[Lowfer] WM too bright!

[Ed Phillips]

John Davis wrote:
> 
> >>Im still looking for an answer of why we get so much reduced losses when
> >>the ground/trees freezes and temps get down below 0F . If my calcs are
> >>correct my total Resistance for the beacon array is now around 10 ohms,
> >>even with the "reduced" earth Mat. Is this purely a dilectric change in
> the
> >>local earth return...wouldnt the top few feet of the "conductive" part of
> >>the earth return (ac?) become worse
> 
> I'm inclined to agree with Bill about the effect of tree sap (or its
> absence) in those temperatures.  And the dielectric changes in the soil
> probably do make your ground system more effective.  I'm not sure that the
> soil conductivity necessarily gets worse for this to happen, though.  I seem
> to recall (from back when I lived out on the Great Plains) that some
> broadcast engineers attempting to measure soil conductivity in the AM band
> by means of signal attenuation noted that their conductivity results came
> out on the high side during very cold winters.
> 
> John D

	With regard to tree conductivity I wonder if any of you remember (or
better yet have) an article in RCA review (early 1960's as I recall)
which described experiments on low-power long-distance HF communication
using very narrow bandwidth receivers (~1 Hz).  They used a 1 watt
(again depending on memory) transmitter with a wire in a tree for
antenna.  I seem to remember the transmitter was made in pieces and that
the operator carried the crystal in his arm pit to stabilize the temp
and frequency.  I'm pretty sure they had something on the properties of
the tree and it might be of interest here.

	A few years back, in preparation for a move, our company library threw
out all old stuff (by their definition pre-1990) as being obsolete and
useless!  Lost all RCA Reviews, IRE Proceedings, BSTJ's,etc. Library
had complete issues to the beginning and just plain trashed them - threw
them into dumpsters and they were gone before anyone knew about it.

Ed