[TowerTalk] Why Rain static is worse on the top antenna.
Guy Olinger, K2AV
olinger at bellsouth.net
Thu Sep 2 01:35:16 EDT 2004
Not being able to reply for a while does not mean I agree. There are
some repeatable observations that need to be taken into account, and
in this thread and the others from it, these observations do not seem
to be addressed, as neither are they addressed by you.
Calling someone else's argument "folklore" does not constitute
technical argument. The last time I looked, you also belong to the
class "folk" and you also are providing accounts of things that have
happened.
I have merely pointed out that one aspect of this consternation is
explained by the ground and antennas carrying a greater charge than
the medium IN THE CASE OF THE RAIN/SNOW STATIC PARTICULARLY, that the
common conversations about this particular case seem to have the
supply and demand reversed.
Observation 1: Tower 1 with beam A at 130' and beam B at 80'. Tower 2
with beam C at 80'. The precip static (or WHATEVER it actually is in
the eyes of the Creator) is all over beam A and beam C while beam B is
barely affected. The effect is not related to height per se, at least
not at these common ham antenna heights.
Observation 1A: It is clear that beam B gets just as much snow or rain
hitting it as beams A and C. If the snow or rain or surrounding humid
air, whatever, is carrying or shepherding the charge which dissipates
onto the grounded antennas then why does Beam B not noise up.
Observation 2: The noise is there while rain or snow is falling. Noise
stops when the snow or rain stops. Noise starts up again when rain or
snow resumes. If it's not the snow or rain, whatever it is does not
occur without the snow or rain.
Observation 3: Clean dry wind has never caused the noise we associate
with rain or snow anywhere I've been. While I have been kicked on my
a** as apparently have you by wind building up a charge on an
ungrounded antenna, the same 50 mph clear sky dry wind out of the NW
did NOT cause the noise we associate with rain or snow.
I have not been in a dusty wind since I was a child in New Mexico, and
cannot comment. I wonder whether a dusty wind would spare beam B in
the situation above. E.g. that the charge was being carried on the
dust and ALL metallics connected to ground were fair game for
discharge.
These simple observations have been reported by many other hams. The
explanations need to take them all into account. Beam B is the monkey
wrench.
Something is acting as a charge sink for the charged up antennas, and
it's either the snow or rain, or something directly associated with
it, or both.
Regards,
Guy.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Tom Rauch" <w8ji at contesting.com>
> I'm afraid that doesn't work very well either Guy. Folklore
> has caused us to ignoring what we easily can observe
> repeating over and over again.
>
> If the noise was from droplets, dust, or snowflakes the
> noise we hear would have a pitch directly related to the
> number of drops hitting the tower and an intensity directly
> related the size of those particles and the charge gradient.
> If you listen carefully to the noise while watching outside,
> you'll see that just doesn't happen at all.
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