The only thing I had on hand was some square cross-sectional hard wood
stake. The cross-sectional diagonal length was about 3/4 of the Butternut
mounting tube diameter. I have clay soil and we are in the middle of a
drought, so I used plenty of water and each time went an inch or two deeper.
Driving the mounting tube was quite easy, and the plumb is quite good.

The tube is now in the ground and secured to a DX Engineering stainless
ground plane radial plate. http://dxengineering.com/

"Dave "Doc" Corio" wrote in message
...
From my own experience (water problems aside) use a smaller pipe to drive
a pilot hole. If your ground mount is 1 1/8", use either a 3/4, or at the
most, 7/8" pipe to make a pilot hole. I tried using 1 1/8", and ended up
with quite a bit of "slop". 3/4" seemed to yield the best results for me.
Leaves enough earth to firmly hold the base, yet makes it very easy to
install without beating the heck out of the base Itself!

73
Dave
N0HNJ