That is far from the only thing wrong with living in a city . In fact it rates pretty far down my list of reasons. :laugh:
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Well I got a letter from the FCC
- Thread starter KD2GOE
- Start date
That is far from the only thing wrong with living in a city . In fact it rates pretty far down my list of reasons. :laugh:
Radio interference - YouTube
I am going to contat the ARRL. the whole situation stinks because I really don't have a problem with people "growing things" I'm in a hard spot right now because of the interference and even just DXing. .. and i dont want to be a dick to peope. But well if they dont want me to help them to fix it then so be it..
I am going to contat the ARRL. the whole situation stinks because I really don't have a problem with people "growing things" I'm in a hard spot right now because of the interference and even just DXing. .. and i dont want to be a dick to peope. But well if they dont want me to help them to fix it then so be it..
I must pick and choose my words carefully.
There is a web site, I do not remember the address, where the host was an X electric company employee and also a amateur radio operator.
In that web site, he teaches you how to build a receiver and a antenna to detect interference and then goes about telling you how to address those issues.
In my case, the electric company replaced the lines from about 1/4 mile behind my house to the end of the line with steel core aluminum clad cable.
The cable was new, the insulators appeared to be in good shape.
The power came into the town - 3 phase, one leg of the power was used to energize the town, the rest was sent off to a coal deep mine about 3 miles away.
The coal company hit a fault and had to pull out, so there was no extreme loads on the line.
There was no corona on the insulators - hence no cracked insulators.
There was no noise beyond the junction point where the copper wire met the aluminum clad wire.
The noise was 10/9 at the junction point where the 3 phase power was branched off the main line.
Walking down the right of way, the noise was the strongest at the water pumping station.
Two theory's - one was that the American Water Company was using a dirty transmitter at the site.. The noise was from the Commercial Am - 540 kc to 6000 Mhz..
The other theory was that they were using Broadband Over Powerline.
At the meter base, there was a round module, said Turtle Automatic Reporting System. The Turtle company made erroneous claims about interference standards. Then the Turtle company went out of business and sold the patent rights to another company that made a different set of claims about interference standards.
Using laboratory grade measuring equipment, I had found that I was not receiving a quality product. My electric coming into the house was 166 VAC at about 72 hz.
The refrigerator was making horrible noises - like an airplane about to take off at the airport. The 24V transformer on the furnace was humming loudly.
The lightbulbs were blowing out at a rate of about 2 a week..
The first thing was to replace the transformer on the pole.
The paint was missing from the side of the transformer and my theory was that the components inside of the transformer was getting hot.
That did not fix the problem.
The next transformer down was emitting a noise even louder then the powerline at my QTH. So the power company took it down, replaced it with a larger unit.
This did not solve the problem.
The next transformer down was even louder then the last, this one we simply disconnected.. This did not solve the problem.
When we got to the junction point, the bucket truck radio could not receive the base station radio - 12 miles away - even with a digital signal.
No problem found.
At this point the electric company knew what the problem was, but did not want to admit it.
They packed up and went home.
The next day I received a letter in the mail - informing me that the insulation jacket on the wire going down the side of my house was faulty and that I had 30 days to replace it - else they were going to shut off my service.
So I paid an electrician $750 to replace everything from the weatherhead to the load center - including the grounds.. The electric company demanded that I install all new ground stakes - since they could not guarantee that the stake used at my location was the proper length and construction.
All a bunch of b.s.
At this point I got out my 35 mm camera and started taking pictures of the electric pole at the pump house. I made notes of how the street light was connected, the missing hardware on the pole, the lack of proper grounds at the pump house, the Turtle automatic reporting system transponder.
I sent this information to the ARRL, along with an additional letter to the FCC.
I explained my problem, I even made a video of the noise, along with a ride in the truck - where the XM radio was knocked out at the pump house - and 1/4 mile in every direction.. You could hear the noise on the XM frequencies almost two miles away.
The water company had a UHF antenna mounted to the side of some type of monitoring station about 2 miles away and it was emitting the same digital noise.
About 3 weeks went by with no resolution.
One morning I left for school and the noise was there, when I returned in the afternoon the noise was gone.....
2 years went by with no problems.
About a month ago I was driving past the pumping station and there were electricians there installing a 20' tower with a UHF antenna pointed towards the water tank - about 2 miles away..
I still do not hear any noise, but I suspect that at least part of the problem was due to the American Water Company installing a illegal transmitter at the pumping station..
Today, the gas company, the water company, the electric company all uses some type of monitoring equipment on all my utilities at my QTH.
It is unfortunate that some of these companies do not understand a bandplan and will put up a transmitter on any frequency they do not hear a signal on and think that it is ok to do so - because no one is using it.
Then when it interferes with amateur radio, they just change the frequency.
If no one complains, then they got away with it.
I guess it is a lot like panning for gold..
If you find gold, it is worth it.
You need to build some type of fox hunt antenna, you need to use the radio detection equipment to pin point the noise source. You need to be verbal while trying to talk to your neighbors about the interference - but you need to know how to talk to them and how to do it in a non offensive manner.
If you can find the interference, then you need to be prepared to explain to them a solution.
Plasma televisions, loose wires on a doorbell transformer, some type of light dimmer switch, florescent lights, LED lights - what ever it is, it might not be a cheap solution, especially if those items are hardwired into the house.
As others has said, sometimes it is easier to just move to the country.
Then all you have to put up with is ignition noise, fence chargers, motor brush noise etc...
The ARRL is not going to come to your neighbors house to look for the noise.
The FCC is not going to come to your neighbors house to look for the noise.
It is your job to prove where the noise is coming from and offer a solution.
Even if that solution is to throw parts at the problem until it goes away!
What the ARRL will do for you - if you are a member of ARES and RACES and are a active ham on the emergency nets, is that they will send a letter to the FCC on your behalf and will advise them that there is a problem and that you are an emergency communicator and that you must be interference free in order for you to be an effective communicator.
If all you do is rag chew on some net and contest occasionally, they probably aren't going to get too excited and they probably won't do anything.
Just reporting someone is not enough..
You have to take repeated steps - more then one occassion of trying to resolve the issue before any action is taken..
My other question would be if you belong to the ARRL..
I think they get a little more involved in the matter if you are a member then they will if you are not!
The last time I checked, there was somewhere around 750,000 call signs in the USA and maybe 150,000 ARRL members in the world....
That is quite a disparity...
There is a web site, I do not remember the address, where the host was an X electric company employee and also a amateur radio operator.
In that web site, he teaches you how to build a receiver and a antenna to detect interference and then goes about telling you how to address those issues.
In my case, the electric company replaced the lines from about 1/4 mile behind my house to the end of the line with steel core aluminum clad cable.
The cable was new, the insulators appeared to be in good shape.
The power came into the town - 3 phase, one leg of the power was used to energize the town, the rest was sent off to a coal deep mine about 3 miles away.
The coal company hit a fault and had to pull out, so there was no extreme loads on the line.
There was no corona on the insulators - hence no cracked insulators.
There was no noise beyond the junction point where the copper wire met the aluminum clad wire.
The noise was 10/9 at the junction point where the 3 phase power was branched off the main line.
Walking down the right of way, the noise was the strongest at the water pumping station.
Two theory's - one was that the American Water Company was using a dirty transmitter at the site.. The noise was from the Commercial Am - 540 kc to 6000 Mhz..
The other theory was that they were using Broadband Over Powerline.
At the meter base, there was a round module, said Turtle Automatic Reporting System. The Turtle company made erroneous claims about interference standards. Then the Turtle company went out of business and sold the patent rights to another company that made a different set of claims about interference standards.
Using laboratory grade measuring equipment, I had found that I was not receiving a quality product. My electric coming into the house was 166 VAC at about 72 hz.
The refrigerator was making horrible noises - like an airplane about to take off at the airport. The 24V transformer on the furnace was humming loudly.
The lightbulbs were blowing out at a rate of about 2 a week..
The first thing was to replace the transformer on the pole.
The paint was missing from the side of the transformer and my theory was that the components inside of the transformer was getting hot.
That did not fix the problem.
The next transformer down was emitting a noise even louder then the powerline at my QTH. So the power company took it down, replaced it with a larger unit.
This did not solve the problem.
The next transformer down was even louder then the last, this one we simply disconnected.. This did not solve the problem.
When we got to the junction point, the bucket truck radio could not receive the base station radio - 12 miles away - even with a digital signal.
No problem found.
At this point the electric company knew what the problem was, but did not want to admit it.
They packed up and went home.
The next day I received a letter in the mail - informing me that the insulation jacket on the wire going down the side of my house was faulty and that I had 30 days to replace it - else they were going to shut off my service.
So I paid an electrician $750 to replace everything from the weatherhead to the load center - including the grounds.. The electric company demanded that I install all new ground stakes - since they could not guarantee that the stake used at my location was the proper length and construction.
All a bunch of b.s.
At this point I got out my 35 mm camera and started taking pictures of the electric pole at the pump house. I made notes of how the street light was connected, the missing hardware on the pole, the lack of proper grounds at the pump house, the Turtle automatic reporting system transponder.
I sent this information to the ARRL, along with an additional letter to the FCC.
I explained my problem, I even made a video of the noise, along with a ride in the truck - where the XM radio was knocked out at the pump house - and 1/4 mile in every direction.. You could hear the noise on the XM frequencies almost two miles away.
The water company had a UHF antenna mounted to the side of some type of monitoring station about 2 miles away and it was emitting the same digital noise.
About 3 weeks went by with no resolution.
One morning I left for school and the noise was there, when I returned in the afternoon the noise was gone.....
2 years went by with no problems.
About a month ago I was driving past the pumping station and there were electricians there installing a 20' tower with a UHF antenna pointed towards the water tank - about 2 miles away..
I still do not hear any noise, but I suspect that at least part of the problem was due to the American Water Company installing a illegal transmitter at the pumping station..
Today, the gas company, the water company, the electric company all uses some type of monitoring equipment on all my utilities at my QTH.
It is unfortunate that some of these companies do not understand a bandplan and will put up a transmitter on any frequency they do not hear a signal on and think that it is ok to do so - because no one is using it.
Then when it interferes with amateur radio, they just change the frequency.
If no one complains, then they got away with it.
I guess it is a lot like panning for gold..
If you find gold, it is worth it.
You need to build some type of fox hunt antenna, you need to use the radio detection equipment to pin point the noise source. You need to be verbal while trying to talk to your neighbors about the interference - but you need to know how to talk to them and how to do it in a non offensive manner.
If you can find the interference, then you need to be prepared to explain to them a solution.
Plasma televisions, loose wires on a doorbell transformer, some type of light dimmer switch, florescent lights, LED lights - what ever it is, it might not be a cheap solution, especially if those items are hardwired into the house.
As others has said, sometimes it is easier to just move to the country.
Then all you have to put up with is ignition noise, fence chargers, motor brush noise etc...
The ARRL is not going to come to your neighbors house to look for the noise.
The FCC is not going to come to your neighbors house to look for the noise.
It is your job to prove where the noise is coming from and offer a solution.
Even if that solution is to throw parts at the problem until it goes away!
What the ARRL will do for you - if you are a member of ARES and RACES and are a active ham on the emergency nets, is that they will send a letter to the FCC on your behalf and will advise them that there is a problem and that you are an emergency communicator and that you must be interference free in order for you to be an effective communicator.
If all you do is rag chew on some net and contest occasionally, they probably aren't going to get too excited and they probably won't do anything.
Just reporting someone is not enough..
You have to take repeated steps - more then one occassion of trying to resolve the issue before any action is taken..
My other question would be if you belong to the ARRL..
I think they get a little more involved in the matter if you are a member then they will if you are not!
The last time I checked, there was somewhere around 750,000 call signs in the USA and maybe 150,000 ARRL members in the world....
That is quite a disparity...
yep...it wasn't even on the radar screen when I decided to move...
Two local hams and myself are getting bad interference from somewhere,its at times 20db on all modes and from 440mhz to 1.0mhz.And also get landline and wifi.Its so sporadic you just cant find it.Its within a one mile area.Its not bpl,or cable bleed off,its a wide pulsing noise.Will try to get a video of it and post.73
The FCC is probably too preoccupied with destroying the Internet to be bothered with these pesky radio interference complaints. 
The same socialists that are pushing for the 1st amendment repeal are the same ones who want to control the internet. What will they think of next?
The ARRL will do nothing and neither will anyone else,the only REAL choice is probably to move,not much else you can do.
You're slackin' in your old age. Where the heck is "Too Long, Didn't Read" in response to Browningman?
73,
Brett
well the power company was nice enough to end up coming over. they went through all the street lights up and down my street and the side street but he did it when there was no interference. they energize each light and tested them one at a time... the conclusion that he came up with it must be a house around the neighborhood with an electric eye or a timer, I kind of agree with him. he was nice and asked me to call him if there's any other problems with their system.
I am now trying to put together a directional antenna I can carry around and pinpoint where its coming from..
I am now trying to put together a directional antenna I can carry around and pinpoint where its coming from..
and not only did the FCC not lift a finger to do anything, other than write me a letter saying they're not going to do a damn thing. it's my responsibility to fix the interference in my neighborhood caused by somebody else.. I found out the power company lost my request for them to come out and take a look at the lights. so the FCC was BSing me the whole time I never followed up on anything
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