Monthly Archives: June 2010

We were at Weston Rd and State Rd 84 … in Markham Park, demonstrating how Amateur Radio (Ham Radio) operators can set up in minimal time, including with emergency power, completely off the grid, to provide communications in emergencies.

The media went 5 miles further west to report on a decayed human remains. But they didn’t bother, despite being invited, to stop by to Ham Radio Field Day operations. I guess it’s more sensational, the human remains, than Ham Radio Field Day. We ended Field Day operations at 2pm Sunday and started our tear down (disassembly) of our antennas and equipment and temporary structures (tents.) The sensational human remains thing came to light Monday morning. Either that kept them from coming (the day before or two?) or the sensation of a sexual scandal involving former Vice President Al Gore. I guess they would rather report on GORE than on GOOD things. Pun totally intended. Now if we’d have shot a racoon … or one of us got eaten by a wild alligator in the woods – in the park – they might have stopped by. Maybe?

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73 from KA4UDX,

Alan Spicer

The C3i Amateur Radio Group, www.ac4xq.net, participated in Field Day 2010 as a 2 Alpha SFL – South Florida entry. We still have to resolve our logs for exact numbers and such…

TS-480SAT was one of the two Main HF Stations used. It was operated on a Marine Deep Cycle Battery + 10 amp power supply. Sunday during daylight hours it was operated only on the battery. I just forgot to bring out the power supply and hook it up. We didn’t even notice it wasn’t there until the 2pm end of operations. We were just in a rush to get operating and get as many contacts as we could before the curtain came down at 2pm.

We had a 40 foot trailer tower that cranked up with a TA33JR Mosley beam with two off-center fed dipoles also strung from the top. We shared the TA33JR with the other HF station, also a Kenwood – I don’t remember what model but that was nice radio as well. So we spent some time on 15 meters and 10 meters, and even 20 meters on dipoles as well.

The microphone was Heil HM-10 and the Narrow “DX Dream” help get attention to us as well as to cut through when conditions were tough. And let me tell you with so many signals on the air, literally one or two Khz apart at times … conditions often go tough. But the Kenwood TS-480SAT hung in there tough as well a cracked almost every nut that was thrown at it.

The TS-480SAT, especially when on the TA33JR, created pile ups to us virtually everywhere we went. It was amazing how 10 meters hung in there for us all weekend. But we hammered out some contacts in pileups we created on 15 meters as well. 20 meters was so over-crowded that we usually switched bands rather than try to stay on 20.

We switched operators quite a bit, we even had operators that had barely if ever operated HF. We were transmitting for hours at a time with 100 watts full output power. The radio never got hot enough to cook hamburgers so we kept using the barbeque grill for the cooking. If she ever go it bit warm the fan kicked in and brought her right back to just a light warmness. The radio never hiccupped it never burped … it never got in the way of what we were doing. It was a joy to have on the field day site … and everyone there said just that “That’s a Nice RAdio”. That was said quite a few times.

By the way, the temerature outside was in the 90′s – not sure what the humidity was. There was no air conditioning in that tent. That particular tent we left all 4 sides open since we had NO RAIN (thank God!) the whole weekend. We had a nice breeze coming through the tent. We were right on a lake in Markham Park in Sunrise, Florida near the Southwest end of Broward County Florida.

We had racoons visit us several times… There were warning signs at the lake about alligators. None came to visit thankfully. Bugs were fairly tame although I hit myself with bug repellent Saturday night.

Setup and teardown times were around 2 hours only for the main radio, antennas, and tents. The 2 RV’s and a huge generator (courtesy of a Generator Company Guy also a ham and club member) were still there when I left around 4:30pm Sunday. But the don’t add much time to the teardown operation. We ate good food all weekend, gourmet hamburgers and hot dogs, barbeque chicken, corn on the grill, potato salid, and lots of water and Coca Colas. Boy did we have Fun!!!!

Note: These pictures are (C) Copyright 2010 Alan Spicer. The Media, that didn’t bother to show up … may NOT reproduce or use these photos. Period. Licensed amateur radio operators feel free to use them for non-profit purposes at your leisure.

We did a pre-field day meeting and tower checkout a couple weeks before Field Day

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06-10-10_1829.jpg

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And here it is up at the actual Field Day by the lake - 

With Mosley TA33JR Beam Antenna on the Top and Off-Center Fed Dipole antennas attached and strung and secured into place…

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And here is our VHF and UHF “Stack” on a mast secured to the rear ladder of an RV. This stack and our VHF / UHF (6-Meters) operation was courtesy of John W6BXQ. You’ll note some “Home Brewing” in these antennas. The 2-Meter VHF antenna was once a Television antenna … cut for 2-Meter Band

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During breaks from “Radio Ops” we could relax, cool off, eat, or meet here…

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Another photo opportunity of the VHF-UHF Antenna “Stack”

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Here is the VHF-UHF Antenna “Stack” from another angle…

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RV with Satellite TV …

“Now we got country and western on the bus,
R & B, we got disco in 8-tracks and casettes in stereo
We’ve got rural scenes and magazines
And we’ve got (Ham Radio Operators on the Rigs)
We got Richard Pryor on the video
We’ve got time to think of the ones we love
While the miles roll away…”

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A nice wide shot looking east at the site … the tents were not up yet.

06-25-10_1627.jpg 

We had Golf Cart! Well the guy that owned it had one. Parked in the back of that white RV (the one behind the other RV in the foreground)

06-25-10_1628.jpg – The tower trailer setup

06-25-10_1629.jpg – Nice shot of the tower with the Mosley TA33JR Beam Antenna and the American Flag at the top. The tower also had blinking Tower Lighting on the top

06-25-10_1631.jpg – A shot upwards towards the top of the tower shows more detail The sun tried to creep into this picture. Note the beacon red light fixture at the top of the tower before the mast with the antenna and the flag. Note the rope cord we used to steer and turn the beam antenna

06-25-10_1647.jpg – Warning Wild Alligators! We tied a rope securing one of the dipole antennas to this sign.

06-25-10_1648.jpg – A nice picture “In the Field” during antenna setup, dipoles!

06-25-10_1656.jpg – I see a Dipole Antenna going up, note the balun and feedpoint for coaxial cable hookup. Note: for non hams a lot of antennas have their ratings compared to a dipole antenna. So here is a real dipole antenna!

06-25-10_2017.jpg – The Kenwood TS-480SAT Transceiver and Power Supply (battery not visible) on Friday – Set up day/night time radio checkout and warm up for Field Day

06-25-10_2018.jpg – Another shot of the Kenwood TS-480SAT during initial setup and checkout

06-26-10_1510.jpg – And we’re Operating! Saturday starting 2:00PM 06-26-2010 Our Field Day Operation went into Action! This is the 2nd radio tent, with the other Kenwood HF Station … and at the other table across from the foreground was Johns 6 meter, 2 meter, and 70 centimeter (vhf lo, vhf, uhf) radio equipment

06-26-10_1511.jpg – 2nd radio tent, operations, another view…

06-26-10_1515.jpg – 1st radio tent … John W6BXQ working on the logging program. The TS-480SAT is here, and another GOTO station used if visitors would want to talk on the radio – without interrupting the main HF radio operation

06-26-10_1518.jpg – The rear of the same radio tent #1 (note this designation is arbitrary and does not make it more important, both tents and radio setups were imporant and worked tremendously well)

06-26-10_1846.jpg – AC4XQ “Field Day” 2 Alpha South Florida – ON THE AIR!!!!

* Ok … that’s all for now … I’ve got a lot more pictures, and others took pictures as well. I may make a seperate AC4XQ (unofficial) Field Day picture page elsewhere here on MarineTelecom.Net. * If that were to occur, and it’s very likely it would be at:

http://www.marinetelecom.net/AC4XQFieldDay2010AmateurRadioHamRadio

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73 from KA4UDX,

Alan Spicer

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73 de KA4UDX,
Alan Spicer

* Our very own KA4UDX, Alan Spicer, will be deploying with the C3i Amateur Radio Group at Markham Park:

http://www.sunrisefl.gov/2park_markham.html in Sunrise, Florida … within Broward County … South Florida. And now on with the news bulletin …

See also: http://www.livescience.com/technology/ham-radio-upgrade-100622.html

The Media is definately buzzing about it: http://www.arrl.org/media-hits-c

Make sure you check out C3i: http://www.ac4xq.net/ and you can learn from there where you can put your scanner to listen in on the C3i group as we prepare and work through this field day. You don’t need a fancy scanner … any old scanner that can do VHF and UHF will do. The frequencies are conveniently at the very top of that page. And you can even listen to HF radio without a radio (what???) on the Internet … check out something called WebSDR (Software Defined Radio on the InterWEB) on the east coast is www.w4mq.com (looks like his stuff might be down today?) or just go to http://www.websdr.org/ and pick a different one. We choose to go to the moon http://websdr.camras.nl:8901/ and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard. (Arecibo on 432 MHz Moon Bounce.)

NEWINGTON, Conn., June 16

NEWINGTON, Conn., June 16 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Amateur Radio activities are growing and thousands of radio operators, often called “hams,” will be showing off their capabilities June 26-27.  Erecting radio stations at community parks, campgrounds, schools and emergency centers around the country, they will hold a “Field Day” showing their emergency communications capabilities while having fun talking and texting to friends with their radios. 

Far from fading in the age of cell phones and Internet, Amateur Radio has been growing in the US and 2009 saw over 30,000 new people became “hams.”  Figures from the ARRL, the national association for Amateur Radio, show consistent growth for the past five years.  The technical skills of hams also improved as almost 50% of American Amateur Radio operators now go beyond the entry level FCC licensing requirements and pass the more difficult testing to earn higher class federal licenses.  There are now more than 682,000 Amateur Radio operators in the US, and 2.5 million around the world. 

In past months, many reports of ham radio operators providing critical communications in emergencies have been in the news.  From Haiti to California, during floods, fires, earthquakes, tornados and other crises, Amateur Radio volunteers are providing emergency communications for many rescue and recovery groups.  Amateur Radio operators are often the first to report critical information to responders in the first hours of crisis situations.  FEMA, DHS, the National Weather Service, and emergency management offices include Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES®) operators in their communications plans.  On June 26-27, the public will be able to meet and talk with the hams and see for themselves what Amateur Radio is all about.  Using everything from Morse code to modern digital and satellite systems, voice communications and even Web-radio hybrid capabilities, they prove “It’s not just your Grandfather’s radio anymore.”

The amateur operators will construct temporary, emergency style radio stations around the country for the weekend and send messages in many forms — without the use any other infrastructure that can be compromised in a crisis.  Over 35,000 Amateur Radio operators across the country participated in last year’s event. 

To learn what modern Amateur Radio systems can do, go to www.ARRL.org/fieldday.  There you can find information about the locations the Amateur Radio operators will set up in your home area.  They can even help you get on the air!

http://www.twitter.com/ARRL_FD

SOURCE American Radio Relay League

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73 de KA4UDX,

Alan Spicer

We encourage the presentation of contrasting points of view, the following may not represent the opinions of management of this company or this Internet Station.

Bailout … Shmailout?

It seems like we’re all about bailouts here lately in this country. And it’s all huge corporations which should be able to bail themselves out.

The BIG car companies … what happened? They had to be bailed out. We can’t have the big car companies going out of business … a lot of people will lose jobs. Wahhhhh. That’s a baby crying sound you are hearing. So then they should have to pay those people unemployment or other compensation to take care of them while they would find other employment. Not an excuse to bail out Big Corporations.

UPS seems to want a bailout … because business is rough … and the only way to gain the upper hand is to somehow kill the competition. Literally … You chose one business model, and they chose another. Now you want them to move over to your business model because it’s not working? Now that’s fair, right? Because they actually come to the door and knock with a package … and you throw the packages in the mud puddle, you want a bailout? 

Now BP? BP … we cannot afford to have BP go down in flames. Even though they let an Offshore Oil Platform go down in flames, and let the Gulf go down in OIL. But if we don’t keep them solvent … people will lose jobs. That and they won’t have enough money to clean up their own mess.WAhhhh – the baby crying again. Set aside the money for those people that would lose jobs … They should have liability insurance for the current problem, take and use the liability insurance money, and secure more to be sure, and let the platform sink itself.

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That’s all from this news station…

—

Alan Spicer Marine Telecom

http://www.marinetelecom.net – http://www.wifiyacht.net

+1 954 683 3426

The Brown Bailout Newsletter …

June 22, 2010

READ THE COMPLETE OP-ED.

Follow the Brown Bailout on Twitter!

For more information on the Brown Bailout and to find out how you can get involved, visit us at Brownbailout.com.

—

Alan Spicer Marine Telecom

http://www.marinetelecom.net – http://www.wifiyacht.net

+1 954 683 3426

Alan Spicer Marine Telecom Occassional Bulletin – June 22, 2010

Occassionally sent out via email to friends and customers worldwide … generally light and easy to digest, even over slow satellite links on marine vessels.

Happy Summer Everybody. Drop me a line and let me know where you are and what you’re up to. Here’s a couple of tidbits from by blog on. There’s more graphics/videos on the blog, and on YouTube. But I’ve got to keep this low bandwidth because some boats may be at sea on expensive satellite links.

If anyone knows of any news that should go on my Blog please let me know. If anyone needs a broadcast of crew needed, crew wanted, or anything else that could be shouted out from my blog please let me know. It’s not craigs list, but it does get a lot of eyes on it.

Anyone having any computer or communications (incl. Internet for Marine) questions please ask. Anyone up for Consulting and Support Agreement Renewals (or wants to renew early) the discount is minus $150.00 as I have been offerring for several years. You get one visit onboard in South Florida, 1 hour, with the $500 Silver level ($350.00 with the discount.)

* We’ve developed, programmed, and delivered a WiFi Hotspot System for Harbour Island Marina in the Bahamas. I was just on the phone and in email conversations with them today. The word is “it’s working fantastic”. So good that we’re probably going to have to lock it down with a security code – because non marina guests are also hopping on the system. So far it is handling everyone that logs on. No complaints, well if you don’t consider the report that it’s powerful enough that boats with onboard wifi sharing systems are logging on to it from TOO far away.

http://blog.marinetelecom.net
 

Free shipping on orders over $200 anywhere in the world on Ericsson Gear: W35 and W35 Complete Marine Pack (Kit):

http://blog.marinetelecom.net/2010/06/21/free-shipping-on-orders-over-200-anywhere-in-the-world-on-ericsson-gear-w35-and-w35-complete-marine-pack-kit/

Press Release: WiFiYacht.Net – LightSpeed Version 2 – Marine WiFi Hotspot Sharing System

http://blog.marinetelecom.net/2010/06/15/press-release-wifiyachtnet-lightspeed-version-2-marine-wifi-hotspot-sharing-system/

I have uploaded the new brochure to the web site http://www.wifiyacht.net with the updated specifications for “LightSpeed Version 2″.**** Up to 800mW Transmit Power (depending on 802.11b? or 802.11g in use)**** Up to 4000mW (4 Watts) using a 9dB Gain Marine Omni Antenna (we supply these)(Note: We have LightSpeed 2 in the current implementation (same box as LightSpeed 1) but we are ever working on getting closer to the antenna … to squeeze that last few db or WiFi transmit and receive that we can get. You see the closer the “tranceiver” to the antenna the less the “coaxial cable” and other losses. How about if we went right to the bottom of the antenna???? Well that’s exactly what we’re working on.)

Livewire: Access Controller (Service Selector):
http://www.marinetelecom.net/Livewire_Service_Selector/
Sorry that wasn’t a blog entry, well there is a Video up on Youtube that I did: http://www.youtube.com/user/alanspicertelecom about the new Access Controller FB-10. And I continue to get asked about this gear.

Alan Spicer Marine Telecom ships to St. Maarten Netherlands Antilles, Winnipeg Manitoba Canada, Tahiti French Polynesia, Fort Lauderdalehttp://blog.marinetelecom.net/2010/06/15/alan-spicer-marine-telecom-ships-to-st-maarten-canda-tahiti-french-polynesia-fort-lauderdale/ Recent shipments … to St. Maarten Netherlands Antilles, Winnipeg Manitoba Canada, Tahiti French Polynesia, and Fort Lauderdale Florida …

Has anybody read this? Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explosion (From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

http://blog.marinetelecom.net/2010/06/16/has-anybody-read-this-deepwater-horizon-drilling-rig-explosion-from-wikipedia-the-free-encyclopedia/

Alan Spicer, KA4UDX, will be participating in Amateur Radio “Field Day 2010″ with the C3i Group – AC4XQ.Net June 25, 26, 27…

http://blog.marinetelecom.net/2010/06/18/alan-spicer-ka4udx-will-be-participating-in-amateur-radio-field-day-2010-with-the-c3i-group-ac4xqnet-june-25-26-27/

Why Amateur Radio on a Marine Telecom Blog?

http://blog.marinetelecom.net/2010/06/18/why-amateur-radio-on-a-marine-telecom-blog/

KA4UDX – Amateur Radio – Contact Stats … from eQSL.cc

http://blog.marinetelecom.net/2010/06/18/ka4udx-amateur-radio-contact-stats-from-eqslcc/

ARGENTINA  1 
     ARUBA  2 
     AUSTRIA  5 
     BARBADOS  1 
     BELGIUM  3 
     BONAIRE/CURACAO NETH. ANTILLE  2 
     BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA  1 
     BRAZIL  7 
     BULGARIA  2 
     CANADA  12 
     CANARY ISL.  4 
     CHILE  1 
     COLOMBIA  2 
     COSTA RICA  6 
     CROATIA  2 
     CUBA  1 
     CZECH REP.  2 
     DENMARK  2 
     DOMINICA  1 
     DOMINICAN REPUBLIC  6 
     ECUADOR  5 
     ENGLAND  2 
     FRANCE  6 
     FRENCH GUIANA  1 
     GERMANY  3 
     GREECE  2 
     GRENADA  1 
     GUADELOUPE  1 
     GUATEMALA  1 
     HAWAII  3 
     HONDURAS  2 
     ISLE OF MAN  1 
     ITALY  8 
     JAPAN  1 
     LATVIA  1 
     MARTINIQUE  1 
     MEXICO  2 
     NETHERLANDS  2 
     NORTHERN IRELAND  1 
     POLAND  1 
     PORTUGAL  2 
     PUERTO RICO  7 
     RUSSIA (EUROPEAN)  1 
     SCOTLAND  1 
     SLOVAK REP.  2 
     SLOVENIA  4 
     SPAIN  4 
     ST. MAARTEN/SABA/ST. EUST  1 
     ST. VINCENT  1 
     TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO  2 
     UKRAINE  1 
     USA  159 
     VENEZUELA  4 
     VIRGIN ISL.  1 

Talking to Connecticut on FM (also lately regularly talk to New York) – Amateur Radio Contact: FM 10 Meters 29.640 – 100 Khz (Repeater) – KJ1Q + KB1CDI Systems…

http://blog.marinetelecom.net/2010/06/16/amateur-radio-contact-fm-10-meters-29640-100-khz-repeater-kj1q-kb1cdi-systems/

* When propogation isn’t working well on 10 meters … it’s that sun spot cycle stuff affecting ionospheric propogation, a.k.a. “skip” or DX long distance contacts. This year we’ve been getting quite a bit of Sporadic-E Propogation. You can look that up on Google.com. Sometimes it seems to come with weather over Florida and other parts of the Eastern Seaboard and the Caribbean (comma, etc.) Even when the propogation makes it difficult we can still get through to the NY repeater system and many other FM repeater systems around the globe via something called EchoLink. You can look that up on Google.com as well. There is also something called IRLP – The Internet Radio Linking Project. We can also play with AMSAT – Amateur Satellites … even using handheld radios and handheld yagi (dual band such as the Arrow Antenna) … and make contacts that way.




Video: An example of the NY KQ2H / W2FLA system as access both via Internet (voice over ip – EchoLink) and via 10 Meters FM



—
Alan Spicer

DBA Alan Spicer Telcom / Alan Spicer Marine Telecom
Computer Services, Wired/Wireless Networking,
Cell/Sat/Landline Communications, General Consulting…
Marine, Business, Small Office and Home Office (SOHO)

* Cost Savings and Integration of Multiple Internet Technologies
on board Sail and Motor Yachts * Documentation, Operating
Instructions, and Support after the Sale *

* http://www.marinetelecom.net/
* http://www.internetforyachts.net/
* http://www.wifiyacht.net/
* 954-683-3426

Mobile Internet! Step up to the HSPA 3G Fast Internet!

Ericsson W35 released in the USA. This you’ve gotta SEE!!
Better looking presentation than W25 (you might not want to
hide this one in the Doghouse!) + High Speed Upload which
the W25 did not have.

http://www.marinetelecom.net/Ericsson_W35/

Livewire: Access Controller (Service Selector):

http://www.marinetelecom.net/Livewire_Service_Selector/

For those that don’t know what this is? Here’s a primer: http://w4neq.com/htm/linenoise.htm 

You can also have a look here: http://www.powerlinenoise.com/ and here: http://www.arrl.org/power-line-noise

Powerline Noise source quite graphically demonstrated by Powerlinenoise.com

Example of what my HF rig looks like, Kenwood TS-480SAT – This is where I get the Interference described in this blog post. More pictures are here: http://forums.qrz.com/showthread.php?t=193638

Another powerline noise – radio frequency interference (RFI) was located Friday at just under a mile from my antenna. The noise got as high as S9 on the meter on my HF/SSB/AM/FM Ham Radio (Kenwood TS-480SAT) in and around  the 80 meter ham band. It was also able to drown out or cover WWV time signals on 5 Mhz to a hand held AM receiver in the area around here. At the source the interference go up into the VHF bands around 300 Mhz. In the ham bands it makes contacts impossible to all but the strongest signals. In amateur radio we often communicate to stations with weak signals down to even S1 or S0 (off the scale).

An example of my VX-6R handheld that has wide recieve and AM capability that I used on my Powerline RFI hunt

I took a drive the night before myself and tracked it  the best I could without a directional antenna – using a Yaesu handheld tranceiver that has wide band coverage all the way down to the AM broadcast band. Before the FPL guy came out I had a map, see the following:

Powerline-Noise-Pompano

The trick to locating powerline noise sources is to start low in frequency … where you first can hear it on your base station ham gear. Note what it sounds like and  the re-acquire that same sound on a handheld AM reciever. Then you can drive North, South, East, and West and see when it disappears. If you’re lucky you will find a general direction where it is coming from. You can then drive in that direction … in that area … and try to narrow it down more. If, like happened to me, you can get an S-meter reading going up higher as you get closer you can try to re-acquire the signal at a higher frequency. In my case the highest I got was 20 Mhz, and I wasn’t able to get close to it. It’s often difficult to know where you can drive to get closer to it. Often you are dealing with private or semi-private property. You can look suspicious to security and police. I do remember asking myself “Could it be from this FPL Power Substation” while driving by it on Mcnab Road in Pompano Beach, Fl. Just east of Powerline Rd. And that’s exactly where the FPL guy found the source. So a work order is in to fix it.

The actual power pole(s) that the noise is coming from, exiting the FPL Substation

And here is where that is at…

At this outdoor facility, Substation Cypress Creek #279

A Google Earth “Street View” look at the Cypress Creek #279 Substation

Thank you to FPL for coming out and tracking it down the the exact spot. And for putting it in for repair.

* Here’s what powerline noise RFI hunting looks like by the Power Company folks. These are not local pictures – but the process and the equipment used is the same.

Log Periodic handheld antenna (very directional) tracks it down to the source pole (or whatever.)

Tracking down a specific pole with Log Periodic VHF – UHF Antenna

Bucket Truck Fixing Powerline Noise broken Power Company Hardware

* Some people reading this might say “So what?” because they don’t use Amateur Radio. Well other communications can be affected as well as the ARRL article above tells … Because most people nowadays listen to FM Radio, watch Satellite TV or Cable Tv, and Portable Music Players not too many of them would even detect much less report powerline interference. There might be a few that use CB Radio, or listen to Shortwave Radio broadcasts. But other things including television can be affected. I think we need more people listening to “something” that would detect powerline noise interference. The power companies will only fix what WE report that we hear on our radios on our antennas. But there is a lot more broken and failed powerline hardware out there – and I find it hard to believe that the power companies don’t have a way to detect them. This broken and arcing hardware is obviously a safety issue as well. There was a story somewhere (off the ARRL page) of arcing powerline hardware starting a tree and fence on fire.

Have a look here: http://www.tvtower.com/Commercial%20Television%20Frequencies.html TV and CATV frequencies – many are in VHF and UHF. Powerline Noise when you are close to the source can get up into VHF and UHF frequencies. It could get picked up by cable tv systems. Powerline noise doesn’t care if you use the newer HDTV (ATSC television) or the older Analog (NTSC) it’s all frequencies. It can all be interfered with. * I have had powerline noise interference up to 52 Mhz here! That’s the 6 meters ham band and it’s in the VHF range. When hunting down powerline noise they find it with directional antennas up around 300 Mhz. So it’s possible for it to affect two way radio, FM radio, Television, and more… It’s very broadband. It’s very ugly.

Here’s what the ARRL article had to say about what all can be affected by powerline noise interference:

Power-line noise can interfere with radio communications and broadcasting. Essentially, the power-lines or associated hardware improperly generate unwanted radio signals that override or compete with desired radio signals. Power-line noise can impact radio and television reception — including cable TV head-end pick-up and Internet service. Disruption of radio communications, such as amateur radio, can also occur. Loss of critical communications, such as police, fire, military and other similar users of the radio spectrum can result in even more serious consequences. 

* Check out the video on this page: http://blog.labelprinters.org/2007/09/fp-substation-explosion.html 

—

73 de KA4UDX,

Alan Spicer

South Florida Media – We’d like to invite YOU – Field Day 2010 Press Release / Wire Release is Here! Channel 4, Channel 6, Channel 7, Channel 10, Newspapers Sun Sentinel, Miami Herald …

The C3i Group – http://www.ac4xq.net will be setting up and operating in Field Day 2010 demonstrating Emergency Operating Capabilities of Amateur Radio Operators in your local area. We will be at Markham Park in Southwest Broward County for Field Day the weekend of 26 and 27 June … and you are invited to stop by! You are even invited to operate on a radio! Please download the Wire Release Below. My contact information is also below.

Field Day 2010 wire release – Amateur Radio Field Day – Emergency Communications Demonstration – 2010

—

Alan Spicer

communications @ marinetelecom.net (remove the spaces)

+1 954-683-3426

Field_Day_Logo ARRL

When All Else Fails – Amateur Radio

Field-Day-2010-Markham-Park

Field-Day-2010-Markham-Park-2

I will be participating in Amateur Radio “Field Day” 2010 with the C3i group – http://www.ac4xq.net in a local park in South Fort Lauderdale. We will very likely be operating as AC4XQ … please look for us on the bands on the June 25th, 26th, 27th.

Example of Field Day (not us, but you get the idea…)

http://www.arrl.org/public-service

Even if you are not a licensed “ham” Amateur Radio Operator … if you have a radio capable of SSB MF and HF frequencies … you might just tune around (get a list of amateur radio frequencies) and listen in for us!

Get that right here: http://www.arrl.org/files/file/Hambands_color.pdf

http://www.qrz.com/db/ka4udx

* We will be literally “In The Field” that weekend … Past the Yachts and Boats on “Marina Mile” a.k.a. State Road 84 in Fort Lauderdale … Past 441, Past the Florida Turnpike, Past the Sawgrass Expressway … we will not be “Out of the Woods Yet” until late Sunday / Monday. Out off the old “Alligator Alley” and at the Western Edge of Civilization in many parts of Broward County. (The Western Edge of Civilization just south of the location has moved a bit further west, about 5 miles further, in areas such as Weston and all the way down to Homestead, Florida.)

* We will operated Emergency Power … we will have Generators … we will have GOOD FOOD! Oh that last one was the best part. But we will be demonstrating what private amateur radio operators are capable of … in setting up Field Operations for Communications … using no Commercial Infrastructure. We have to set up in so many hours, we cannot start operating before a certain time, and we will try to log as many worldwide contacts as we can in the alloted time frame.

http://www.arrl.org/field-day

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73 de KA4UDX,

Alan Spicer