Amateur Radio

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A Lemmy Community to share links about and for amateur (ham) radio to advance the technology, and promote communication and international goodwill. This community IS NOT for CB, GMRS, MURS, FRS, etc topics unless they are related to ham radio in some way.

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If asking questions about regulations, please include your country because we recognize that, while the hobby is international, regulations often aren't.

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TrojanHam

Interference from power lines? (lemmy.sdf.org)

submitted 7 months ago by [email protected] to c/amateur_radio

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Just moving in to our first home, and I'm very excited to have the freedom to set up a permanent HF antenna.

I'll probably build a sort of fan dipole and run it along the side of our property. That's the only place long enough to fit. However, the power lines for the neighborhood run over part of our backyard. I'm not worried about my dipole being too close to high voltage power (it won't be) but I wonder if the AC frequency can cause interference on certain bands?

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago

It's definitely possible. I don't know if you have one of those portable shortwave receivers, but if you do, you could check the amateur bands with that and see the interference. Generally, you're gonna get more interference on lower bands such as 160, 80, and possibly 40. Then you will on the upper bands like 20, 15, 12, and 10.

[–] TrojanHam 3 points 7 months ago

In addition to what @shortwavesurfer has, I would like to add you go through your house and look for noise inside. I found many noisy electronic devices when I did. I suspect you are more likely to find interferences this way. The call is often coming from inside the house.

I have an OCFD which has the long leg within ~20ft of the neighborhood lines but the don't cross. I don't hear any noise but it is at about a 45° angle to the lines. I have a "kinda ugly" common mode choke I built and put up with the antenna so I can't tell you if it's choking out noise but I would suggest you use one. If you hear interference, you should contract your power company and let them know because the lines aren't supposed to be interfering (at least in the US).

Depending on your geometry and distance between your antenna and the power lines, there may be impacts on your reception and transmission. I don't know enough about thee physics, though.