Located a new noise source that I suspected, but didn't know affected L-Band

General Othernet Discussions
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Well let me start with some location information, give you some current and past history, and then a surprise I had.

I am located in central California. We had some nice storms on Friday that knocked my neighbors tree across my power and internet lines. So I have been running on generator with internet tethered internet off my phone for the last two days. Anyway three separate power line cuts just in the neighborhood.

So when the power company was running the lines back from the HV lines to my transformer I mentioned I have had a nasty hash at times from transformer input arcing. If you have ever had a really foggy day and heard (or seen) an buzzing around your pole pig transformer you know what I am talking about.

Anyway the surprise I got was when they cleaned up the power connections and added a nice no-ox layer to them my power came back on. I fired up my CHIP and outernet and my SNR to RSSI had shifted.

Before I have had 5-6 at -118 or so, but now with the antenna not moved at all I have a 8-9 at -115.

So the Lesson there is don’t discount the broadband noise that a minor spark gap can cause even up into the GHz range from power distribution issues.

When I get a bit of time I will check if my HF background has dropped as well, I am thinking they may well have.

-Cecil

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Very Good Cecil! I am pretty sure that would have fixed your HF noise too :slight_smile:
That storm had a silver lining!

Many centuries ago I went to a big “hobby show” in Australia, and the model boat people had set up a huge pool with RC boats in it so people could have a play with them. They were having trouble and every so often the boats would go crazy and drive off into a wall or something like that… This was well before “digital” remote controls, BTW

As I wandered around , I saw that there was someone demonstrating a Marconi Spark Gap transmitter to send CW … LOL!!!

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Yikes! That spark transmitter would generate hash from DC to Daylight! (Grin)

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RC systems were down on 28MHz way back when… I seem to remember an urban legend that CB radios that had less than legal amplifiers would sometimes bring down planes. I wasn’t in the hobby at that time so I do not know for sure.

-C

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