Dealing with fluorescent lights and interference

[quadraphonic]

I'm trying to take an AM radio to work to listen to a show that's on the first hour or so I'm there, instead of the dance music they pipe in. Like 99.9999% of businesses, the place is awash in fluorescent lights, computer equipment, electrical lines, and interference. I can't stream the show because the computers shut off after a couple minutes of inactivity.

So I'm asking this question:
I doubt there's any that are surefires, but is there any mid-level AM radio (with a headphone jack) anyone here knows of that is better at squelching out some of the interference than others? Anyone had any luck with any, or any that surprised them?
Or is it just a lost cause? Should I bring in the SuperRadioIII and Select-A-Tenna and just hope for the best? Maybe look for another job altogether?

 

[crainbebo]

Most businesses are terrible to listen to AM radio from. Businesses that are concrete, forget even listening to a local 5kwer 2 miles away. Even FM is AWFUL. I'd better off saying, find a radio with recording capabillities to record the show and play it back once you get home.

-crainbebo

 

[pianoplayer88key]

My preferences for dealing with it would be more like follows...
Get the FCC out of bed with device manufacturers! Anything marketed for sale to anyone should have radiated emissions limits at least 60-80dB below the absolute faintest signal a multi-decade seasoned Ham could possibly detect, using the absolute best radio and antenna and most efficient mode possible, even with his antenna touching the device and the device's cover, if any, removed, and even if there were otherwise NO noise sources within 13,000 miles.
The other thing would be isn't there a way to stop making buildings of materials that attenuate radio waves from 0 nHz to 1000000 PHz by more than, say, 0.00001 μB?

 

[carmen]

the lights are the biggest problem. upgrade to LED

 

[spunker88]

Fluorescent lighting will only get worse in the future. We upgraded to electronic ballasts in the lights at work last year and now there is interference on the FM band as well. The older style, heavier magnetic ballasts have been phased out in the US. There is actually a notice on the packaging for ballasts and some CFLs that warns of radio interference on lower frequencies. This is why I only allow incandescent lighting near my radios at home.

 

[KyDXIn]

If you think this isn't a problem, try surfing the dial over the weekend and see how many more stations you will receive. I wonder if we petition the FCC on this interference issue if they would take action.

 

[KeithE4]

If you think this isn't a problem, try surfing the dial over the weekend and see how many more stations you will receive. I wonder if we petition the FCC on this interference issue if they would take action.

Force 300 million Americans to retrofit, replace, or remove hundreds of millions of fluorescent lights (which have existed since the 1930s), light dimmers (been around since at least the '60s), PCs (an appliance orders of magnitude more important than a radio in most people's lives), and the like, just so a few old geezers, DXers (the few non-hams that still bother with this activity), and luddites can listen to the last wheezing remnants of the AM band? :

The chances of that happening are less than zero. This is 2011, not 1961. The use of frequencies below 54 MHz in residential areas, other than hams and CBers, is just about over.

If you want to DX, get equipment that can deal with the noise - something with DSP or a noise-cancelling antenna.

 

[K6JHU]

My quick guess would be a Smartphone with a radio App asuming the station streams.

The other alternative would be to get a wire or a loop out the nearest window if that is possible. Or get the radio close to an outside wall. Otherwise try using an electrical ground for a longwire antenna (assuming you know what you are doing - you can destroy the radio, or yourself, otherwise).

If you have an old fashioned analog phone line in, not one of the new VOIP phones, try wrapping a coil aroune the phone line and then conenct to the AM antenna input.

Now we know why the AM's want to move to FM

 

[FreddyE1977]

My preferences for dealing with it would be more like follows...
Get the FCC out of bed with device manufacturers! Anything marketed for sale to anyone should have radiated emissions limits at least 60-80dB below the absolute faintest signal a multi-decade seasoned Ham could possibly detect, using the absolute best radio and antenna and most efficient mode possible, even with his antenna touching the device and the device's cover, if any, removed, and even if there were otherwise NO noise sources within 13,000 miles.
The other thing would be isn't there a way to stop making buildings of materials that attenuate radio waves from 0 nHz to 1000000 PHz by more than, say, 0.00001 μB?

Amen to that! There is a particular house I drive by on the way to and from work every day.
They must be splitting atoms in the basement, because when I go by there something blows out
EVERY AM station (including the strongest locals) on my car radio. Just overpowers them for about
a block in either direction. I have come to refer to it as The Soviet Jamming House.

I am guessing that they have one of the biggest plasma TV's on the market and they
never turn it off.

The other trouble spot is where I drive by a local hospital, where they are using MRI equipment.
But even that interference is nowhere near as bad as what comes out of this house.

 

[Icangelp]

My preferences for dealing with it would be more like follows...
Get the FCC out of bed with device manufacturers! Anything marketed for sale to anyone should have radiated emissions limits at least 60-80dB below the absolute faintest signal a multi-decade seasoned Ham could possibly detect, using the absolute best radio and antenna and most efficient mode possible, even with his antenna touching the device and the device's cover, if any, removed, and even if there were otherwise NO noise sources within 13,000 miles.
The other thing would be isn't there a way to stop making buildings of materials that attenuate radio waves from 0 nHz to 1000000 PHz by more than, say, 0.00001 μB?

Amen to that! There is a particular house I drive by on the way to and from work every day.
They must be splitting atoms in the basement, because when I go by there something blows out
EVERY AM station (including the strongest locals) on my car radio. Just overpowers them for about
a block in either direction. I have come to refer to it as The Soviet Jamming House.

I am guessing that they have one of the biggest plasma TV's on the market and they
never turn it off.

The other trouble spot is where I drive by a local hospital, where they are using MRI equipment.
But even that interference is nowhere near as bad as what comes out of this house.

;D
That's funny.

Just driving along the highway has its mobile interference makers, including heavy duty semis and city busses. Drive by them and the whole AM dial is gone. Fortunately, it is a short distance problem.

This is all Steve Jobs fault, thanks to his vision that all communications should flow to, through, and from the Iphone. His very words..."I don't want no dirty, stinkin' AM/FM radios cutting into my Iphone business. Fluorescent lights and dimmers in every home!! Now go out and get it done, underlings."

It's a conspiracy, I tell you.

 

[KeithE4]

If you have an old fashioned analog phone line in, not one of the new VOIP phones, try wrapping a coil aroune the phone line and then conenct to the AM antenna input.

I hope you mean inductive coupling, not just wrapping the line around a ferrite and connecting it directly to the antenna input. Between the 48 VDC battery voltage and the 90 V @ 20 Hz AC ring voltage (yes, it still has to be there since there are still plenty of old Ma Bell phones still connected), your radio wouldn't last long if you attempted to use a phone line as an antenna.

The phone company and the FCC probably wouldn't care for that too much either. ;D

Now we know why the AM's want to move to FM

Because that's where the listeners are and where the money is.

 

[pianoplayer88key]

I was thinking about something...
Rather than spending $almost_infinity to put something up in space (and charging $arm+leg subscription fees)...
For the network broadcasts at least (the ones syndicating the same program across the country)...
What frequency range would likely be best for using maybe just 2 or 3 terrestrial-based transmitters (preferably only 1 centrally located, though) per network to blanket the entire lower 48 states 24/7 with a good signal?
Also the noise makers have GOT to go.  I'm guessing that a 0.03 mV/m signal in a man-madnoise free area would be as good quality as a 10 mV/m in a metro area like L.A. under current conditions.
I also would prefer the minimum antenna efficiency for those "network" stations would be 510 mV/m/kW.  Each network would get its own single frequency and the transmitters would be synchronized, I guess kind-of like how some may be done in Europe (with an exception that there'd be several hundred to over a thousand miles separation between the transmitters, if possible).
(I'm guessing that, for example, a 2 MW signal on 153 kHz with that efficient of an antenna in maybe Lebanon, KS, could cover the entire 48 states, maybe with the help of boosters in San Francisco and Philadelphia for example.)

 

[Icangelp]

I was thinking about something...
Rather than spending $almost_infinity to put something up in space (and charging $arm+leg subscription fees)...
For the network broadcasts at least (the ones syndicating the same program across the country)...
What frequency range would likely be best for using maybe just 2 or 3 terrestrial-based transmitters (preferably only 1 centrally located, though) per network to blanket the entire lower 48 states 24/7 with a good signal?
Also the noise makers have GOT to go. I'm guessing that a 0.03 mV/m signal in a man-madnoise free area would be as good quality as a 10 mV/m in a metro area like L.A. under current conditions.
I also would prefer the minimum antenna efficiency for those "network" stations would be 510 mV/m/kW. Each network would get its own single frequency and the transmitters would be synchronized, I guess kind-of like how some may be done in Europe (with an exception that there'd be several hundred to over a thousand miles separation between the transmitters, if possible).
(I'm guessing that, for example, a 2 MW signal on 153 kHz with that efficient of an antenna in maybe Lebanon, KS, could cover the entire 48 states, maybe with the help of boosters in San Francisco and Philadelphia for example.)

You're beginning to make sense to me. I don't know if that is good or bad. Good, I guess.

Lebanon, KS?

Nice little town. I haven’t been there, but I’ve been told. The Higby Brothers gun shop in Lebanon does a very nice business selling muzzle loaders and shotguns, and the Lebanon city library has a wide selection of technical publications about wheat and corn cultivation. Then there is the Lebanon elementary school churning out the next generation of KU and KSU collegiates, and the prospect of putting a super tall, multi-multi-megawatt transmitting antenna smack dab in the middle of Lebanon would surely generate a lot of talk around the Midway Co-op service station.

Just a suggestion, but we might want to consider another town for the multi-multi-megawatt transmitting antenna because last I heard, the whole Lebanon community was totally scared of the possibility of getting cancer, not to mention they are 100% committed to the IPad as THE source for all entertainment.

The Lebanon KS community has even started a web site to promote the building of a giant multi-multi-watt WIFI transmitter to cover the entire nation, and they believe Lebanon NE would be the perfect spot for it. I forget the web site, so try Googling it. I'm sure you'll find it.

-------------------------------------------------------
Just a spoof. I couldn’t help myself. I'm high on strong coffee and crunchy Jif peanut butter on english muffin. Plus, I envy anyone who has the good sense to live in the land of perfect weather.

 

[gar hi]

Fluorescent light interference will only get worse even in our own homes, especially if you live in a condo or apartment as I do, because the eco-hippies who somehow get to make the choices for the rest of us have said we have to use those fluorescent light bulbs and the incandescent bulbs will no longer be available.

It was a big frustration to try to do any DXing from my hotel in Santa Cruz on my California vacation because of all that kind of interference. Even the light bulbs in all the lamps were those flourescent ones.

A great DXing opportunity, the first in years, was greatly diminished and there was no place to go outside at night, not to mention it was so cold.

Aside from the interference those fluorescent bulbs cause, I'm stocking up big time on the old fashioned ones because I refuse to use the ones they are forcing on us.

 

[Tom Wells]

If there is a way to make the FCC uphold their duty to require compliance with the intent of the published
standards, it could only be a proposed rulemaking, to address the issue, with a new meaningful standard for
"devices whose operating function is not substantially a continuous sinewave form".

The ARRL would likely already have such a concern and probably good to see what they might be doing.

The crazy thing is that the FCC could simply begin writing tickets and requiring compliance now.

Why they refuse to do anything to protect the medium they license within is baffling, unless the intent is really to wreck it for
total corporate or government ownership for all spectrum, and a total denial of any public share in
even partial "ownership" of such a valuable (controlled) commodity.

 

[spunker88]

Aside from the interference those fluorescent bulbs cause, I'm stocking up big time on the old fashioned ones because I refuse to use the ones they are forcing on us.

I have a hard time believing that CFLs are really better for the environment when you take everything into consideration. Sure they may save some electricity, but they are mercury filled and use a ballast on a circuit board. The longer life of CFLs is a joke especially if you only turn your lights on for a short amount of time. Incandescents can last just as long if you buy 130v bulbs. Regular 120v bulbs burn out quicker when your mains voltage goes over 120 by a few volts which is quite common. As an added bonus you can find 130v vibration/rough service incandescent bulbs that are used by carpenters/contractors. These bulbs are exempt from the incandescent ban and I imagine people besides carpenters/contractors will be buying them in the coming years. They are a bit more expensive than regular incandescents but cheaper than CFLs.

 

[kenglish]

If your desk is near a window, try putting a loop antenna, like the Eton/Kaito AN-200, on the window sill. Run a piece of RG-58 (50-ohm) coax to the radio. You'll need to tweak the position and tuning on the loop antenna a bit, for the particular station.

As for interference....the FCC has lost control over the situation. Each and every device interferes with nearly everything else.

(BTW, you might want to try some ferrite cores on the power cords and signal cables on any nearby monitors, and any computers or printers/fax machines. You'll need something like the "J-Mix" of ferrite for AM BCB frequencies.)

 

[kenglish]

Amen to that! There is a particular house I drive by on the way to and from work every day.
They must be splitting atoms in the basement, because when I go by there something blows out
EVERY AM station (including the strongest locals) on my car radio. Just overpowers them for about
a block in either direction. I have come to refer to it as The Soviet Jamming House.

I am guessing that they have one of the biggest plasma TV's on the market and they
never turn it off.

The other trouble spot is where I drive by a local hospital, where they are using MRI equipment.
But even that interference is nowhere near as bad as what comes out of this house.

Growing Pot is a distinct possibility. Those huge grow lamps put out a ton of RF.
How's their electric meter running?

 

[ddsparxx]

I once had a ton of intereference on the entire FM band in one apartment few years ago, but it affected little or NO interference on AM. The noise sounded somewhat like a washine machine spinning its load rapidly and it was loud. I had no idea what caused it.

 

[quadraphonic]

Dang.
It sounds like I am overmatched by today's technology (and/or lack thereof)....
Guess I'll have to get a Smartphone if'n I wanna do it.