Does anyone know if high voltage power lines put out any sort of interferance that could effect 2.4 ghz signal.

High voltage power lines put out EMF that can effect signals in any frequency range.

They really mess up your plane's responses when you fly into them! Another good reason to stay away from them.

High voltage line do not affect the radio signals what they will affect is the electronics in your plane and/ or helicopter.
It is true that all power line produce 'EMF' and the higher the voltage the greater the EMF. Now in high voltage tower the line could carry upto 500,000 volts and the magnetic field it produces would probably be in excess of 200-300ft ( Getting weaker as it goes further ). Try and stay at least that far away from them, because it could mess up the circuits in the receiver or ESC.
When you pass a metal object through a magnetic field it produces voltage in that object.

What Could interfere with your signal are wireless transmission tower or other wireless devises in the area. They will transmit at very high wattages and definetly interfere with your signal. Sometimes if the feild is in between office buildings (they could be upto 15 miles apart) they may have wireless line-of-sight antennas which will also interfere with the signal and you won't even know what happened.

These are the joys of living in the city.

I live next to some high voltage lines... when humid they even crackle... I was curious about the negative effects so I contaced an electrical engineer from the local college. He is "into" this sort of thing and came out with a "testing" device of some kind.. this was a couple yrs ago so the memory has faded a bit.. but I do believe it measured EMF... It turns out that he stood directly under the lines and there was no noticeable issue with EMF. It turns out we had an old electric analog type clock that emitted way more EMF than the lines...way way more.. he actually suggested we toss it.. which we did. The Computer monitor we had also was more than the wires but much less than that old clock. He also mentioned that each of those insulators between the pole and the wire would tell you how much voltage was on the line by how many insulators there were.. I forgot the formula but the more there were.. the more juice on the line.

I have also flown my DLG glider with a hitec neon radio and electron reciever with no issues. The field is approx 300 ft so at any time I would approx 150' or so from the lines.. sometimes closer sometimes farhter with no issues. I beleive the lines were insulated causing the low EMF. But was just my experience.
Mike

Test your gear near, or under under the HT line.
A standard range check of the system should show any "potential" problems

Regardless if the EMF generated by high power lines causes 2.4 gig interference or whether it interferes with your electronics on board the aircraft, it is a terrible idea to fly near high power lines.

Yes this is all very interesting i will be doing a range test around the power lines tomorrow.Thanks for the info.

True

Mike,
Is that picture from the crash video you picked up in Toledo???

Ken

We have some high tension lines ( not very high though) at the far N end of our field they are just outside of our flying zone but occaisionally we fly above them. we have notice that if a plane gets low and visually behind the lines they glitch or crash. I don't know but suspect the signal is blocked to a degree in this case. Courtesy is to go with some who just crashed and I often do except when they go into the wooly @&*$ past those wires![sm=72_72.gif]

Magnetic fields are caused by amps, not volts. A low voltage/high amp power line would make a greater magnetic field than a high voltage/low current line. Furthermore, the sum of the currents of a transmission line is always zero. The magnetic field created by one wire is cancelled by the magnetic fields of the other wires. If the conductors were co-axial, there would be no magnetic field ouside the line whatsoever.

Maybe. But there's a heck of a buzz around a 13,500 volt phase to phase line by my house on a foggy night.

I would imagine the 135,000 volt lines in Minnflyer's picture would have a pretty good corona around the wires?

High tension power lines are like magnets - they attract model aircraft. The field I learned to fly at had high tension lines just over 1/4 mile away so I was taught early on to keep away from them. I saw several guys who didn't heed that advise and provided lunch to those lines. But this was also in the days of AM and some guys where still flying reeds. Best bet is to just stay as far away from them as possible.

High tension lines will win the battle and war every time.

Hogflyer

Just an update to my original question,i have done a range test under the power lines today and upart from a slight flicker in the receiver neons at 20 paces it all seemed ok.It didnt go into failsafe until 50 paces on low power,so i'm a happy camper.

B.L.E. is this your theory or are you just going by what someone has told you?

I don't know why they would install power lines if no one was going to use them. The greater the use the more current drawn, and i suspect there are many houses and commercial/industrial building being fed off of them.

As for the cancelling of magnetic fields...If the loads were perfectly balanced the fields would cancel each other out in the middle of the phases, this way the amount of 'Eddie currents' induced in the other lines is minimized. There are magnetic fields coming off the outter sides of the lines. Don't forget these lines are usually approx 100ft. and higher from the ground.

Yes Ken it is. That was one of my favorite crashes on the whole DVD

Some poor guy flew a giant-scale Ultimate Bipe right into the power lines (At least I think it was an Ultimate, but it was Giant Scale for sure - It even knocked down a few lines)

here's the review:

http://www.rcuniverse.com/magazine/a...article_id=905

FYI, EMF stands for ElectroMotive Force.. or a fancy name for voltage. What you may be talking about is EMI (Electro Magnetic Inteference) or EMR (Electro Magnetic Radiation) and they don't actually cancel out, they are always there. Usually due to leakage current and that sort of thing, that is always present in high-voltage/high-current carriers like power lines. It's the leakage, usually some sort of arcing that causes problems (like thunderstorms with lightning).

There also was something discussed within the AMA called BPL or Broadband over Powerlines a few years ago that was investigated pretty thoroughly. The result was that it would not cause problems. I still think the jury's out with this one, especially for 72 MHz.

CGRetired......
What are you talking about??
EMF can stand for anything...In this case it stands for Electro Magnetic Field....FYI
EMF's are not caused but leak currents but are a product of current travelling in a wire ( in this case ) Anything that has current flowing produce a magnetic field.

Again, as i stated the electro magnetic field around the power wires can affect the electronic components in the Receiver and/or ESC.
They may glitch and people may mistaken that as a transmission failure.

Red. EMF stands for ElectroMotive Force, or another name for voltage. You may not like it, but that's the way it is. And, I won't debate the causes of it, it has all been documented by more experts than you or I.

I didn't say that the only source was leakage current, but that's where it mostly comes from. Leakage can be from many different things, such as proximity of the two current carriers (or three depending on the type of phase transmission) and humidity around the insulators at the top of the towers where the wires pass through or around. It is always there. Sorry to disappoint you. It's been debated over and over again so I won't go any further on the subject, if you don't mind.

CGr.

It's electromotive force or potential. Volts is a unit of measurement. Calling potential "voltage" is like calling distance "mileage". Amps is another unit of measure that is often used as a synonym of what it is a unit of measurement of. Electric current is measured in amps or more properly, amperes.

Both are metric units by the way, based on kilograms, meters, and seconds. All electrical units are metric, non metric countries just adapted these units instead of inventing non metric units for electicity.

Sorry, BLE, I meant to say ELECTROMOTIVE... not ELECTROMAGNETIC.. got wound up in the discussion I mis-typed... fingers moving faster than brain this morning. You are absolutely correct. Thanks for the correction.. I corrected my post.

CG are you retired..... Stay retired if you are. I will also not argue with you because you can't teach an old dog new tricks.

The original thread was about interference of the transmitter to the receiver.
stay on topic

EMF = Electronic Music Foundation
EMF = Electromagnetic Field
EMF = Electromotive Force (as in the potential differece between two electrodes in a galvanic ro voltaic cell)
EMF = Electromagnetic Force
Etc..

You get the picture

Red.. please.. take a hike. Find some other house to haunt. You are the type of poster that trys to find something to argue with people about. You took exception to BLE and now me. Sorry, but perhaps you need to find some other outlet for your anger.

Good bye and please do not reply because I don't need any more of your insults.

When anyone of us feels the need to discuss the other poster instead of the topic under discussion, remember the red colored advice that is directly above the message box you're typing your post into............

Please resist the urge to curse, flame, degrade, insult or embarrass someone in your post. We encourage the free flow of your ideas, but believe that they can be communicated (and received) much more effectively if you keep things civil. If you have to vent, take it offline.