[RFI] An HVAC NO RFI experience

Matt Foster wedgef5 at gmail.com
Wed May 27 13:05:54 EDT 2020


Good point, John.

My antenna (a 40m OCFD at about 35') is roughly 60' from the furnace and
probably around 90' from the AC compressor.

I have not scanned all HF and VHF, but so far I have not noted any RFI on
20, 17, 15, 12 or 10 meters. With my previous HVAC system, I had pretty
strong birdies from the fan motor on 15-40m. 20m was the worst, and I have
nothing there now.

It's my understanding that ALL furnaces now are shipping with ECMs to
comply with increasing government efficiency requirements. I did, however,
stick with a single-stage compressor. That might have eliminated an ECM
there, but I found that detailed information like that is hard to find.

73, Matt, N0EYE


On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 10:32 AM John K9UWA <john at johnjeanantiqueradio.com>
wrote:

> Matt and ALL others posting your RFI report says nothing about the
> location of
> your antennas as to how far away and how high they are relative to your
> Furnace
> and or AC system. Matt's report on the Trane furnace is perfect except he
> too left
> out this most important part.
>
> A really great report would be something like My Scanning All HF and VHF
> frequency transistor radio make model .. when placed near the furnace
> hears
> nothing no RFI No Birdies or an SDR where one can watch the waterfall
> across all
> band frequencies and again the SDR placed near the furnace or AC system.
>
> I am very glad that TRANE has implemented the RFI changes into their
> furnaces.
> One of my local friends bought one a few years ago and went through all
> sorts of
> things before they solved it for him.
> John k9uwa
>
>
> On 27 May 2020 at 9:24, Matt Foster wrote:
>
> > We recently had to replace our entire HVAC system. Our existing system
> had
> > been causing me RFI from its ECM fan motor (the "birdies" about every 18
> > KHz). Needless to say, I was concerned about RFI from the new system and
> > expressed as much to each of the three contractors from whom we received
> > bids.
> >
> > The contractor we ended up going with was an authorized Trane
> distributor,
> > and they spent the better part of a day investigating the potential for
> RFI with
> > their regional Trane representative. I had provided them with information
> > regarding the Trane "RFI Kit" that I had seen referenced in email lists
> from
> > about 9-10 years ago. They ended up concluding that the components of
> the RFI
> > Kit were now included routinely on Trane equipment (I was unable to
> confirm that
> > independently, so I took them at their word). As for the other two
> contractors,
> > one seemed to not understand the issue at all and had no interest in
> learning
> > about it, and the other was basically pushing it back on me to deal with.
> >
> > I'm happy to report that our new system (XR16 compressor and XV80
> furnace)
> > is causing ZERO RFI in my shack! I'm hoping that others who are shopping
> > for new HVAC equipment will find this useful.
> >
> > 73, Matt, N0EYE
> > _______________________________________________
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> > RFI at contesting.com
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> >
>
> John Goller, K9UWA & Jean Goller, N9PXF
> Antique Radio Restorations
> k9uwa at arrl.net
> Visit our Web Site at:
> http://www.JohnJeanAntiqueRadio.com
> 4836 Ranch Road
> Leo, IN 46765
> USA
> 1-260-637-6426
>
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