The Ultimate Aggravation--Interference!

[scanaholic]

We have lived in our present location, a very nice apartment complex since the first of Feb.
Scanner reception has been clear with very little noise on worst days.

I just purchased a Radio Shack Pro-433, am beginning to enjoy it, and note it's great sensitivity, then BANG! Last night, I started getting the worst noise ever! It's either from a transformer or power tools or "something". It isn't constant and currently as I type this, is silent.

I had this problem once before at another location in our city, and the power co. had a nice fellow come out with a tracer, a device with a small beam type antenna and meter with a speaker. They found the source of noise, and after it was fixed, I was again in happy listener land!

I just hope this is a temporary thing, and will stay gone, or move on through as it came.

I wonder if anyone else has been bothered with electrical noise type interference and what you did for it, and how things turned out?

If it continues to be a problem, I will again contact our power co., and see if they can trace down the noise source, and get it resolved.

Thanks and have a noiseless and enjoyable monitoring day.

 

[nd5y]

I had the same thing happen a few years ago at my old house. I had some real bad line noise and called the electric company. They sent an engineer out, who was also a ham, with the same type of tracer (a wideband UHF AM receiver & yagi antenna) The noise was caused by a damaged insulator on the primary in my back yard. About 2 days later they replaced the insulator and cured the problem.

 

[trainman111]

I think I'm going to be calling the power company too. I am getting a horrible buzzing noise on my scanner that just drowns everything out unless its a strong signal. I'd say it started a couple weeks ago.

 

[scanaholic]

Hi, Tom & trainman111!

I'm glad they got that noise fixed for you, Tom. Lots of stuff can sure go wrong with power lines, and cause us misery. It's been quiet here ever since the flare up this a.m. I don't have a clue yet on what it is(hopefully WAS). Looks like if it was a bad transformer or insulator, it wouldn't clear up for periods of time. Well, I'll just enjoy the quiet, and if it acts up more, try to get them to check it.

Sounds like what this has been here, trainman. It takes out my out of town stations, but the strong ones survive. I wish you quieter times soon!