I have in my yard two 60 foot steel poles about 120 feet apart, placed there
40 years ago by a previous ham owner. The old halyards, about 3/4 inch
diameter cotton-covered wire (wire core was about 1/8 inch) are long gone,
and I need to find new rope to haul up my wire. I can't find anything like
the old stuff.

I was thinking about using wire rope, the flexible 7x19 kind, maybe
stainless steel, at maybe 3/8 inch diameter. I think that will roll over the
pulleys (which I think are less than 1 inch radius). Given that my longest
wire will have maybe 8-10 feet of poly lines supporting each end, will wire
rope present appreciably more metal at the ends than the poles themselves
will?

Is there a synthetic rope up to the task? Keep in mind that the rope I need
will be running vertically, and when the antenna load is placed
perpendicularly, the loads on the halyard will be in the several hundred- to
thousand-pound load range. Of course it needs to last for decades or more in
the sun.

As always, if you have suggestions that haven't occurred to me I'll gladly
listen to them.

--
Bruce Wilson KF7K
http://science.uvsc.edu/wilson