------Toast Observing Log------ * unless otherwise noted, location is Florence Alabama 34.81° N 87.64° W K3PGP front end (night version) with a 3x3mm detector diode and 15 inch light bucket mirror, fed directly into the computer sound card. About 100 feet of 50 ohm coax cable connecting receiver and computer. The software used is Argo V1 build 134 and others as noted. *** a new beacon *** April 23rd - i installed a new optical beacon at a friends house about 12 miles south of me. This one is a laser diode type, with a 780nm 5mw beam modulated at 34.3 Hz with a 50/50 duty cycle squarewave. Pointing north at about 5 degrees azimuth (toward my house) and 30 - 35 degrees elevation to just clear some trees at the site. The Laser has a beamwidth of about 3 x 5 degrees using a small 1" dia. lens to shape the beam. It runs off a 12 volt wall transformer, so it is on all the time as long as there is power at the site. ******************** ``````````````````````````````` Date: april 25 2005 Time: 10:00pm - Weather: Clear skies, becoming overcast with rain towards end Pointing: south (185 az.) about 20 degrees elevation Comments: did a 120 sec/dot scan from 10pm till 1:30am april 26 no sign of beacon at 34.3 Hz ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 4 2005 Time: 4am - Weather: mostly clear some haze Pointing: south (185 az.) about 20 degrees elevation Comments: made spectrograms of the low band from 0 to 100 hz every 15 minutes. Then another wide bandwidth one. (practice making spectrums and an hour or so of a 120 sec/dot scan. captured the display again with the low band scale selected) ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 4 2005 Time: 10pm - Weather: partly cloudy with high thin clouds, becoming mostly cloudy after midnight. sunrise at 5:55am. Visibility 10 miles Pointing: 90 degrees elevation (straight up) Comments: recorded an hour and 52 minutes at 60 sec/dots centered on 34 Hz with argo. No sign of beacon at 34.3 Hz made three spectrograms. (343_02x, 343_04x, 343_06x.jpg) made a long 120 dot/sec scan, started at 2:40am. There is a weak signal at 33.64 Hz that doesn't vary in frequency like the 1 Hz harmonics do. At 4 am Temp is 56f at 49% humidity, mostly cloudy skies, ceiling 11,000 feet. about 4:20am a second signal appears to branch off the 33.64 sig and drift upward in frequency weakening fading out at 5:15... then everything starts fading out about 5:20 with twilight and then sunrise. (343_10.jpg) ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 7 2005 Time: midnight - Weather: clear skies, temp 54f, dew point 50, hum 86%, visibility 5 miles, winds calm, sunrise 5:53am Pointing: 90 degrees elevation (straight up) Comments: no sign of the beacon with an hour at 120 sec/dots. Also no sign of that signal i saw at 33.64 Hz. Is it possible my beacon could have drifted down by about 0.66 Hz from where i set it over the last couple weeks? i'm not sure how it behaves after being on this long, but in the short term (several hours) it was rock stable. Next time i visit the site i'll try to make an accurate frequency measurement to confirm the exact frequency. The 34 Hz harmonic of the strobe light is running about -45dB, pretty quiet relatively. ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 10 2005 Time: midnight - Weather: clear skies, slight haze Pointing: 90 degrees elevation (straight up) Comments: Made a long 120 sec/dots scan. Put a 0-50 Hz spectrum at start and finish ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 12 2005 Time: 9pm - Weather: partly cloudy with haze, clearing later. 79f 66%rh visibility 9 miles, chance of isolated thunderstorms Pointing: straight up Comments: moved dish to a darker site behind my house to prevent passing cars and 120hz buzz from neighboring houses from disrupting scan. made a progressively narrower scan up tp 120 sec/dots, then a 0-50 Hz spectrum at end. ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 14 2005 Time: 2am - Weather: clear 66f 75%rh Pointing: straight up (90 degrees) Comments: Hearing lightning pulses, some pretty strong. some thunderstorms near Memphis (about 150 miles away) moving this way. ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 15 2005 Time: 9:30pm Weather: very clear skies Pointing: straight up (90 degrees) Comments: After repairing some cables that got wet, i set up my light- bucket once again out in the darkest part of my backyard. Upon hooking it up to the computer, i was amazed to find the loud "POP POP POP" signal missing. But aparently it is still there, just so weak it's hard to hear. Making a short 60 sec/dot scan i could see the 33, 34 and 35 Hz spectrum lines down an amazing -55dB. That's as weak as they've ever been up to this point. I seem to have more 60 Hz hum than usual. I may have left off the grounding wire after i soldered the cable back today... fixed that. made a 0 - 1000 Hz spectrum and a long 120 sec/dot scan. (343_29x, 343_32.jpg) ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 17 2005 Time: 1am Weather: very clear skies Pointing: straight up (90 degrees) Comments: noticed an odd signal tonight on about 54.67 Hz. It's a strong drifting carrier unrelated to the tower strobe signals. It drifts more erratically and farther in frequency, from 54.84 Hz to 53.85 Hz so far. The strobe signals, by comparison, only vary by about 0.05 Hz at most, even at 34 Hz (the 34th harmonic of 1 Hz). *** Later i realized this signal was being caused by an exhaust fan i keep in the window of my workshop. The receiver is located where stray light from my window can shine on it weakly. The fan was modulating the room light at 54.xx Hz. I confirmed this later with a photodiode and some sunlight shining through the running fan blades. (343_36, 343_37.jpg) After making several spectrums of the low band recently, i've come to realize that in my situation here with the loud interference, there are a few "quiet" frequencies where a beacon would be better suited. Since these harmonics of the tower strobes are based on a 1 Hz period, i have set beacons to frequencies of xx.3 to xx.7 Hz and generally the closer to xx.5 the better, as that would put it halfway between two lines. However, there are gaps in the spectrum here and there where a harmonic is missing or weak. So a beacon placed there would be as far as possible from an interfering line. On nights like this though, when the air is so clear, i wonder if the strobe signals interfere enough to mask much of anything, as long as it's not extremely close to one of the lines. ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 25 2005 Time: 5am Weather: clear skies 54f 83%rh Pointing: 290 degrees az. (WNW) 20 degrees el. Comments: made spectrums of 0 - 100 Hz band (343_45xb, 343_45xa.jpg) ``````````````````````````````` Date: May 26 2005 Time: 10pm - Weather: clear skies 63f 75%rh visibility 10 miles. some high thin clouds off to the north Pointing: straight up (90 degrees) Comments: quiet tonight with the harmonics near 34 Hz down around -52 dB saw a signal at 36.11 Hz on Argo. At first i thought this might be the 36 Hz harmonic that is usually missing on clear nights (even on cloudy nights it is still quite weak) but the frequency is off too far. I saw this signal on a 30 sec/dot scan but it only lasted a few minutes. (343_00046.jpg) ``````````````````````````````` Date: June 17 2005 Time: 10:30pm - Weather: mostly clear slight haze 67f 79rh visibility 9 miles Pointing: straight up (90 degrees) Comments: made a long 60sec/dots scan from 10:30pm to 12:20am ``````````````````````````````` Date: June 25 2005 Time: midnight - 3:30 am Weather: mostly cloudy with fog 70f 93rh Pointing: straight up (90 degrees) Comments: made a series of spectrums and looked at the 35 Hz band at 30 and 60 sec dots Just for fun, recording some raw audio from the reciever on tape, while monitoring casually for any strange signals. ``````````````````````````````` Date: June 29 2005 Time: sunset Weather: partly cloudy Pointing: straight up (90 degrees) Comments: made a 60 sec/dot scan and noticed that 36.1 Hz signal again. The weak 36.0 Hz harmonic of the strobes is faintly visible underneath it. It lasted about 10 minutes. No idea what that might be. Last saw it may 26 on a 30sec/dot scan (343_00051.jpg) ``````````````````````````````` Date: July 30 2005 Time: 1 - 3:30am Weather: clear sky 73f 76%rh visibility 9 miles Pointing: straight up Comments: bare diode detector with shield for 60 degree FOV made several 0 - 2200 Hz spectrums 0 - 6.5 Hz band at sunrise ``````````````````````````````` Update May 2006: when i finally got around to checking the beacon frequency in person, it had drifted down to about 32.72 Hz. The beacon was also found to be erratic at times, drifting up and down by as much as 2 Hz in just a few minutes. I suspect the timing capacitor used (an electrolytic type) might be the problem. I had seen that same problem in other 555 clock circuits ive built before. So, It's possible i may have detected the signal at 33.64 Hz on May 5th 2005 but there's no way to know for sure since there was no modulation of the carrier to identify it.