[AMRadio] AMRadio Digest, Vol 171, Issue 4

Sun Apr 22 11:54:03 EDT 2018

please remove from distribution lists. Jimmie passed away 3/26/2018

---------- Original Message ----------
From: amradio-request at mailman.qth.net
To: amradio at mailman.qth.net
Subject: AMRadio Digest, Vol 171, Issue 4
Date: Sat, 21 Apr 2018 02:54:10 -0400

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Today's Topics:

   1. Re: Desperate for a RFI solution. (Bill Guyger)
   2. Re: Desperate for a RFI solution. (Randy Berry)
   3. Re: Desperate for a RFI solution. (Randy Berry)
   4. Re: Desperate for a RFI solution. (Randy Berry)

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Fri, 20 Apr 2018 19:53:37 -0500
From: Bill Guyger <bguyger at yahoo.com>
To: JAMES HANLON <knjhanlon at msn.com>
Cc: AMradio <amradio at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: Re: [AMRadio] Desperate for a RFI solution.
Message-ID: <361F2B98-A776-427E-AFDA-B9B564E3BF93 at yahoo.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

The CFL's might not be the only source of noise. Computers can be real dirty, and there are those grow lights that have been mentioned in QST. Also, not sure of your QTH, but I live 3 blocks from the Dallas Area Rapid Transit light rail tracks and those things are powered by giant switching power supplies that feed the overhead wires. My noise level is S7.

Bill AD5OL 

Sent from my iPhone

> On Apr 20, 2018, at 7:32 PM, JAMES HANLON <knjhanlon at msn.com> wrote:
> 
> Randy,
> 
> 
> If you are on the third floor and the hallway there is populated with CFLs, then the other floors probably have additional CFLs as well - which of course only makes your problem even worse.  I'm sure you needed someone to remind you of that, sorry.
> 
> 
> Here's a suggestion.  Perhaps if you approached them nicely and explained your problem, the folks who own your building or who maintain it would allow you to run a test or two.  One obvious thing would be to turn off some or all of the hallway lights long enough to see if it made any change in your noise level.  that would at least help to pin down the problem.  If the CFLs are indeed the problem, one solution would be to replace them all with Edison bulbs or LED bulbs.  Maybe there would be some way that you could get that done, perhaps by participating in buying the new bulbs or paying some additional fee to offset the additional electricity cost if there is one.
> 
> 
> Good luck!
> 
> 
> Jim Hanlon, W8KGI
> 
> 
> ________________________________
> From: Randy Berry <randyn3lrx at gmail.com>
> Sent: Friday, April 20, 2018 3:14 PM
> To: AM Radio List
> Subject: [AMRadio] Desperate for a RFI solution.
> 
> Hi,
> I recently bought a Yaesu FT-857D and I have tried everything to mute
> the noise in the receiver. I get an s8-s9 noise floor on every band
> but VHF/UHF. I've tried everything I can think of to kill the noise.
> This is not the first radio plagued by the noise. This has been an
> ongoing battle ever since I moved into this building.
> 
> Here's my situation. I am an apartment dweller living on the third
> floor with indoor antennas. I am not allowed to have any outdoor
> antennas on my balcony. (I've already been warned once with my stealth
> shortened dipole.) So I am using 2 MFJ-1699T 10 band antennas and a
> dipole kit in my living room. I also use a MFJ-939 autotuner which
> works great, it will tune lawn furniture! It even does 6 meters which
> it's not supposed to.
> 
> Anyway, I get a constant noise floor as high as s9 on all HF bands. I
> added a common mode choke inline and that dropped it some. (It was
> even as high as +20db before the choke.) I can't even hear anything on
> CB channel 19! I tried to hear the local 10 meter slop bucket net and
> could hear faint voices but not make any intelligence out of them due
> to the high noise floor. 144/440 is fine. I get little noise at all, 6
> meters is a little noisy, but usable.
> 
> I bought this rig because my standalone receiver died and I needed
> something to listen to and since I can't use my K7DYY Super Sr.
> transmitter anyway, I decided to buy a transceiver so I can talk too.
> It does AM at 25 watts carrier, and one of the first things I did was
> program in all the common AM frequencies on all the bands! Over the
> years I have spent tons of dollars and countless hours trying to
> resolve this and nothing works.
> 
> I think it's the CFL's in the hallway. There is one every 10 feet or
> so for the entire length of the building, on both sides of the
> hallway. They are the only thing I can think of that runs 24/7/365. Is
> there any way possible to clean up their noise so I can use HF
> peacefully?
> 
> I don't have any CFL's in my apartment. I'm still using Edison
> technology, all my wall warts and switching supplies are clean, so
> it's not coming from my apartment. I've even turned off the AC main in
> my breaker box and tried on battery from inside my apartment. No
> change.
> 
> I'm open to all suggestions apart from vandalizing the property by
> breaking all the bulbs. (Believe me I've thought of that already!)
> Anything I can make or buy to filter CFL noise?
> 
> tnx es 73 de Randy, N3LRX
> 
> ______________________________________________________________
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> Message delivered to bguyger at yahoo.com

------------------------------

Message: 2
Date: Sat, 21 Apr 2018 02:15:27 -0400
From: Randy Berry <randyn3lrx at gmail.com>
To: Jonathan Rines <ka1tdq at gmail.com>
Cc: AM Radio List <amradio at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: Re: [AMRadio] Desperate for a RFI solution.
Message-ID:
 <CANoMxYS0qbsKg6ENi=unto9ZpOQqCqR8-v=3-myRJMZn4BWxGg at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"

I have the same noise issue on my SDRs. HF is useless while VHF on up
is fine. I don't have an SDRPlay, I have several dongles, a Ham It Up
upconverter and my most recent purchase is an RTL-SDR.com V3 HF+
dongle with direct sampling. I use Linux and gqrx and that works quite
well for VHF up. Linux has GNU Radio, which is pretty powerful stuff,
it's just beyond my ability to design my own software receiver using
that.

I'm kinda limited to SDR software that I can run. I've tried running
SDR#, HDSDR, etc. on wine (software that allows you to run some
Windows software on Linux) but no luck. I even know the author of SDR#
and he refuses to release the code so it can be ported to work on
Linux as well. As far as I know the SDRPlay itself doesn't work very
well with Linux either. At least there are no drivers for Fedora Linux
I can find.

The noise blanker on gqrx is not that effective. I wish it was, then
the problem would be solved. It is adjustable, but I haven't gotten it
to work effectively yet. The noise blanker on the 857 is also
adjustable. I've set it to max and it does nothing. SDR's are fun, I
enjoy playing with them but I'd much rather have a radio when it comes
to playing HF. That's why I bought a radio.

I can listen to websdrs and the noise floor is much lower, and I hear
familiar voices, yet on my end it's s9+ of  static. On 3885 KHz AM
right now it's up to 10 db over s9. I hear the whistling of heterodyne
so I know someone is out there. Meanwhile in Ohio (I'm in Michigan)
the noise floor is s5 and over s9 with intelligible signals.

I just don't know where this garbage is coming from.

On Fri, Apr 20, 2018 at 5:39 PM, Jonathan Rines <ka1tdq at gmail.com> wrote:
> My location is noisy on the lower bands to the point of being unusable. I use separate transmitters and receivers, so I have more options. I use an SDRplay for my receiver and the noise is eliminated using the noise blanking feature. Just one mouse click and it?s gone.
>
> Jon
> KA1TDQ
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
>> On Apr 20, 2018, at 2:14 PM, Randy Berry <randyn3lrx at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hi,
>> I recently bought a Yaesu FT-857D and I have tried everything to mute
>> the noise in the receiver. I get an s8-s9 noise floor on every band
>> but VHF/UHF. I've tried everything I can think of to kill the noise.
>> This is not the first radio plagued by the noise. This has been an
>> ongoing battle ever since I moved into this building.
>>
>> Here's my situation. I am an apartment dweller living on the third
>> floor with indoor antennas. I am not allowed to have any outdoor
>> antennas on my balcony. (I've already been warned once with my stealth
>> shortened dipole.) So I am using 2 MFJ-1699T 10 band antennas and a
>> dipole kit in my living room. I also use a MFJ-939 autotuner which
>> works great, it will tune lawn furniture! It even does 6 meters which
>> it's not supposed to.
>>
>> Anyway, I get a constant noise floor as high as s9 on all HF bands. I
>> added a common mode choke inline and that dropped it some. (It was
>> even as high as +20db before the choke.) I can't even hear anything on
>> CB channel 19! I tried to hear the local 10 meter slop bucket net and
>> could hear faint voices but not make any intelligence out of them due
>> to the high noise floor. 144/440 is fine. I get little noise at all, 6
>> meters is a little noisy, but usable.
>>
>> I bought this rig because my standalone receiver died and I needed
>> something to listen to and since I can't use my K7DYY Super Sr.
>> transmitter anyway, I decided to buy a transceiver so I can talk too.
>> It does AM at 25 watts carrier, and one of the first things I did was
>> program in all the common AM frequencies on all the bands! Over the
>> years I have spent tons of dollars and countless hours trying to
>> resolve this and nothing works.
>>
>> I think it's the CFL's in the hallway. There is one every 10 feet or
>> so for the entire length of the building, on both sides of the
>> hallway. They are the only thing I can think of that runs 24/7/365. Is
>> there any way possible to clean up their noise so I can use HF
>> peacefully?
>>
>> I don't have any CFL's in my apartment. I'm still using Edison
>> technology, all my wall warts and switching supplies are clean, so
>> it's not coming from my apartment. I've even turned off the AC main in
>> my breaker box and tried on battery from inside my apartment. No
>> change.
>>
>> I'm open to all suggestions apart from vandalizing the property by
>> breaking all the bulbs. (Believe me I've thought of that already!)
>> Anything I can make or buy to filter CFL noise?
>>
>> tnx es 73 de Randy, N3LRX
>> ______________________________________________________________
>> Our Main Website: http://www.amfone.net
>> AMRadio mailing list
>> Archives: http://mailman.qth.net/pipermail/amradio/
>> List Rules (must read!): http://w5ami.net/amradiofaq.html
>> List Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/amradio
>> Post: AMRadio at mailman.qth.net
>> To unsubscribe, send an email to amradio-request at mailman.qth.net with
>> the word unsubscribe in the message body.
>>
>> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
>> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
>> Message delivered to ka1tdq at gmail.com

------------------------------

Message: 3
Date: Sat, 21 Apr 2018 02:17:27 -0400
From: Randy Berry <randyn3lrx at gmail.com>
To: "Ron.K3PID" <ron.k3pid at sbcglobal.net>
Cc: AM Radio List <amradio at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: Re: [AMRadio] Desperate for a RFI solution.
Message-ID:
 <CANoMxYQRxwOOYgq1NhTo1fo3kZ6GZNQMVXVXCGgcn4+Xkaedwg at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"

Yes, I have shut off my AC mains on my breaker box and run the system
on battery. Same issue.

On Fri, Apr 20, 2018 at 7:07 PM, Ron.K3PID <ron.k3pid at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> Hi Randy, Sorry if this is a stupid question but have you tried running the
> FT857 on battery?
>
> -----Original Message----- From: Randy Berry
> Sent: Friday, April 20, 2018 4:14 PM
> To: AM Radio List
> Subject: [AMRadio] Desperate for a RFI solution.
>
> Hi,
> I recently bought a Yaesu FT-857D and I have tried everything to mute
> the noise in the receiver. I get an s8-s9 noise floor on every band
> but VHF/UHF. I've tried everything I can think of to kill the noise.
> This is not the first radio plagued by the noise. This has been an
> ongoing battle ever since I moved into this building.
>
> Here's my situation. I am an apartment dweller living on the third
> floor with indoor antennas. I am not allowed to have any outdoor
> antennas on my balcony. (I've already been warned once with my stealth
> shortened dipole.) So I am using 2 MFJ-1699T 10 band antennas and a
> dipole kit in my living room. I also use a MFJ-939 autotuner which
> works great, it will tune lawn furniture! It even does 6 meters which
> it's not supposed to.
>
> Anyway, I get a constant noise floor as high as s9 on all HF bands. I
> added a common mode choke inline and that dropped it some. (It was
> even as high as +20db before the choke.) I can't even hear anything on
> CB channel 19! I tried to hear the local 10 meter slop bucket net and
> could hear faint voices but not make any intelligence out of them due
> to the high noise floor. 144/440 is fine. I get little noise at all, 6
> meters is a little noisy, but usable.
>
> I bought this rig because my standalone receiver died and I needed
> something to listen to and since I can't use my K7DYY Super Sr.
> transmitter anyway, I decided to buy a transceiver so I can talk too.
> It does AM at 25 watts carrier, and one of the first things I did was
> program in all the common AM frequencies on all the bands! Over the
> years I have spent tons of dollars and countless hours trying to
> resolve this and nothing works.
>
> I think it's the CFL's in the hallway. There is one every 10 feet or
> so for the entire length of the building, on both sides of the
> hallway. They are the only thing I can think of that runs 24/7/365. Is
> there any way possible to clean up their noise so I can use HF
> peacefully?
>
> I don't have any CFL's in my apartment. I'm still using Edison
> technology, all my wall warts and switching supplies are clean, so
> it's not coming from my apartment. I've even turned off the AC main in
> my breaker box and tried on battery from inside my apartment. No
> change.
>
> I'm open to all suggestions apart from vandalizing the property by
> breaking all the bulbs. (Believe me I've thought of that already!)
> Anything I can make or buy to filter CFL noise?
>
> tnx es 73 de Randy, N3LRX
> ______________________________________________________________
> Our Main Website: http://www.amfone.net
> AMRadio mailing list
> Archives: http://mailman.qth.net/pipermail/amradio/
> List Rules (must read!): http://w5ami.net/amradiofaq.html
> List Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/amradio
> Post: AMRadio at mailman.qth.net
> To unsubscribe, send an email to amradio-request at mailman.qth.net with
> the word unsubscribe in the message body.
>
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
> Message delivered to ron.k3pid at sbcglobal.net

------------------------------

Message: 4
Date: Sat, 21 Apr 2018 02:54:04 -0400
From: Randy Berry <randyn3lrx at gmail.com>
To: Rob Atkinson <ranchorobbo at gmail.com>
Cc: AM Radio List <amradio at mailman.qth.net>, "Ron.K3PID"
 <ron.k3pid at sbcglobal.net>
Subject: Re: [AMRadio] Desperate for a RFI solution.
Message-ID:
 <CANoMxYTXZfwk5EeD5uQ43v-iN0YvELC0Wnno_AWzURHp6u=tzQ at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"

Yeah, my primary mode of interest is AM, that is why one of the first
things I did when I plugged the radio in was to program all the AM
frequencies I could find on all the bands in to it. (Including 6 and 2
meters.) In fact if not for discovering AM on HF while living in
Maryland (the origin of my 3 call) I'd probably still be a Technician.

I know about websdr.org. I listen to a few SDRs found there now and
then, but it's not the same as listening locally. Plus the latency of
going through the SDR/computer then by the time it gets through the
internet through your computer and to your speaker it's up to a second
delay from real-time. Thats worse than running EchoLink. I can hear
the 500ms delay on my own machine as compared to off the air and I run
a pretty fast machine. It gets confusing.

On Fri, Apr 20, 2018 at 8:30 PM, Rob Atkinson <ranchorobbo at gmail.com> wrote:
> I don't know who you are trying to talk to or the band/mode (AM I
> guess since this is the AM Radio List) but I'd try using a separate
> receiver that's networked on the internet instead of one in your
> apartment.  I know it isn't the same as a traditional setup but
> there's no way of knowing how long you'll have to deal with the noise
> in a building you don't own and this might be about all you can do
> besides moving.  http://www.websdr.org/
>
> 73
>
> Rob
> K5UJ

------------------------------

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End of AMRadio Digest, Vol 171, Issue 4
***************************************