Remote Towers Rely on Heavy-Duty Connectors – A Case Study

Ruggedized, heavy-duty connectors are an essential element in remote tower installations. The structure and its electronics must be able to endure continuous outdoor environmental conditions.

Heavy-duty connectivity solutions are an essential part of successful outdoor communications infrastructure. Tower Solutions, located in Pine City, Minnesota, a manufacturer of mobile tower platforms for surveillance, communications, tactical support, and lighting applications, relies on electronic components that are ruggedized against outdoor environmental conditions to design low-maintenance towers with easy deployment and operation.

Stable towers withstand strong winds

One of Tower Solutions’ flagship products is the PTX-100 tower, a robust and stable mobile tower that can lift a one-ton load up to 120 feet in the air. These towers are built for long-term deployment and rapid mobile reconnaissance in the harshest weather conditions.

The towers are often located in remote locations that can experience wide temperature fluctuations and high winds, which could put an unstable tower at risk. To address this, Tower Solutions builds the PTX-100 series on a wide, stable base.

The PTX-100 tower is a robust and stable mobile tower. It can stand up to hurricane-level wind speeds without the need for ground-penetrating guy wires.

The 16,000-pound base self-supports the tower, even in winds up to 100 miles per hour. The towers often need to be deployed quickly, so Tower Solutions has designed the base with an integrated outrigger that attaches directly to guy wire, so there is no need for ground penetration.

Due to the mobile nature and extreme operating environments, Tower Solutions also needed to ensure vibration-tight connections that would not come loose.

Many connections within the system

Because of their remote locations, the towers require standalone power generation and control systems. The large trailer supports a high-capacity lithium-ion battery system, which, when coupled with generators and solar panels, requires refueling only every 45 days or more. All of these systems need to be interconnected.

“There’s a hybrid energy system, which is battery storage,” explained David Hall of Hallfield Controls, the engineering firm that assisted with the electrical side of the system. “The system is designed to run as a standalone, so they have two diesel generators for redundancy. Whenever the batteries run low, it kicks one of the generators on to charge the batteries.

“The hybrid system goes to the tower control system to distribute the power, so we have to connect the two generators to one hybrid system. We also have to connect that hybrid system to the tower control system, and then the tower control system provides power to the customer.

“Today, they run liquid-tight conduit between all the components on the trailer,” said Hall. There are seven liquid-tight conduits per tower. “They pull wires and then terminate all of those wires.”

Higher output required faster but heavy-duty connectors

In the past, Tower Solutions focused on smaller projects, but it recently won a contract that requires a higher output. When building the initial trial run of 14 towers, each tower took about three days to wire.

The next order was for 50 towers, so Tower Solutions wanted to increase its output to three towers per week. The local distributor had presented a quick-connect system several years ago, but it was not necessary at the time. With the production volume increasing, Tower Solutions decided it was time to upgrade to this faster connection technology.

Hall said, “We were looking for a product that was compatible with the liquid-tights.”

Based on the earlier recommendation, Hallfield Controls selected a family of heavy-duty, rectangular connectors that protects interfaces from dirt, water, oil, and other contaminants. The family comprises thousands of different components, including contact inserts and contacts, cable glands and adapters, and housings. The combined component family can create more than 70 billion different combinations.

Phoenix Contact’s HEAVYCON Advance (ADV) protects interfaces from dirt, water, oil, and other contaminants. The connectors can withstand high vibrations and mechanical strain and provide sealing protection up to IP69K degrees.

The connectors can withstand high vibrations and mechanical strain and provide sealing protection up to IP69K. Although this job did not require an IP67 or IP69 rating, Hall said it’s a best practice to select products that will keep the water out.

Additionally, Hall selected a variant designed specifically for outdoor use. This connector featured a black powder coating and Viton seal that are excellent for prolonged exposure to the elements, including UV exposure.

Because the end customers do the final field installation, Tower Solutions wanted to prevent accidental disconnection. A manual latch, while easy to use, could be disconnected unintentionally. A screw-locking mechanism met the middle ground. It ensures easy assembly, but if disassembly is needed, it would require tools.

Tower Solutions also needed to ensure vibration-tight connections, as they did not want connections to come loose when towing the towers on or off road, or from the towers’ height and potential wind speeds in the field. The assemblers are very mechanically oriented. While they have a basic understanding of the electrical side, it is not their specialty. Hall said that having the ability “to just connect and screw down is a huge gain for them. They can get just about anybody in their shop to do that. They don’t have to worry about relying on the one or two guys in their shop who have enough knowledge to pull it off.”

So far, Tower Solutions has sent out more than 100 of the new towers and has the potential to build many more. The end customer assembles the systems on-site, and Hall said they’ve been happy with the ease of the new connection solution.

“The wiring time has gone from three days to maybe three or four hours,” he said. “The new connectors have interfaces that easily match up, so it only takes a couple of hours. When they’re trying to crank out three a week, they can’t have one guy spending three days terminating wires at the final customer.”

He concluded, “In the end, it’s about saving time.”

Visit Phoenix Contact to learn more about harsh environment connector solutions.

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