To all.
Read this.
I moved to Pender Island in October 1993. Had lots and lots of
noise, (buzzing) on all bands.
Wrote letter to Radio Inspector in Victoria and sent an Audio
tape of the noise.
One year later, still no reply. Wrote another letter, and after
a couple more months delay had a visit from an Inspector
who also brought a BC Hydro crew with him. Arrived 9.30am.
(By then had a Beam up and noise heaviest towards Europe,
which was my main interest in those days. Nulls to the West.
Power lines about 200 feet East of house run N/S.)
BC Hydro crew INSISTED the noise was coming from my
house, as did the Inspector.
Main breaker was shut off in the house, Inspector took my little
SW Portable outside and noise was there.
BC Hydro crew then did the following.
1...Disconnected the Power to the Service inlet at my house. Still
heavy noise on Portable (outside the house).
2...Disconnected Power line from the Secondary of the Xfmr on
the Pole across the street. Still noise but a bit lighter.
3...Opened the Switch feeding the PoleTransformer from the
overhead power line and the noise dropped considerably.
All of the noise was heard on my little portable. The Inspector
had one of those units which only indicates where HEAT is,
I think it is called Ultra-sound.
He had no VHF rcvr nor any DF antennas.
He spent 10 minutes with my small Portable in his car going up and
down the street. His comment was ...."it is all over the place"
I had already told them that one year before and also that same year.
I had WALKED 15 miles of our 30 mile tarred roads on the Island
and found noise everywhere. At noon same day, he told me that
I would have to find the noise myself and then they MAY come and
see what they can do. He spent a total of 2 1/2 hours at my place.!!
A local HF guy told me he had noises many years ago and traced
it to a Transformer. BC Hydro advised, but nothing done until the
day came and the Transformer BLEW. Apparently a short to the
outer case had done the trick. But by this time the local HF guy
had QUIT Ham radio because of the noise and the lack of
understanding or help from the BC Hydro.
12 years later with the same noise, I again wrote to the BC Hydro
and was given some other fellows name. I got in touch with him
and he arranged to come over to see what could be done.
Eventually he came and brought an RFI locator receiver with him.
He hooked up my Beam coax to this and looked on the Screen
to see what the noise was like. He then went out in his car
and eventually came back saying it was quite widespread and
he would have to come back and spend more time looking for
the source. That was nearly two years ago and that was the last
I heard from him.
He had been told that even while listening to the AM Bdcst band
on 600kHz there was one place over 1 mile away from my QTH
that the noise was quite heavy on this QRG. He said he had
also taken that into consideration.
Normally the noise was the heaviest, and I mean heaviest,
during the HOT summer months. When it rained the noise either
diminished or reduced intensity, depending on how heavy the
rain was. But soon after the rain stopped and the Sun came
out the noises began, gradually building up to strong.
I made an Audio tape many years ago of the noise, if anybody is
interested in listening to it. It takes a few minutes to download,
that is the problem. I sent this tape to AC5K (who used to be
a Power Utility Noise finder) many years ago and he confirmed
the noise was Power Line noise. It's not a very good Video but
gives an idea what it is like at my QTH.
There have been times during some contest or other I have had
to operate with 16dB of Attenuation on the Rcvr and with the
RF gain way below half way. The noise blanker is of course
useless.
My routine now is dry WX in the morning and go out and play
a round of golf, come back and pray for heavy rain to give me
a noiseless background. Never happens that way.
By the way, I have no VHF (Aircraft QRG) RX with which to
go around the Poles, and have to rely on my Portable handheld
SW receiver.
73
Doug/VE7NH
----- Original Message -----
From: "EP Swynar" <gswynar@durham.net>
To: "G. White" <radiotrade@rogers.com>; <rfi@contesting.com>
Sent: Wednesday, October 08, 2008 10:50 AM
Subject: Re: [RFI] DTV and Power line RFI
> On 8th October, it was written:
>
> "... In Ontario, you must NEVER tell Ontario Hydro (Power) that you are a
> HAM or they will ignore you. Tell them you are a disgruntled television
> owner and chances are they will give you more attention..."
>
>
> ***********************************
>
> I have to disagree with that statement, based upon my own first-hand
> experience in that regard...
>
> A couple of years ago I started getting an S-9 PLUS buzzing noise on
> 40-meters. The ONLY time it would "cease & desist" was on wet, rainy
> days...
>
> Cruising the area in my car, with the AM radio tuned to a dead spot on the
> band, I traced the source of the racket to be a hydro pole at the end of
> my
> neighbour's driveway.
>
> I phoned Ontario Hydro on a weekday morning, and was assured that someone
> would be at my place that very same day! Sure enough, a few hours later,
> there's a white & orange "cheery picker" parked out front, with two
> servicemen visually scanning the poles along the street. I brought one
> fellow into the shack, & showed him first-hand what the noise sounded
> like.
> While he listened, he was in communication with his partner outside via a
> walkie-talkie radio, as the latter hammered each pole, one by one, with a
> huge hammer.
>
> No change in noise.
>
> Finally, I directed them to where I thought the noise was coming from, and
> one of the crew went "topside" in the cherry-picker to see. Sure enough,
> when he opened the knife switch that connected the main line to my
> neighbour's drop line, the noise stopped.
>
> Examination of the switch revealed corrosion, which was the result of
> prolonged arcing. They installed a new switch, & I confirmed that the
> noise
> had completely disappeared --- with my deepest of thanks.
>
> I later wrote a letter of appreciation to the local head office of Ontario
> Hydro, expressing my gratitude...
>
> On the other hand, LOCAL utility companies here fall into the "...Hams are
> on the back-burner" category of PR. That's why, when we lived in the city
> and street lamp ballasts would go awry, causing all sorts of mayhem on the
> low bands, I would call & complain that the intermittent operation of the
> pole lamp was of concern to the citizenry walking their dogs after dark.
>
> It worked every time.
>
> ~73~ Eddy VE3CUI - VE3XZ
>
> _______________________________________________
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