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Re: Snow on telly, help needed !

At 06:52 PM 1/1/99 -0700, you wrote:
>Original Poster: gweaver <gweaver-at-earthlink-dot-net> 
>
>>I was operating my 2kW Tesla coil a couple of weeks ago,  when someone
>>in my street complained about snow on their television screen.  The
>>person who complained lives 5 houses along from me,  and said that it
>>was affecting all of the televisions in the street !  My coil produces
>>2 to 3 foot arcs and works great otherwise.

>The best thing to do is not tell the neighbors that you have a Tesla Coil.
>If someone has interference they won't know who to complain to if they don't
>know who is doing it.  


Hello list.

Perhaps I am a little sensitive, but I cringed when I read this. This
advice doesn't actually solve the RFI problem. In fact, if you don't do
anything about the RFI then its not unreasonable to expect the following to
happen to you, except with Tesla coil substituted for Amateur Radio Antenna:


>Its a lot less of a problem than the Amateur Radio operator that use to live 
>over on the next street.  No one could watch TV from 4 pm to 10 pm every
night 
>for over 2 years.  I got cable TV because of him and still got
interference from 
>him on the cable.  Everyone in the neighor hood complained to the FCC and
they did 
>nothing about him.  Finally one day on my way to work I had to drive
around his 
>Amateur Radio Antenna which was laying twisted and bent in the middle of
the city 
>street where someone had pulled it down in the middle of the night with a
car, 
>truck or something.  He never put the antenna up again and moved away
about 6 months 
>later.  


RFI can clearly produce a lot of anger, and can even endanger life
(remember ambulances, police, and firemen all communicate via radio). By
building and operating a radio frequency device, a coiler has undertaken to
act responsibly and reasonably. 

Don't be a moron, don't give people a reason to persecute you, and don't
damage the reputation of coiling. Instead be intelligent, restrict the
operating times for your coils (perhaps even explore alternate operating
venues), and raise local interest in your hobby.    

Safe coiling,

Gavin Hubbard