Elecraft

[OT] A Very Quiet Day

Classic

List

Threaded

11 messages Options

alorona

[OT] A Very Quiet Day

Power was shut off to my noisy urban neighborhood yesterday while crews replaced a power pole. For a long time, I have wanted to check my HF noise floor when the power is out, and yesterday was my chance. For days like this is why my station is solar-powered!

I expected to be surprised but I was absolutely blown away by what I heard. The 40 meter noise floor was at least *17 dB* lower than normal. I could hear layers and layers of signals that I never knew were there. Nets I never knew existed… I mean, have you heard of the Montana Sheepherders net, for pity’s sake? A midday 40 m pileup on a SOTA QRP CW station in Texas that I never would have had a prayer of hearing normally. The noise was so low that I could hear way, way down into the intermod of SSB signals—and most of them were quite yucky. I heard birdies and crud from washing machines from what must have been three blocks away. I heard the 7150 kHz 5th harmonic of a local AM station. By measurement on the P3, I confirmed that all of these signals would have been completely under my usual noise floor.

On 20, it was so quiet I almost believed that the K3’s receiver had failed. WWV was coming in at a 56 dB signal-to-noise ratio.

Interestingly, 80 meters was also quieter, but not by as much. I’m not complaining about nearly 10 dB less noise, but it’s too bad that power was turned on before dark, before I could really evaluate the conditions.

When it gets this quiet, there are no ticks, crashes or noise transients of any kind... just a gentle rushing sound, so it ‘feels’ even quieter than it is. It was every bit as quiet as a forest Field Day a hundred miles from civilization. Yes, radio was amazing yesterday for six glorious hours.

R,

Al W6LX

______________________________________________________________
Elecraft mailing list
Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
Post: mailto:[hidden email]

This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Message delivered to [hidden email]

wayne burdick

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

Administrator

Hi Al,

Thanks for entertaining observations.

I have a proximately the same experience every time I take the KX2 or KX3 miles away from humanity.

Wayne
N6KR

----
elecraft.com

> On Sep 10, 2020, at 12:53 PM, Al Lorona <[hidden email]> wrote:
>
> Power was shut off to my noisy urban neighborhood yesterday while crews replaced a power pole. For a long time, I have wanted to check my HF noise floor when the power is out, and yesterday was my chance. For days like this is why my station is solar-powered!
>
> I expected to be surprised but I was absolutely blown away by what I heard. The 40 meter noise floor was at least *17 dB* lower than normal. I could hear layers and layers of signals that I never knew were there. Nets I never knew existed… I mean, have you heard of the Montana Sheepherders net, for pity’s sake? A midday 40 m pileup on a SOTA QRP CW station in Texas that I never would have had a prayer of hearing normally. The noise was so low that I could hear way, way down into the intermod of SSB signals—and most of them were quite yucky. I heard birdies and crud from washing machines from what must have been three blocks away. I heard the 7150 kHz 5th harmonic of a local AM station. By measurement on the P3, I confirmed that all of these signals would have been completely under my usual noise floor.
>
> On 20, it was so quiet I almost believed that the K3’s receiver had failed. WWV was coming in at a 56 dB signal-to-noise ratio.
>
> Interestingly, 80 meters was also quieter, but not by as much. I’m not complaining about nearly 10 dB less noise, but it’s too bad that power was turned on before dark, before I could really evaluate the conditions.
>
> When it gets this quiet, there are no ticks, crashes or noise transients of any kind... just a gentle rushing sound, so it ‘feels’ even quieter than it is. It was every bit as quiet as a forest Field Day a hundred miles from civilization. Yes, radio was amazing yesterday for six glorious hours.
>
> R,
>
> Al W6LX
>
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
> Post: mailto:[hidden email]
>
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
> Message delivered to [hidden email]

______________________________________________________________
Elecraft mailing list
Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
Post: mailto:[hidden email]

This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Message delivered to [hidden email]

NK7Z

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

I have a 22 db noise floor change here when power fails... If the pot
grower has his lights on the noise floor drops almost 40 db during a
power fail.

73, and thanks,
Dave (NK7Z)
https://www.nk7z.net
ARRL Volunteer Examiner
ARRL Technical Specialist
ARRL Asst. Director, NW Division, Technical Resources

On 9/10/20 1:38 PM, Wayne Burdick wrote:

> Hi Al,
>
> Thanks for entertaining observations.
>
> I have a proximately the same experience every time I take the KX2 or KX3 miles away from humanity.
>
> Wayne
> N6KR
>
> ----
> elecraft.com
>
>> On Sep 10, 2020, at 12:53 PM, Al Lorona <[hidden email]> wrote:
>>
>> Power was shut off to my noisy urban neighborhood yesterday while crews replaced a power pole. For a long time, I have wanted to check my HF noise floor when the power is out, and yesterday was my chance. For days like this is why my station is solar-powered!
>>
>> I expected to be surprised but I was absolutely blown away by what I heard. The 40 meter noise floor was at least *17 dB* lower than normal. I could hear layers and layers of signals that I never knew were there. Nets I never knew existed… I mean, have you heard of the Montana Sheepherders net, for pity’s sake? A midday 40 m pileup on a SOTA QRP CW station in Texas that I never would have had a prayer of hearing normally. The noise was so low that I could hear way, way down into the intermod of SSB signals—and most of them were quite yucky. I heard birdies and crud from washing machines from what must have been three blocks away. I heard the 7150 kHz 5th harmonic of a local AM station. By measurement on the P3, I confirmed that all of these signals would have been completely under my usual noise floor.
>>
>> On 20, it was so quiet I almost believed that the K3’s receiver had failed. WWV was coming in at a 56 dB signal-to-noise ratio.
>>
>> Interestingly, 80 meters was also quieter, but not by as much. I’m not complaining about nearly 10 dB less noise, but it’s too bad that power was turned on before dark, before I could really evaluate the conditions.
>>
>> When it gets this quiet, there are no ticks, crashes or noise transients of any kind... just a gentle rushing sound, so it ‘feels’ even quieter than it is. It was every bit as quiet as a forest Field Day a hundred miles from civilization. Yes, radio was amazing yesterday for six glorious hours.
>>
>> R,
>>
>> Al W6LX
>>
>> ______________________________________________________________
>> Elecraft mailing list
>> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
>> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
>> Post: mailto:[hidden email]
>>
>> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
>> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
>> Message delivered to [hidden email]
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
> Post: mailto:[hidden email]
>
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
> Message delivered to [hidden email]
>

Tony Estep

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

In reply to this post by alorona

On Thu, Sep 10, 2020 at 2:53 PM Al Lorona <[hidden email]> wrote:

> Power was shut off to my noisy urban neighborhood...radio was amazing
> yesterday for six glorious hours.
>
======================
Well, here's the flip side. My old qth was noisy enough, but the real
eye-opener came when I toted my KX3 to Hyderabad, India a few years ago. I
was teaching at the Indian School of Business and living in the faculty
apartments, and I had brought the KX3 along expecting to hear a bunch of
call-signs that would sound exotic to a midwestern Yank. So I strung up a
wire around the walls of my living room, up near the ceiling, and laid a
counterpoise out along the floor. Donning my headphones I switched it on,
looking forward to an evening of entertainment as I tuned 20 CW.
Zowie! What a cacophony of squeals, buzzes, crashes, honks and toots,
burps, whistles and grinds. The S-meter jumped up to about S9+10 and stuck
there. Nowhere on the band, it seemed, was there a slot wide enough for a
signal to peep through. Finally I was able to discern a little peep
half-buried beneath the layers of trash, a lonely VU2 calling CQ. I
answered him, but of course to no avail. On a later night I heard a few
words from a QSO between a local ham and a VR2 in Hong Kong, and that was
the sum total of my ham experience while there. Where were the noises
coming from? I dunno -- from everywhere, it sounded like.

73,
Tony KT0NY
______________________________________________________________
Elecraft mailing list
Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
Post: mailto:[hidden email]

This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Message delivered to [hidden email]

Elecraft mailing list

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

I can well understand that experience.

Back in 2000 my new XYL and I honeymooned in St. Maarten / PJ7. I took a K2 with me and a length of wire and coax. I managed 40 - 50 CW QSO’s in between other activities. After we got back home I wrote an article that ARRL published in one of their online journals. At one time there was a link to it on the Elecraft site.

Anyway, one of the things I warned prospective vacationers going to non-US sites was to be prepared for some horrendous QRN. As I mentioned in the article, many foreign countries have no laws governing RF interference. You’ll run into all sorts of crud on the power mains, not to mention some really ugly HF band obliterators in the form of cars and trucks. I suspect some places are better than others. In St. Maarten, every time any truck went down the street by our condo I had to take off the headphones for a while - it was bad, with a capital B!

Jim / W6JHB

> On Sep 10, 2020, at 2:17 PM, Tony Estep <[hidden email]> wrote:
>
> On Thu, Sep 10, 2020 at 2:53 PM Al Lorona <[hidden email]> wrote:
>
>> Power was shut off to my noisy urban neighborhood...radio was amazing
>> yesterday for six glorious hours.
>>
> ======================
> Well, here's the flip side. My old qth was noisy enough, but the real
> eye-opener came when I toted my KX3 to Hyderabad, India a few years ago. I
> was teaching at the Indian School of Business and living in the faculty
> apartments, and I had brought the KX3 along expecting to hear a bunch of
> call-signs that would sound exotic to a midwestern Yank. So I strung up a
> wire around the walls of my living room, up near the ceiling, and laid a
> counterpoise out along the floor. Donning my headphones I switched it on,
> looking forward to an evening of entertainment as I tuned 20 CW.
> Zowie! What a cacophony of squeals, buzzes, crashes, honks and toots,
> burps, whistles and grinds. The S-meter jumped up to about S9+10 and stuck
> there. Nowhere on the band, it seemed, was there a slot wide enough for a
> signal to peep through. Finally I was able to discern a little peep
> half-buried beneath the layers of trash, a lonely VU2 calling CQ. I
> answered him, but of course to no avail. On a later night I heard a few
> words from a QSO between a local ham and a VR2 in Hong Kong, and that was
> the sum total of my ham experience while there. Where were the noises
> coming from? I dunno -- from everywhere, it sounded like.
>
> 73,
> Tony KT0NY
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
> Post: mailto:[hidden email]
>
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
> Message delivered to [hidden email]

David Gilbert-2

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

In reply to this post by Tony Estep

I used to travel to Malaysia quite often on business, and one of the
guys who worked for me there as an ex-pat in Kuala Lumpur had gotten a
9M2 license. So I went over to his apartment one evening with the
intention of working some 40m CW as a guest op, but the background noise
was a horrendous scratchy buzz that ran at least S9+30. When I went
outside to look around I could see why. Malaysia gets a lot of rain,
things are wet much of the time, and back then (at least 30 years ago)
many of the electrical insulators on the overhead power lines were dirty
with pollution. I could see constant arcing across dozens of insulators.

I'm retired now and live on a reasonably quiet semi-rural hillside, and
!sometimes! on a quiet evening my QRN level on 160m is down below S2
even on my Inverted-L. Counting my blessings ...

73
Dave AB7E

On 9/10/2020 2:17 PM, Tony Estep wrote:

>
> ======================
> Well, here's the flip side. My old qth was noisy enough, but the real
> eye-opener came when I toted my KX3 to Hyderabad, India a few years ago. I
> was teaching at the Indian School of Business and living in the faculty
> apartments, and I had brought the KX3 along expecting to hear a bunch of
> call-signs that would sound exotic to a midwestern Yank. So I strung up a
> wire around the walls of my living room, up near the ceiling, and laid a
> counterpoise out along the floor. Donning my headphones I switched it on,
> looking forward to an evening of entertainment as I tuned 20 CW.
> Zowie! What a cacophony of squeals, buzzes, crashes, honks and toots,
> burps, whistles and grinds. The S-meter jumped up to about S9+10 and stuck
> there. Nowhere on the band, it seemed, was there a slot wide enough for a
> signal to peep through. Finally I was able to discern a little peep
> half-buried beneath the layers of trash, a lonely VU2 calling CQ. I
> answered him, but of course to no avail. On a later night I heard a few
> words from a QSO between a local ham and a VR2 in Hong Kong, and that was
> the sum total of my ham experience while there. Where were the noises
> coming from? I dunno -- from everywhere, it sounded like.
>
> 73,
> Tony KT0NY

NK7Z

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

We are getting ready to move... One of the processes I intend on
performing on any new site is described at:

https://www.nk7z.net/sdr-rfi-survey-p1/

using an SDR as a site survey tool... I will have a quiet location...

73, and thanks,
Dave (NK7Z)
https://www.nk7z.net
ARRL Volunteer Examiner
ARRL Technical Specialist
ARRL Asst. Director, NW Division, Technical Resources

On 9/10/20 4:19 PM, David Gilbert wrote:

>
> I used to travel to Malaysia quite often on business, and one of the
> guys who worked for me there as an ex-pat in Kuala Lumpur had gotten a
> 9M2 license. So I went over to his apartment one evening with the
> intention of working some 40m CW as a guest op, but the background noise
> was a horrendous scratchy buzz that ran at least S9+30. When I went
> outside to look around I could see why. Malaysia gets a lot of rain,
> things are wet much of the time, and back then (at least 30 years ago)
> many of the electrical insulators on the overhead power lines were dirty
> with pollution. I could see constant arcing across dozens of insulators.
>
> I'm retired now and live on a reasonably quiet semi-rural hillside, and
> !sometimes! on a quiet evening my QRN level on 160m is down below S2
> even on my Inverted-L. Counting my blessings ...
>
> 73
> Dave AB7E
>
>
>
>
> On 9/10/2020 2:17 PM, Tony Estep wrote:
>>
>> ======================
>> Well, here's the flip side. My old qth was noisy enough, but the real
>> eye-opener came when I toted my KX3 to Hyderabad, India a few years
>> ago. I
>> was teaching at the Indian School of Business and living in the faculty
>> apartments, and I had brought the KX3 along expecting to hear a bunch of
>> call-signs that would sound exotic to a midwestern Yank. So I strung up a
>> wire around the walls of my living room, up near the ceiling, and laid a
>> counterpoise out along the floor. Donning my headphones I switched it on,
>> looking forward to an evening of entertainment as I tuned 20 CW.
>> Zowie! What a cacophony of squeals, buzzes, crashes, honks and toots,
>> burps, whistles and grinds. The S-meter jumped up to about S9+10 and
>> stuck
>> there. Nowhere on the band, it seemed, was there a slot wide enough for a
>> signal to peep through. Finally I was able to discern a little peep
>> half-buried beneath the layers of trash, a lonely VU2 calling CQ. I
>> answered him, but of course to no avail. On a later night I heard a few
>> words from a QSO between a local ham and a VR2 in Hong Kong, and that was
>> the sum total of my ham experience while there. Where were the noises
>> coming from? I dunno -- from everywhere, it sounded like.
>>
>> 73,
>> Tony KT0NY
>
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
> Post: mailto:[hidden email]
>
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
> Message delivered to [hidden email]

hdv

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

In reply to this post by Elecraft mailing list

It has also to do with Intetnet being provided by all kinds of poorly shielded wiring hanging above ground.
In V31 I always operated with a battery from a remote beach location due to continous 9+++ noise in/near my appartment block and other urban areas.73 HenkPA0C V31HV
-------- Oorspronkelijk bericht --------Van: James Bennett via Elecraft <[hidden email]> Datum: 10-09-2020 23:29 (GMT+01:00) Aan: Elecraft Reflector Reflector <[hidden email]> Onderwerp: Re: [Elecraft] [OT] A Very Quiet Day I can well understand that experience.Back in 2000 my new XYL and I honeymooned in St. Maarten / PJ7. I took a K2 with me and a length of wire and coax. I managed 40 - 50 CW QSO’s in between other activities. After we got back home I wrote an article that ARRL published in one of their online journals. At one time there was a link to it on the Elecraft site.Anyway, one of the things I warned prospective vacationers going to non-US sites was to be prepared for some horrendous QRN. As I mentioned in the article, many foreign countries have no laws governing RF interference. You’ll run into all sorts of crud on the power mains, not to mention some really ugly HF band obliterators in the form of cars and trucks. I suspect some places are better than others. In St. Maarten, every time any truck went down the street by our condo I had to take off the headphones for a while - it was bad, with a capital B!Jim / W6JHB> On Sep 10, 2020, at 2:17 PM, Tony Estep <[hidden email]> wrote:> > On Thu, Sep 10, 2020 at 2:53 PM Al Lorona <[hidden email]> wrote:> >> Power was shut off to my noisy urban neighborhood...radio was amazing>> yesterday for six glorious hours.>> > ======================> Well, here's the flip side. My old qth was noisy enough, but the real> eye-opener came when I toted my KX3 to Hyderabad, India a few years ago. I> was teaching at the Indian School of Business and living in the faculty> apartments, and I had brought the KX3 along expecting to hear a bunch of> call-signs that would sound exotic to a midwestern Yank. So I strung up a> wire around the walls of my living room, up near the ceiling, and laid a> counterpoise out along the floor. Donning my headphones I switched it on,> looking forward to an evening of entertainment as I tuned 20 CW.> Zowie! What a cacophony of squeals, buzzes, crashes, honks and toots,> burps, whistles and grinds. The S-meter jumped up to about S9+10 and stuck> there. Nowhere on the band, it seemed, was there a slot wide enough for a> signal to peep through. Finally I was able to discern a little peep> half-buried beneath the layers of trash, a lonely VU2 calling CQ. I> answered him, but of course to no avail. On a later night I heard a few> words from a QSO between a local ham and a VR2 in Hong Kong, and that was> the sum total of my ham experience while there. Where were the noises> coming from? I dunno -- from everywhere, it sounded like.> > 73,> Tony KT0NY> ______________________________________________________________> Elecraft mailing list> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm> Post: mailto:[hidden email]> > This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html> Message delivered to [hidden email] ______________________________________________________________Elecraft mailing listHome: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraftHelp: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htmPost: mailto:[hidden email] list hosted by: http://www.qsl.netPlease help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.htmlMessage delivered to [hidden email]
______________________________________________________________
Elecraft mailing list
Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
Post: mailto:[hidden email]

This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Message delivered to [hidden email]

Edward R Cole

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

In reply to this post by alorona

Here in Alaska, we have frequent power outages. More often in winter
due to wind storms knocking down wires.

A few years ago we bought a 6500w Honda inverter generator to provide
emergency power. Its large enough to supply the entire house
load. One of the interesting things was noting the drop in radio
noise when power is off. We see no lights in the neighborhood other
than ours so any noise would be made in our house. 2m noise drop
almost to S0. Normal quiet times with commercial power runs
S3. Only see S2 or less on 2m when running our generator. At times
local noise on 2m rises to S7 which renders the band unusable except
strong local signals.

I just set up my 6m eme system and measured S6/7 noise with the ARR
preamp. PR6 shows S3/4. ARR gain is 25-dB vs about 15-dB for the
PR6, so I added a 10-dB attenuator in-line with the ARR preamp which
now matches the PR6 noise floor pretty well. ARR is closer to the
antenna with 0.5 dB NF whereas the PR6 is about 0.7 dB NF. Not
really noticeable with local signals but makes a little improvement
with weak eme signals.

When I first came to AK, I lived off the grid (about 2-3 miles from
nearest power lines (town of pop 75). 80m band was S0 on my dipole
at night. Really heard well back then. I now live 100 miles west of
there in a buried utility area (2 to 5 acre parcels) which probably
helps (though overhead lines are only 1/2 mile away. HF is typically
S5 noise with my K3 (preamp off). I use the PR6 on 10m & 6m so that
raises the noise floor a bit. Our pop is 4,000 spread over 76 square
miles with a city of 15,000 12 miles south.

Going to bush towns is no insurance for low noise. I worked in a
town 400 miles west of Anchorage (pop 3500) and tried setting up a
long yagi on 2m on roof above the TV station. Noise was over S9 (due
to arc igniters in their furnace). 2m was totally unusable (trying
for a long shot to Anchorage). They ran a monitor on the AM radio
station which blared horrible noise when they shut down the
transmitter at night.

73, Ed - KL7UW
http://www.kl7uw.com
Dubus-NA Business mail:
[hidden email]

______________________________________________________________
Elecraft mailing list
Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
Post: mailto:[hidden email]

This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Message delivered to [hidden email]

Phil Kane-2

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

In reply to this post by David Gilbert-2

On 9/10/2020 4:19 PM, David Gilbert wrote:

> Malaysia gets a lot of rain, things are wet much of the time, and back
> then (at least 30 years ago) many of the electrical insulators on the
> overhead power lines were dirty with pollution. I could see constant
> arcing across dozens of insulators.

Yet one of the "cures" of QRM from electrical lines is to wash the
insulators. Many large utilities have a specialized vehicle for that.
We have buried utilities here so there's no insulators to wash....

73 de K2ASP - Phil Kane
Elecraft K2/100 s/n 5402

From a Clearing in the Silicon Forest
Beaverton (Washington County) Oregon
______________________________________________________________
Elecraft mailing list
Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
Post: mailto:[hidden email]

This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Message delivered to [hidden email]

k6dgw

Re: [OT] A Very Quiet Day

I grew up in So Central Los Angeles, 1/2 block from one of the original
2-circuit 230 KV transmission lines from Hoover Dam. Several times a
year, LA DWP came around with a tank truck and coupled it to a pipe
running up the tower. A guy climbed a ladder inside the tower, hooked
up a nozzle at each of the three phases, and blew a water/air mixture at
the insulators. then they moved on to the next tower. My noise level
always declined about an S-unit after the bath.

Often though, the problems aren't the insulators themselves but loose
hardware on the pole that create micro-arcing. Rain sometimes makes
that noise worse, and wind really can.

73,

Fred ["Skip"] K6DGW
Sparks NV DM09dn
Washoe County

On 9/11/2020 10:00 AM, Phil Kane wrote:

> On 9/10/2020 4:19 PM, David Gilbert wrote:
>
>> Malaysia gets a lot of rain, things are wet much of the time, and back
>> then (at least 30 years ago) many of the electrical insulators on the
>> overhead power lines were dirty with pollution. I could see constant
>> arcing across dozens of insulators.
> Yet one of the "cures" of QRM from electrical lines is to wash the
> insulators. Many large utilities have a specialized vehicle for that.
> We have buried utilities here so there's no insulators to wash....
>
> 73 de K2ASP - Phil Kane
> Elecraft K2/100 s/n 5402
>