• State
  • Locked Locked
  • Replies 4 replies
  • Subscribers 54 subscribers
  • Views 491 views
  • Users 0 members are here
Support feedback
Options
Options
Related

This thread has been locked.

If you have a related question, please click the "Ask a related question" button in the top right corner. The newly created question will be automatically linked to this question.

A radio linked probe for studying an unidentified source of electrical and RF problems.

Tuatha De
Intellectual 630 points


I am developing tiny radio linked solar powered MSP430 based probes which will be primarily useful with 'impossible' power line short circuiting problems. These are intermittent, brief episodes of moderate to complete short circuit from milliseconds to minutes long. They may occur on large or small lines and inside transformers. After extensive physical and instrumental examination of the lines involved the problem cannot be explained or resolved. Even visual watch kept on the lines for several days and nights turns up nothing. Failure of the lines can take place in full view of observers and yet no cause for the failure is seen. While I am anecdotally familiar with two rural blackout cases of this kind the overall scale of it globally is hard to discern. The cause of these problems appears to be geologically based so this unusual failure mode should be widespread. The probes are also an attempt to identify and localize some difficult radio 'holes,' large and small geographic areas which intermittently and inexplicably attenuate 100 MHz through multi-GHz communications. The cause of some of these is the same as the cause of the power line problems. A cell phone base station installer once described what I am studying as a rare but important problem in his work which required the installation of extra base stations per area covered and in one case blanked his cell-net over a wide area. Readout of the probes is by laptop carried to within a few yards of the probe clusters. I am hoping that over time this forum will be seen by people who have worked with these electrical or radio problems and request that they contact me so that I might learn more about how these easily installed, rugged and weatherproof probes can be useful in analyzing 'impossible' power line problems. larrygrant44@aol.com
  • 0
    TI__Mastermind 19575 points

     Hi Tuatha De,

    I very interesting idea. I guess the only thing I am aware of is:

    http://www.olimex.com/dev/pdf/MSP430-SOLAR.pdf 

     Do you have a prototype running? 

    LPRF_Rocks

  • 0 in reply to Morten Braathen
    Intellectual 630 points
    Hi LPRF_Rocks: While I do not now have prototypes running I am working steadily in that direction. At this point I am asking for input from anyone who has experienced these difficult to analyze symptoms on their systems in order to refine and improve my own understanding of the practicalities of this application. larrygrant44@aol.com Larry
  • 0 in reply to Tuatha De
    TI__Mastermind 19575 points

    Hi Larry,

    How are things?

    Check out the following company

    http://www.cymbet.com/content/applications-energy.asp

    Has anyone contacted you?

  • 0 in reply to Morten Braathen
    Intellectual 630 points

    Hi LPRF Rocks the World:

    Thanks for the suggestions you've made, both on energy harvesting and storage possibilities.  While I have not received 

    any replies from my posting as to people or companies experiencing this form of intermittent line shorting that's pretty

    much what I expected.  At present this is likely a very sporadic experience known mostly to linemen and not necessarily widely 

    known in engineering.  It should increase in the future.  I'm still pretty much leaning toward supercapacitors due to their

    ability to withstand short-circuiting without self-destruction.  The emphasis on short-circuiting is created by this being a study

    of very high conductance areas forming for no presently discernable reason across very sparsely spread small areas.  I have observed

    this phenomena myself using 'AA' batteries and have heard descriptions of others who have had this experience with common rural power lines.

    The many batteries in my experiment wound up so badly shorted that they were too hot to touch after 10-20 seconds and began leaking contents

    awhile later.  The LPRF probes would be placed in fields which could pose a fire hazard if the batteries powering my device got much hotter than 

    what I observed so I have a strong tendency to protect against that by using supercapacitors, even with their present weaknesses.

    It will be interesting to see just how long it takes before this phenomena becomes prevalent enough that interest is indicated from industry.  The rather

    new world of LPRF suggests that the problem will eventually be bumped into by folks doing LPRF telemetry.  Someone is going to get bugged at how

    some part of their net keeps having battery/storage problems and they will likely turn up in this forum looking for an answer. 

    Work on my prototype is going nicely.  My compliments to TI for their effort in making

    all the pieces of the MSP430 and the CC2250 (and related chips) comprehensible and easy to program!

    Larry