It Happens Every Year....

[Jerry — MacSolutions]

Hi Jack,

I did a quick search on Radio Frequencies and Winter Solstice and came  
up with some stories on how there actually is higher interference that  
time of the year.  Something to do with the lack of sun so the ambient  
level of other man-made transmissions are stronger during this time?

I've go to get ready for work this morning but I'll try to find the  
article I was reading when I return later today...

Jp

On Jan 15, 2008, at 12:38 AM, Jack Brindle wrote:

> Jerry;
>
> You can pretty much rule out solar conditions - things are very  
> quiet on the sun right now. The ham bands are rather quiet as far as  
> noise is concerned, especially as you go up in frequency. I believe  
> the X10 stuff runs around 300 MHz, which tends to be somewhat low in  
> noise anyway. I would suggest that you are not seeing anything that  
> is common to other folks.
>
> However, there is a LOT of man-made RF noise these days. The RF  
> noise floor is dramatically higher these days due to all the  
> electronic toys we folks have, from plasma TVs (especially bad) to  
> noisy computer supplies (the PC users know about these) to lots of  
> other things. I am troubled by power line noise from the old pole  
> transformer in my back yard - it usually gets better after it starts  
> raining hear this time of year, but it is getting worse as the  
> transformer ages. There are lots of potential causes - you get the  
> idea.
>
> I would suggest you try to look around to see what changes just  
> after Christmas - perhaps people start turning off their Christmas  
> lights and thus change things in the power grid? Could there be a  
> street light that is operated by a light sensor that has gone bad?  
> That  can be especially bad for RF interference (RFI). These usually  
> show the most trouble around sunset or sunrise, but it the sensor is  
> bad all bets are off. But they usually don't fix themselves as soon  
> as February comes around. In short, look at the environment to see  
> what is different during this period. It probably is not something  
> that is weather-related, unless it gets dramatically warmer where  
> you are after the "bad" period.
>
> Solving RFI problems is an endeavor that drives people crazy - kind  
> of like figuring out why important connectors fail when dropped to  
> -275 degrees or so... ;-)