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From: Paul Nicholson <vlf0403@abelian.org>
Message-ID: <5753D61E.7080402@abelian.org>
Date: Sun, 5 Jun 2016 07:34:54 +0000
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Subject: Re: LF: Earth modes and ebnaut?
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Jim G7NKS wrote:

 > They weren't overly concerned when some of us were trying
 > with normal rf transmission.  We had to liaise with the team
 > of storm watchers at the met office but it was all very relaxed

That's encouraging as I contemplate the blank NoV application in
front of me. It is necessary to supply some detail to calculate
things like ERP and field strengths. Tricky without building
and testing the antennas first. Maybe the thing to do is just
submit the largest conceivable installation but I don't even
know where I could transmit VLF from yet, or what frequency I
could go down to. I wish there was some general VLF experimental
licence that could enable starting off small and building up,
and allowing /P and /A operation so that trials can be made
at different sites.

A few months ago I tried about 1kW into electrodes 500m apart
and could see nothing on a spectrogram 37km away. The shallow
electrodes and good ground conductivity made it both a very
small transmitting loop area, and a poor earth mode emitter.

Some experiments with kites are in the pipeline but not for
a while. The home location is hampered by downwind power lines
and trees so it is not straightforward to operate from here.

--
Paul Nicholson
--