It is hard to describe this noise because it lacks any features at all.  Think 
of atmospherics, like background noise that usually sits around S0 to S1 on the 
S-meter, more on 80 meters in the evening.  That sort of thing.

Now, make that noise a solid (no changes, no peaks, no features, absolutely 
flat across the spectrum) 30/9 at least.  The waterfall display is virtually 
opaque with this noise.  The frequency spectrum display is just a band of noise 
across the whole top part of the P3 display -- just a little space on top where 
the labels are written.

Then, when I switched from band to band using the KPA500 band switching buttons 
-- exactly the same thing.  But, if it did change, it was slightly worse down 
around 160 meter band but not enough to say for sure that it was really worse.

Like I said, this would turn off and on a varying intervals just as if someone 
were turning on some instrument or tool to do things.  The entire period of 
this RF noise and activity was about 10 minutes and it has now shown itself 
again.  It is like someone hauled out their noise machine at 9:45 AM, starting 
doing things, and then at 9:55 AM or there abouts, he was done.

phil


On Feb 19, 2014, at 12:43 PM, mcduf...@ag0n.net wrote:

> On Wed, 19 Feb 2014 10:15:42 -0800, Phil Hystad wrote:
> 
>> Anyone have ideas of the cause. 
> 
> The first thing to look at is your own house, of course.  If you can very
> temporarily power your radio from a battery, even a UPS (but not one you are
> currently using, just to make sure that isn't the source), do that and turn 
> the
> entire house power off at the breaker.  When that is clean, proceed to look at
> the neighborhood.  My favorite trick is to toss a small radio like a IC706 up 
> on
> the dash with a sniffer antenna on it and drive around.
> 
> One more trick that works well if you are experienced is to put the receiver 
> on
> AM mode and listen to the characteristics of the noise.  If you've been around
> awhile, you can sometimes tell a lot more about what you are really looking 
> for.
> 
> If you can, record it on AM and SSB, and have several knowledgeable people
> listen to it to help steer you to the source.  Do it with a direct connection,
> not an acoustic pickup, and don't overdo your levels.  A good clean recording
> can help your detective work.
> 
> I believe plasma TVs can sound terrible.  I can't say for sure, but I think I
> have heard one in my "neighborhood".  Nearest neighbors are over a quarter of 
> a
> mile away.  When the noise in question came up, I went to AM and it sounded 
> like
> high frequency arcing all over the bands.  Luckily, it hasn't been a problem
> lately.
> 
> Good luck.  I've been fighting one noise for over 20 years here.  We can't 
> seem
> to isolate the source.
> 
> Gary
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