Last night - around 8 PM or so - this HUGE noise signal showed up on 160 -
sweeping up the band slowly. Probably a DC power supply with signals every
80 kHz or something. But - it has some energy all over the ban - thus
rasing my noise floor. Sorry if I was an alligator last night.
I put a Beverage up to the East just before the contest started - so I had
two RX antennas - the other being a Hi-Z 4 square. The Hi-Z said the noise
signal was East - perhaps a bit stronger in the South direction than North
- so call it just South of East. The Beverage picked it up very well - so
it agreed. A feeble attempt at DFing last night was unsuccessful - but
will be tried again if it stays on during the daytime. It is still on this
morning before Sunrise.
The nasty part of the noise is about the same signal strength as most good
signals coming in that are not local (looking at the band scope). It has a
10 kHz or so wide peak.
I was able to put the two RX antennas into a MFJ-1026 - with the output
going to the RX input of my K3 - and adjusted the controls to null out the
noise. With a local signal - I have been able to obtain deep nulls and
this proved to be true with this noise. I was actually running guys on the
East coast right in the middle of the worst part of the noise after doing
this.
This technique would likely be useful for those who have a similar noise
situation - so I wanted to share. You obviously don't need a beverage for
the "noise" antenna - just something that is good at picking up the noise
and perhaps nothing much else. If you have a neighbor that has a noisy
device - just put something that is close to their house.
It's a battle out there to keep your noise sources under control. I'll
report back if I am successful in finding this one.
73 Tree N6TR / K7RAT
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