Shop radio interference w/lights.

[durallymax]

Okay so after working in our shop for nearly 4 years this summer I am starting to get sick of the two radio stations that come in and my iPod.

I read about using some filters from radio shack and bought some but the didn't do anything. Maybe I used th wrong? They were the style you clamped around the cables.

Bear with me as I know nothing about how any of this works.

The head unit is just on oldish Sony stereo with the little wire for an FM antenna that I have outside the window. With the lights off the station's will come in. With half the lights on they still come in fairly clear and with all on its mostly white noise. There are 36 t8 6 bulb fixtures in our 60x80 shop. We have 6 speakers mounted in the ceiling inline with the lights in between fixtures.


Anybody know what I could do to get rid of the interference. Its just white noise/static no buzzing through the speakers.

I'm assuming it is interference since the stations come in with the lights off.

Thanks.

Sent from my Motorola Electrify using Tapatalk

 

[PAT]

Set up a dipole or an inverted v antenna on the rooftop. To get the length for each leg I believe the formula is 233/your freq. Then run it to your radio. Electrical current will cause immpedence loss. So keep it away from powerlines/breaker boxes etc.

You can buy the thin gauged with and "H" connector at radio shack or any online armature radio shop.

 

[PAT]

Thin gauged wire*

 

[bigmackmiller]

Have you tried moving the antenna up where the building will not block it with a longer wire? Or get a outdoor fm antenna and mount it on the roof

 

[madmatt]

I drilled a hole through the wall and stuck an antenna outside lol

 

[PAT]

You will still get immpedence from electrical current like that.

 

[madmatt]

You will still get immpedence from electrical current like that.

oh,, fixed mine,, must have just been a shitty antenna inside

 

[durallymax]

So the antenna location could still be my issue? I figured that. We had wanted to put one on the roof but had a hell of a time finding one. apparently its like trying to find an old 16' satellite dish.

Ill have to find somebody to get up there on the roof for me then. The power supply to the farm runs overhead next to the shop about 30' away and would be eyelevel with the antenna if that would be an issue?

On the antenna leg, i take say 233/94.1=2.48 so does that mean i make a 2.5" or 2.5' leg or?? thanks,.

 

[Sledhead]

So the antenna location could still be my issue? I figured that. We had wanted to put one on the roof but had a hell of a time finding one. apparently its like trying to find an old 16' satellite dish.

Ill have to find somebody to get up there on the roof for me then. The power supply to the farm runs overhead next to the shop about 30' away and would be eyelevel with the antenna if that would be an issue?

On the antenna leg, i take say 233/94.1=2.48 so does that mean i make a 2.5" or 2.5' leg or?? thanks,.

With a poor antenna, your radio is trying hard to pull in the stations, the automatic gain control makes it go very sensitive which causes you to pick up the interference from the lights. A decent antenna (old TV yagi would work well) aimed in the right direction outside with a twin lead to coax balun (black coax connector with 2 wires connected to the antenna) with a coax downlead to the radio should solve the light interference.

Two way radios interfering with your ipod may be caused be a cheap ipod cable or bad ground on the audio input side or poor chassis ground on the stereo.