[Lowfer] "BPL" Propagation Experiment/ Hifer RT Power Reduced

Roger Thompson [email protected]
Wed, 25 Feb 2004 10:08:12 -0600


For possible use in preparing my comments to the recently released FCC
NPRM on Broadband over Power Lines (FCC 04-29), I've reduced the
transmit power of Hifer RT (13.553536 MHz) to the general 1.705-30 MHz
Part 15 limit of 30 microvolts/meter at 30 meters.  

Even at this power level, some skywave reception may be possible and I
invite anyone who is interested in this regulatory action to see if the
signal can be detected.  Even if you don't care about BPL, this should
be a real reception challenge!

I set this power level at about 1330Z on 2/25 and plan to leave it at
this level for a number of days, depending on interest in the
experiment.  The beacon transmits 6 second dot QRSS and has a slow
thermal drift in the order of 4 Hz.  I'd appreciate comments on either
successful or failed reception attempts.

Links to the FCC NPRM document are at www.arrl.org. The Adobe version
seems to preserve footnotes better than the Word format, at least with
my software configurations.

Roger Thompson
AD5T