Hi Ed
No, he did not track it down to high voltage lines. He is passing the buck
to other things, and I've been down this road too many times that I am
fairly certain it's hardware on a nearby pole that is arcing. He did find a
noise source in the church located near the problem area. Some power supply
on a musical device inside the church. They fixed that, but it did not help
my problem.
He said his next move, was to have the cable service shutdown in this area
and see if that fixes the problem. Do you see the pattern here? As in he is
trying to pass the buck? I've never heard of cable causing RFI to hf
frequencies. I know all about what a leaky cable system can do to VHF
frequencies.
It was at least 3 months after I first contacted them, maybe even 4. I have
called them 4 times now. Spacing it out, as I know they have more important
work to do (at least to them).
I can understand them not wanting to work in cold weather, but 3-4 months
ago, it wasn't cold.
73,Mike K9MI
-----Original Message-----
From: Ed -K0iL [mailto:eedwards@tconl.com]
Sent: Saturday, December 10, 2005 20:11
To: 'Mike Brown'; rfi@contesting.com
Subject: RE: [RFI] Electric company problem
Hi Mike,
Did the troubleshooter already track the noise source? And if so, was it
from a high-voltage transmission line?
Only in such a case might it be considered reasonable to wait until spring
in my opinion. An HV line might feed a substation and thousands or more
customers require a large outage to perform repairs. It would be poor
system design to have such conditions of course, but it's common with
today's growth and utilities not spending the capital needed to keep up.
They should be capable of feeding subs from multiple directions, but much of
today's transmission system is overloaded so they might not be able to do
so.
If it requires a scheduled maintenance outage under the conditions I've
stated above, make sure you get it in writing when they will be doing the
work. Then hold them to it! If they fail to do the work, get the ARRL
involved at that point. Maybe even just before to make sure they do it.
If none of the above is the case and it's just on the LV distribution, call
the ARRL to get Gruber to send them a letter. Be sure to have it sent it to
the CEO or president and copy their telecomm manager who deals with the FCC
licensing (looks this up on www.fcc.gov). If you let them put it off until
spring, they probably won't have the resources to do it then either. Put
some pressure on them.
73, de ed -K0iL
-----Original Message-----
From: rfi-bounces@contesting.com On Behalf Of Mike Brown
Early this fall, my 4th case of rfi from electric company hardware in 9
years, reared its ugly head. Number 1&2 were fixed, although it was around 3
or 4 months on each case. Number 3 took ARRL involvement, and finally a
letter from the FCC about fines, to get it fixed. That one was about 7
months.
I got a call yesterday from the guy who trouble shoots these things, and the
bottom line is that my problem is low on the list, and don't expect to see
anyone out again until spring. Not surprising.
Sorry about the boring history, but here's my question. My tower is up 40ft.
If I were to get one up, say around 70ft, will it make it easier to hear on
the ham bands only, or will I just be hearing the Rfi that much better? The
RFI beaming EU is about 20 over with the least being about S7. The source of
the interference is probably 100 yards away, maybe a little less.
Sorry for the dumb question, but I can see this is going to be an ongoing
problem, and I am tired of fighting with them. If I can't come up with a
bandaid fix of my own, I'm about ready to throw in the towel.
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