Hi Al, Thanks for entertaining observations.
I have a proximately the same experience every time I take the KX2 or KX3 miles away from humanity. Wayne N6KR ---- elecraft.com > On Sep 10, 2020, at 12:53 PM, Al Lorona <alor...@sbcglobal.net> wrote: > > Power was shut off to my noisy urban neighborhood yesterday while crews > replaced a power pole. For a long time, I have wanted to check my HF noise > floor when the power is out, and yesterday was my chance. For days like this > is why my station is solar-powered! > > I expected to be surprised but I was absolutely blown away by what I heard. > The 40 meter noise floor was at least *17 dB* lower than normal. I could hear > layers and layers of signals that I never knew were there. Nets I never knew > existed… I mean, have you heard of the Montana Sheepherders net, for pity’s > sake? A midday 40 m pileup on a SOTA QRP CW station in Texas that I never > would have had a prayer of hearing normally. The noise was so low that I > could hear way, way down into the intermod of SSB signals—and most of them > were quite yucky. I heard birdies and crud from washing machines from what > must have been three blocks away. I heard the 7150 kHz 5th harmonic of a > local AM station. By measurement on the P3, I confirmed that all of these > signals would have been completely under my usual noise floor. > > On 20, it was so quiet I almost believed that the K3’s receiver had failed. > WWV was coming in at a 56 dB signal-to-noise ratio. > > Interestingly, 80 meters was also quieter, but not by as much. I’m not > complaining about nearly 10 dB less noise, but it’s too bad that power was > turned on before dark, before I could really evaluate the conditions. > > When it gets this quiet, there are no ticks, crashes or noise transients of > any kind... just a gentle rushing sound, so it ‘feels’ even quieter than it > is. It was every bit as quiet as a forest Field Day a hundred miles from > civilization. Yes, radio was amazing yesterday for six glorious hours. > > R, > > Al W6LX > > ______________________________________________________________ > Elecraft mailing list > Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft > Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm > Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net > > This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net > Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html > Message delivered to n...@elecraft.com ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
