On 9/1/2012 11:22 AM, Andy wrote:
I tured it on in the house, it was hammered by
insanely strong noise- everywhere, unplugged the transmitter, noise gone.
Um, isn't this thing doing exactly what it is supposed to be doing?
Kind of like those underground cable locators, that send an RF signal
into the cable, so you can locate it with a radio. For the customer
who complains, "Hey, this thing radiates RF signals," you got what you
paid for.
I don't mean to sound harsh, but it seems like radiating lots of hash
is exactly the idea here. Isn't that "heavy buzzing signal" what it
is meant to do? Yeah, you could argue they didn't need to make the
noise quite so broadband, or so loud, maybe. That just makes the
signal easier to detect without a more sensitive receiver.
But I really don't think this thing was meant to be left plugged in.
It's like using a smoke generator to look for air leaks in your house.
I wouldn't leave one running 24/7.
But the Amateur Electrician might leave the thing plugged in for days,
or even weeks and it's conceivable they'd get interrupted and just
forget about the thing. If it runs on batteries it would eventually
fall silent.
Even if they only use it for an hour or two, if you live in a
subdivision some one several houses down the street might just start
their project as you call that rare one you've needed for years or right
at the beginning of a contest week end.
It would cost little more for the thing to put out a "clean carrier" on
a discrete frequency rather than take out the whole HF spectrum. Even a
free running oscillator would be better than a square wave generator! IE
Noise generator.
I can't think of a good analogy, but these things are far worst than a
smoke generator because when the user turns off the receiver, to them
it's no longer there even with the transmitter running. They are
completely unaware that any one else can hear it let alone the thing is
capable of wiping out communications for some distance and over a wide
frequency range. Remember that most individuals are completely clueless
about anything technical. Even explaining a topic to them brings that
glazed look I'd get from trying to explain the differences between first
and 7 th normal forms in a data base or putting a bunch of computer sort
programs into mathematical formulas and combining them into 5 or 6 level
simultaneous equations to figure out which is fastest for different data
groups. IE it's a lost cause, don't bother with the details that make
sense to us or expect them to even follow a logical path.
Worse yet is they are likely to take offense at us trying to show off
our technical superiority by saying things they don't understand.
73
Roger (K8RI)
Andy
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