[RFI] Line load detector...

[Ford Peterson]

Here I go again.  Thinking outside the box.  But maybe you guys can help me with this...

Last summer, I spent considerable time documenting my true noise floor at a time when the powerline near my property was shut down (jumpers clearly visible only 300 yards from here).  S0 noise on Topband and 80M was a delight.  Unfortunately, in the middle of summer, I couldn't enjoy the experience much as little operating is done during the summer months.  When they turned the line back on, it was still pretty quiet.  I only noticed about 5dB of elevated noise floor--and then only on Topband and below.  Now, it's 10dB over S9 extending up into the 40M band and beyond!  The difference?  I am beginning to think it is the load delivered by this line.

A little over a week ago, an accident involving a truck took out one of the three feeders that deliver power to my nearby town.  I live on one of those three lines.  The power was out here for a little over an hour one morning.  After that event, my noise appears to be back with a vengence.  In talking with lineman that have appeared here in the past, I learn that this line is one of three that deliver power to the town.  When that truck accident trashed one of them, the load was redistributed back to this line.  I am convinced that the increased load has made the problems here much worse than before.  There is no one point source as the entire 30 miles of line radiates something fierce.  The lineman explained in detail how the central office determines how much load is carried by each line.  Once they set the load, it stays that way until other load changes in the grid mandate a change.

So what I want to do is to build a detector that can monitor the current in that line.  Sound crazy?  Some, (like the lineman that service this line) think I am.  Obviously, I'm going to get seriously hurt if I try to build a traditional current detector loop around one of those lines, much like an AC amp meter does.  It's a 69kV line.  So no, I cannot go anywhere near it.  But I do have a barn building that is right underneath that line.  I want to build something like a loopstick or other sensitive current device that can monitor the 60Hz magnetic field coming off that line.  The higher the load, the greater the detected field.  If I can correlate the changes in my noise level to the load on that line, I can provide some pretty convincing evidence that they need to redistribute some of the load back to the other two lines.

What would such a detector look like?  A loopstick?  A loop of wire?  Rectify it and monitor current picked up?  Would this work?  Am I crazy to think I can do this?

Ford-N0FP
ford at cmgate.com