Topband: Power Line Noise (long)

[Rick Stealey]

Brad - You've gotten some good info here so far.  I have similar problems here about every two years.  My last one lasted over a year and I spent a lot of time arguing with the power company and also a lot of time doing my own hunting.  here's what I learned, non-technical part first:
Write the CEOs office, ask them to call you, ask them if they will track the situation so you have a single point of contact.
Forget the FCC.  Read the letter Laura wrote (announced in QST a few mo. ago) where a power company was jerking around a ham for 10 years.  Her threat to them was they would have to give her a report every 2 weeks or so, no penalty, no nothing.  She's useless.
Technical - 
My noise was deafening on 160 and 80 meters.  It could be heard on 10 meters with a yagi and DF'd.  Efforts to DF the noise with broadcast band are useless because the noise travels unattenuated for long distances.  I built a loop antenna that worked on BCB (I could locate the direction of BCB stations) but it was useless on 160 meters because the noise was all over the power lines, traveling essentially unattenuated so the source appeared to be everywhere.
You need to be able to listen on VHF/UHF with an AM receiver.  Beg, borrow, or buy a multiband rig like a 706 that has 10 meters to 440 MHz AM.  Drive around listening on 10 or 6 meters.  When you hear noise switch to 2 meters, then finally to 440.  In my case that got me to within 50 yards of the offending pole which ultimately was found to have a bad transformer.  I also built a Quagi 8 elements, to use on 440 and I could point it at the pole and hear the noise so I knew I had found it.
The power company guy here had his best experience using the ultrasonic detector that someone else mentioned.  He was familiar with it and it did the job for him most of the time.  but this noise was 1.2 miles from my house so he became frustrated after listening to a couple dozen nearby poles and not finding anything.  That's why you have to use RF, and it has to be VHF and UHF.
Then when you find the pole you have to deal with beaurocracy, unions, etc.  Just keep asking them for dates, expect lots of delays and cancellations, but eventually you will get a crew to do the work.  
In my opinion complaining to the PUC and the FCC gets you absolutely nothing.  Riley wrote lots of letters, but did you ever see Riley colelct any money?

Rick  K2XT

 		 	   		  
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