Thanks for putting so much time into this. I had a bad noise problem with my ladder line feed antenna that largely was eliminated by going to a coax fed antenna. However when I rotated that directional antenna west to try to pick up NZ and VK in the recent contest a noise level reappeared. This direction points right at a pole and the power lines. In the morning when I rotated the antenna to the east for Europe the power line was off the back side and I didn’t hear the noise anymore. So I believe I do have some invasion from the power line 100 feet away next to the street. I also detected a broadband signal in the higher 28 MHz band, a definite handshake or back and forth of signals that appeared with a different tone and shape on the spectrum display of the transceiver. This occurred regardless of the direction of the antenna. I guessed it was some sort of communication between devices, but a definite switching back and forth like a query and response, but it may not have been exactly that. I didn’t note exactly the width during the contest but probably 60 to 100 kHz above 28.7 MHz or so. I’ve got a little work to do and will inspect the lines and hardware out by the pole to begin with. Not sure if I have enough convincing information to approach Dominion Virginia Power.
I was surprised how responsive the power company was here in Michigan. They have an individual who's job it is to look into these noise complaints. I wouldn't wait to contact them. Sounds like you have a pretty good idea where it's coming from. Good luck.
Very nicely done! Methodical, thoughtful, and thorough. Once upon a time (back in the 1980s) I climbed utility poles for a living, but was fortunate in that I worked in telecommunications. As such, high voltage was always a potential hazard, but not the focus of my work. The condition of that pole, however, and the power company's blase attitude, are alarming to say the very least! Considering the look of the surrounding area, that arcing is a forest fire looking for a place to start!! This is an old video, and surely the problem has long since been resolved, but their attitude toward a serious hazard (in addition to your HF woes) is sadly all too typical of power companies across the country. 73 :-)
Great video for me. Right now I'm trying to solve my telemetry VHF noise problem and you have confirmed my early findings. Many thanks. .....Jerry.....
Great video. Imagine if the damage wasn't so visually bad how long this could take to get fixed. Great work and i can't believe they haven't fixed it after all that time. They shoud be paying you for the money you would save them if they came to fix it before it breaks completely. I have just come back on the radio after around 8 or 9 years. It's very quiet at my new QTH, well as in there are no stations except the occasional truck driver on 11M. I've only checked HF for now. The problem is that i have between 4-9 of what seems to be power line noise. This seems to be a very noisy village. I'll be going mobile to DX and i'll be going mobile to try to locate the noise better but i really doubt that i'l be able to get the utility company to come and fix anything. especially here in France. 73's
Thanks for watching and for your remarks. When the noise began it was on and off. It might be noisy for a few minutes and then stop for several hours. Over about 3 or 4 days it stayed noisy longer until it was noisy all the time. When I decided to track it down it only took a couple hours to find the problem. The power company came out and checked it right away after I emailed them photos of the pole. It was 2 or so before they came out and replaced the pole. I hope you have success finding and eliminating your noise.
Set your scope sync to "line", any power line generated noise will be in perfect sync. Of course that won't rule out dimmers and whatnot in your own or your neighbors house.
That pole is pretty secluded. Careful application of a chainsaw at 3:30am would fast-track the replacement. From your 26-minute video i can see that is not your way. When i became an adult i learned to respect other's property. I began to discuss with my neighbors (each time i moved) how thier bright outside lights hurt my eyes and ruined my nightime stargazing, but could be cured (at no cost to them, or in fact any difference in lighting on Their property) with a simple metal shield which would prevent the light from coming my way. Every Time...each neighbor's reply was, "There isn't anything wrong with my light. You'll just have to deal with it". When i was a teenager, my way of 'dealing with it' was the sneaky use of a pellet rifle in the early morning. Doing it that way worked So much better than my wasted conversations as an adult. Sometimes it took 15 bulb replacements to get the desired result (less light pollution), but it worked. As an adult, I could hire a lawyer and take them to civil court, but i don't have the money for that. I wish it were different, but that's the way it is.
No only would the chainsaw method cure the noise problem, it would stop all audio output from my receiver, as my ham shack gets it's AC via the same pole. I can't complain. The replaced the pole in pretty short order.
Excellent instructional video about finding noise. I have had intermittent noise that switches on and off, and it looks exactly the same on the band scope, and i know what direction it's coming from on the beam at my QTH. It sounds the same on all HF bands and VHF. I'm going to build a 2m handheld yagi, find it, and contact the PUD. It goes on and off all day and night long, and interferes with my ability to copy weak stations during local traffic nets. It makes DX almost impossible. Thanks & 73's. KG7SXF.
Use a DXE-NCC-1 with an RTR-1A to null out interference with a Noise Sense Antenna, works great See video's from DXE on the NCC-1 to Null out this interference
Your radio reception is not high on the power companies' priority list. Keeping live wires from falling on the ground will be near the top of their priority list! Good catch, this could even save a life.
Great video. I have a similar pattern of interference on 40 meters mostly. When I rotate my antenna to mostly the west it shows more. However, my interference is intermittent being on for 10 to 13 minute intervals every 30 minutes . I went out in the alley an located one pole with much louder buzzing at about 107 Hz on a cheap newly purchased AM radio. The noise also seems to come from the cable hook ups down the alley. A large cable junction box is next to the pole. I wonder if it is interacting or conducting the interference. Still, the intermittent nature is puzzling me. I also thought about it being a heat pump / furnace motor of sorts as there are houses and apartment buildings (big ones) in close proximity. It is very cold out right now so I though one could be firing intermittently. Tomorrow I am getting an MFJ 5008 delivered so I will go do some more "sniffing" though it is going to be near zero degrees F over the next few days making it harder to stay out let alone walking on the ice in the alley.
HI Steve, Great video showing your methodology, and amazing pole damage. Does your scope not have single sweep capture capability? Single Sweep would make it much easier to analyze the spikes. I previously used my oscilloscope similar to what you do, but then realized it's often much easier to just use a soundcard based audio oscilloscope program, and I now use one called "Soundcard Oscilloscope" for analyzing the audio. This software is free for private use applications. This software allows you to do a single sweep capture, and it has cursors so you can easily measure the time as well as frequency of the spikes. I use the software with a laptop that has a built in mic, and therefore no interface required. I was easily able to capture and measure the spikes in the audio you recorded using this software. Just FYI, and thanks for the previous 160 meter contest contacts (keep em coming). Don (wd8dsb)
Hi Don. Thanks for the info, as well as the 160m contest QSO's. My scope does not have a sweep capture feature. It's a good scope but an older one. I have heard of the sound-card based scopes for audio but never used one. I'll have to check it out. Thanks for the tip. 73, Steve
Power company could be leasing listening circuits locally, to law enforcement. Longitudinal and Latitudal hot spots on the lines are current to distance related. The current tags the radio frequency and meets, the spy current at the steel support wire. LED lights are the new microphones. Two types of light per led, allows recordings of vid/aud...One metal in the led uses wide light for video and thin light does audio. Potentiometer and a desk. CJT
Is Often interference from light bulbs in the house with bad filtering absolute Beautiful radio by the way Fun fact when the house power fails I get really Nice AM radio
yes PLA is killing are Hobby! its worse if you have a vertical antenna, as most of the PLA's seem to radiate in that Poll, i have removed 8 houses worth of adaptors to some that are clean , at my out of my own pocket , as Ofcom was Hopeless in Helping.
Is it a good idea to use a power conditioner with radio equipment to eliminate the chance of getting noise via the supplied power to the radio equipment?
The term "power conditioner" was new to me so I looked up some info on-line about them. It looks to me like "power conditioner" is a pretty generic term that refers to anything that provides voltage regulations along with at least one other feature which could include noise suppression. The descriptions I read referred to mostly audio, video and lab equipment and not radio receivers. I would say based on what I found, using a power conditions wouldn't hurt, but these devices do not pickup electrical noise via electromagnetic radiation like a radio receiver. If the source of received noise in a radio receiver is coming via radiated energy from arcing in a defective power line component such as the one in this video, a power conditioner would have no effect as the energy is radiated and comes to the radio through the air via the antenna. So at this time in general I would say NO, it wouldn't necessarily something that would reduce radiated RFI reception in a receiver. I would like to see some reviews of their use for this purpose before I would recommend getting one for reducing RFI.
I live in a very rural area how far should I go around my home to find PLM I located one pole about a half mile away and power company repaired it dropped noise level from s9+ to s7+ but very loud buzzing thanks de KF4ZNL
The noise can actually "propagate" (for lack of a better description) down the power lines a long distance so if you have a receive that you can take to poles 1 to 2 miles in each direction (or maybe even further) it might ID more sources of arcing that are resulting in QRN at your location.
I pick up rfi on my GMRS radios. It sounds like a diesel engine running at high rpm. While driving around scanning channels I get it on different locations on different channels. In one area it will be on one channel only. In another area it will be on a different channel. What is causing this?
GMRS radios are FM radios and are not subject to impulse noise such as that caused by power line arcing which causes noise in an AM mode receiver such as regular AM voice, SSB or CW or even digital modes. I really don't have a possible cause for that one. Sorry.
@@k8bz983 It is just very odd. It seems like it is always in the vicinity of a farm place. At one location it might be effecting channel 15 and another channel 20. But it is always the same sound. Well thanks for replying back.
Use a DXE-NCC-1 with an RTR-1A to null out interference with a Noise Sense Antenna, works great See video's from DXE on the NCC-1 to Null out this interference
ok 2 things hahhahaha ..... u showed them issue. let it be. kind of out of there control that it happened... good job old man... 2nd.............. CALL THE FD...our local power would be out there that day replacing.. damnnnnnnn....... them lines come down thats a ahzzzzzzzzzardddddd....... 73
My ex next door neighbor took a 16 ft floracient light fixture wraped 100 ft of power cord around it to wipe me out the power co put a stop to that took me one have a year to put an ent to that kg6mn
I am being very bothered now with a lowfrequency sound at around 35-50Hz... at 3 different addresses. Else I havent heard this sound. At all 3 locations there are powerlines and transformers in the close nearby. Very very irritating and distracting at nights and when its quiet around.. Is this a well known problem with power lines ?
I'm not sure but I think you mean that you can hear the sound with your ears, and not as static over the radio. Yes, I would have to say it is possible. Arcing in faulty power line transformers and other components make a quick snap sound with each arc. The frequency of the AC will determine the pitch of the sound you hear. 60 Hz AC will usually make a 120 Hz hum as the arc will happen at the peak and valley of each cycle. Human hearing is about in the range of 20 Hz to 20 KHz, so it would be within our hearing frequency range.
Within the power distribution industry, arcing is a well-known precursor to wooden power pole damage and even fires caused by it. Any responsible power company is going to want to deal with such arcing before it gets to the fire stage.
sure - maybe new york utility workers went to santa cruz california. you are dealing with high power wideband noise. megawatts over cities. nearly everyone in government has knowledge of nick nacks.
I have a problem with my Laptop. And is that in some songs that I listen to there is a bothersome sound that is not supposed to be part of the song, and I'm sure that this is RFI. Sometimes while watching series, I heard people talking and I'm starting to believe that it's made on purpose. So What gadget can let me wipe out these people's voices talking in whatever i'm hearing?
+Pablo Leroy Jerez I'm not sure what you can do about the problem. I am not experience at solving RFI with a Laptop. I recommend that you have a qualified laptop service technician check out the problem and see if there is something they can do.
Found this while researching my own problems with PL-RFI and must say it was very methodical and made perfect sense. Thank you.
Thanks for putting so much time into this. I had a bad noise problem with my ladder line feed antenna that largely was eliminated by going to a coax fed antenna. However when I rotated that directional antenna west to try to pick up NZ and VK in the recent contest a noise level reappeared. This direction points right at a pole and the power lines. In the morning when I rotated the antenna to the east for Europe the power line was off the back side and I didn’t hear the noise anymore. So I believe I do have some invasion from the power line 100 feet away next to the street.
I also detected a broadband signal in the higher 28 MHz band, a definite handshake or back and forth of signals that appeared with a different tone and shape on the spectrum display of the transceiver. This occurred regardless of the direction of the antenna. I guessed it was some sort of communication between devices, but a definite switching back and forth like a query and response, but it may not have been exactly that. I didn’t note exactly the width during the contest but probably 60 to 100 kHz above 28.7 MHz or so.
I’ve got a little work to do and will inspect the lines and hardware out by the pole to begin with. Not sure if I have enough convincing information to approach Dominion Virginia Power.
I was surprised how responsive the power company was here in Michigan. They have an individual who's job it is to look into these noise complaints. I wouldn't wait to contact them. Sounds like you have a pretty good idea where it's coming from. Good luck.
Very nicely done! Methodical, thoughtful, and thorough. Once upon a time (back in the 1980s) I climbed utility poles for a living, but was fortunate in that I worked in telecommunications. As such, high voltage was always a potential hazard, but not the focus of my work. The condition of that pole, however, and the power company's blase attitude, are alarming to say the very least! Considering the look of the surrounding area, that arcing is a forest fire looking for a place to start!! This is an old video, and surely the problem has long since been resolved, but their attitude toward a serious hazard (in addition to your HF woes) is sadly all too typical of power companies across the country. 73 :-)
Great video for me. Right now I'm trying to solve my telemetry VHF noise problem and you have confirmed my early findings. Many thanks. .....Jerry.....
Can I hear telemetry on Ham radio or on HF?
Great video! My issue is exactly the same. The noise is intermittent and worse on cold dry windy days. No luck with the power company yet. Thanks!
A most excellent presentation, thanks for sharing this - KC8RFP.
Bravo! Well done, and well presented!
Thanks so much.
Great video. Imagine if the damage wasn't so visually bad how long this could take to get fixed. Great work and i can't believe they haven't fixed it after all that time. They shoud be paying you for the money you would save them if they came to fix it before it breaks completely.
I have just come back on the radio after around 8 or 9 years. It's very quiet at my new QTH, well as in there are no stations except the occasional truck driver on 11M. I've only checked HF for now. The problem is that i have between 4-9 of what seems to be power line noise. This seems to be a very noisy village. I'll be going mobile to DX and i'll be going mobile to try to locate the noise better but i really doubt that i'l be able to get the utility company to come and fix anything. especially here in France. 73's
Thanks for watching and for your remarks.
When the noise began it was on and off. It might be noisy for a few minutes and then stop for several hours. Over about 3 or 4 days it stayed noisy longer until it was noisy all the time. When I decided to track it down it only took a couple hours to find the problem. The power company came out and checked it right away after I emailed them photos of the pole. It was 2 or so before they came out and replaced the pole.
I hope you have success finding and eliminating your noise.
Set your scope sync to "line", any power line generated noise will be in perfect sync. Of course that won't rule out dimmers and whatnot in your own or your neighbors house.
That pole is pretty secluded. Careful application of a chainsaw at 3:30am would fast-track the replacement. From your 26-minute video i can see that is not your way.
When i became an adult i learned to respect other's property. I began to discuss with my neighbors (each time i moved) how thier bright outside lights hurt my eyes and ruined my nightime stargazing, but could be cured (at no cost to them, or in fact any difference in lighting on Their property) with a simple metal shield which would prevent the light from coming my way. Every Time...each neighbor's reply was, "There isn't anything wrong with my light. You'll just have to deal with it".
When i was a teenager, my way of 'dealing with it' was the sneaky use of a pellet rifle in the early morning. Doing it that way worked So much better than my wasted conversations as an adult. Sometimes it took 15 bulb replacements to get the desired result (less light pollution), but it worked. As an adult, I could hire a lawyer and take them to civil court, but i don't have the money for that. I wish it were different, but that's the way it is.
No only would the chainsaw method cure the noise problem, it would stop all audio output from my receiver, as my ham shack gets it's AC via the same pole. I can't complain. The replaced the pole in pretty short order.
Correction: that pole is _burnt_ toast. 😀 Great work, thanks. 👍
Excellent instructional video about finding noise. I have had intermittent noise that switches on and off, and it looks exactly the same on the band scope, and i know what direction it's coming from on the beam at my QTH. It sounds the same on all HF bands and VHF. I'm going to build a 2m handheld yagi, find it, and contact the PUD. It goes on and off all day and night long, and interferes with my ability to copy weak stations during local traffic nets. It makes DX almost impossible. Thanks & 73's. KG7SXF.
Thanks Drew, Good luck tracking down your source. Let me know how you made out. 73, K7BZ
Use a DXE-NCC-1 with an RTR-1A to null out interference with a Noise Sense Antenna, works great
See video's from DXE on the NCC-1 to Null out this interference
Great work Steve!
Was this on Hockaday road?
Your radio reception is not high on the power companies' priority list. Keeping live wires from falling on the ground will be near the top of their priority list! Good catch, this could even save a life.
This is excellent detective work!
Great video. I have a similar pattern of interference on 40 meters mostly. When I rotate my antenna to mostly the west it shows more. However, my interference is intermittent being on for 10 to 13 minute intervals every 30 minutes . I went out in the alley an located one pole with much louder buzzing at about 107 Hz on a cheap newly purchased AM radio. The noise also seems to come from the cable hook ups down the alley. A large cable junction box is next to the pole. I wonder if it is interacting or conducting the interference. Still, the intermittent nature is puzzling me. I also thought about it being a heat pump / furnace motor of sorts as there are houses and apartment buildings (big ones) in close proximity. It is very cold out right now so I though one could be firing intermittently. Tomorrow I am getting an MFJ 5008 delivered so I will go do some more "sniffing" though it is going to be near zero degrees F over the next few days making it harder to stay out let alone walking on the ice in the alley.
apparently a tv cable wire that's damaged will act like a transmitter
you discovered a fire Hazard very good this turns quickly in high priority repair I think
Excellent work my friend.
I Hope you realize by now it is not a knife switch but rather a FUSE JACK! - 73 - KV4WM
Yep, it's a fuse cutout that can be used as a switch by pulling on it with a hot stick. Canucks call it a 'door'.
HI Steve,
Great video showing your methodology, and amazing pole damage.
Does your scope not have single sweep capture capability? Single Sweep would make it much easier to analyze the spikes.
I previously used my oscilloscope similar to what you do, but then realized it's often much easier to just use a soundcard based audio oscilloscope program, and I now use one called "Soundcard Oscilloscope" for analyzing the audio. This software is free for private use applications. This software allows you to do a single sweep capture, and it has cursors so you can easily measure the time as well as frequency of the spikes. I use the software with a laptop that has a built in mic, and therefore no interface required. I was easily able to capture and measure the spikes in the audio you recorded using this software.
Just FYI, and thanks for the previous 160 meter contest contacts (keep em coming).
Don (wd8dsb)
Hi Don. Thanks for the info, as well as the 160m contest QSO's. My scope does not have a sweep capture feature. It's a good scope but an older one.
I have heard of the sound-card based scopes for audio but never used one. I'll have to check it out. Thanks for the tip. 73, Steve
Very Very informative vid..Thank you N3DHE
+Mark Grybos
Thanks Mark. I hope it was helpful. 73,
Power company could be leasing listening circuits locally, to law enforcement. Longitudinal and Latitudal hot spots on the lines are current to distance related. The current tags the radio frequency and meets, the spy current at the steel support wire. LED lights are the new microphones. Two types of light per led, allows recordings of vid/aud...One metal in the led uses wide light for video and thin light does audio. Potentiometer and a desk. CJT
Is Often interference from light bulbs in the house with bad filtering absolute Beautiful radio by the way Fun fact when the house power fails I get really Nice AM radio
great video thanks for posting
Nice IC-7600.
Tks. I love that radio!
Hi, a most excellent investigation!
How far was the pole from your location?
Thanks for the comment. The pole is about 300 yards down the road from my driveway.
yes PLA is killing are Hobby! its worse if you have a vertical antenna, as most of the PLA's seem to radiate in that Poll, i have removed 8 houses worth of adaptors to some that are clean , at my out of my own pocket , as Ofcom was Hopeless in Helping.
Is it a good idea to use a power conditioner with radio equipment to eliminate the chance of getting noise via the supplied power to the radio equipment?
The term "power conditioner" was new to me so I looked up some info on-line about them. It looks to me like "power conditioner" is a pretty generic term that refers to anything that provides voltage regulations along with at least one other feature which could include noise suppression. The descriptions I read referred to mostly audio, video and lab equipment and not radio receivers. I would say based on what I found, using a power conditions wouldn't hurt, but these devices do not pickup electrical noise via electromagnetic radiation like a radio receiver. If the source of received noise in a radio receiver is coming via radiated energy from arcing in a defective power line component such as the one in this video, a power conditioner would have no effect as the energy is radiated and comes to the radio through the air via the antenna. So at this time in general I would say NO, it wouldn't necessarily something that would reduce radiated RFI reception in a receiver. I would like to see some reviews of their use for this purpose before I would recommend getting one for reducing RFI.
I live in a very rural area how far should I go around my home to find PLM I located one pole about a half mile away and power company repaired it dropped noise level from s9+ to s7+ but very loud buzzing thanks de KF4ZNL
The noise can actually "propagate" (for lack of a better description) down the power lines a long distance so if you have a receive that you can take to poles 1 to 2 miles in each direction (or maybe even further) it might ID more sources of arcing that are resulting in QRN at your location.
I pick up rfi on my GMRS radios. It sounds like a diesel engine running at high rpm. While driving around scanning channels I get it on different locations on different channels. In one area it will be on one channel only. In another area it will be on a different channel. What is causing this?
GMRS radios are FM radios and are not subject to impulse noise such as that caused by power line arcing which causes noise in an AM mode receiver such as regular AM voice, SSB or CW or even digital modes. I really don't have a possible cause for that one. Sorry.
@@k8bz983 It is just very odd. It seems like it is always in the vicinity of a farm place. At one location it might be effecting channel 15 and another channel 20. But it is always the same sound. Well thanks for replying back.
thank u nice job~
niiiiiiiccceeee
Pulsating noise? Have you tried mfj-1026? I assure you that noise will be eliminated.
Use a DXE-NCC-1 with an RTR-1A to null out interference with a Noise Sense Antenna, works great
See video's from DXE on the NCC-1 to Null out this interference
Try newer unit NCC-2 from DX, has rtf-1a built into it !
ok 2 things hahhahaha ..... u showed them issue. let it be. kind of out of there control that it happened... good job old man... 2nd.............. CALL THE FD...our local power would be out there that day replacing.. damnnnnnnn....... them lines come down thats a ahzzzzzzzzzardddddd....... 73
My ex next door neighbor took a 16 ft floracient light fixture wraped 100 ft of power cord around it to wipe me out the power co put a stop to that took me one have a year to put an ent to that kg6mn
Sorry you had such a hard time getting it resolved. Hopefully it won't happen again.
I am being very bothered now with a lowfrequency sound at around 35-50Hz... at 3 different addresses. Else I havent heard this sound.
At all 3 locations there are powerlines and transformers in the close nearby. Very very irritating and distracting at nights and when its quiet around..
Is this a well known problem with power lines ?
I'm not sure but I think you mean that you can hear the sound with your ears, and not as static over the radio. Yes, I would have to say it is possible. Arcing in faulty power line transformers and other components make a quick snap sound with each arc. The frequency of the AC will determine the pitch of the sound you hear. 60 Hz AC will usually make a 120 Hz hum as the arc will happen at the peak and valley of each cycle. Human hearing is about in the range of 20 Hz to 20 KHz, so it would be within our hearing frequency range.
@@k8bz983 Thanks.. Its like a consitant "humm" sound all the time. Gonna check this with the local power company ++
Within the power distribution industry, arcing is a well-known precursor to wooden power pole damage and even fires caused by it. Any responsible power company is going to want to deal with such arcing before it gets to the fire stage.
Is probably caused by a high voltage power line
no shit!!!
Is it possible that v2k voices be discovered through HF?
I doubt it. You already have a V2K receiver.
Also I wanted this IR camera recorded voices be able to decipher. Donno how should I do it? Pls help me out.
sure - maybe new york utility workers went to santa cruz california. you are dealing with high power wideband noise. megawatts over cities. nearly everyone in government has knowledge of nick nacks.
what are you going on about?
PG&E has people that cant pass wiring tests.They grounded the high voltage removed thousands of insulators, added a 4th wire
I have a problem with my Laptop. And is that in some songs that I listen to there is a bothersome sound that is not supposed to be part of the song, and I'm sure that this is RFI. Sometimes while watching series, I heard people talking and I'm starting to believe that it's made on purpose. So What gadget can let me wipe out these people's voices talking in whatever i'm hearing?
+Pablo Leroy Jerez
I'm not sure what you can do about the problem. I am not experience at solving RFI with a Laptop. I recommend that you have a qualified laptop service technician check out the problem and see if there is something they can do.