have been finished a fortnight ago; with any luck it will be completed in the present week. Mr Aterini is a former paratrooper and has done much rock-climbing in Europe. Heights hold no qualms for him, and his cairn philosophy' also embraces casual acceptance of the vagaries of weather. Since his Italian employers sent him to Sydney in 1956 he has supervised the construction of hundreds of

tower s in Australia and New Zealand. A visit to Hong Kong looms up next, and jobs in Saigon, Bangkok and Canada are in prospect. At the end of last week the television tower reached nearly 300ft. above the peak, dwarfing the 10ft. high translator which for a year or so has passed on programmes to thonsands of television sets.

On Thursday a record day's construction height of 40ft. was reached, and this week the 413ft. high mast should be completed. Television signal radiating panels will be placed in position around the top section and permanent ladders for maintenance will replace the winch and platform which the * construction workers have heen using. Before the party leaves, the whole structure will be painted in alternate 20ft. bands of white and orange to comply with civil aviation requirements, and lights will be spaced up its height.

The steel for the tower was fabricated in Australia and assembled at Te Aroha. The mast, which has been designed to withstand a wind of 135 miles an hour, may sway 2ft. at the top in a moderately severe wind. Although snow is rarely known on the mountain, the possibility of icing has also been taken into account in design calculations. The tower foundations were constructed by the Ministry of Works staff from Paeroa. Each of the four foundations contains about 40 cubic yards of reinforced concrete. Three

holes penetrate solid rock to a depth of 50ft. below each of the foundations and are stressed to a pull of 1101b. per square inch. Steady progress is being made close to the tower on the construction of the 10,080 square foot building which will house the 100 kilowatt transmitter. When. about the end of the year, the station is operating the whole project will have cost £350,000 and reception will be five times stronger than at present for viewers in the Waikato, Thames Val- 1 ley and Bay _of Plentyj areas.