Mike Coslo wrote:
Richard Harrison wrote:
Gene W4SZ wrote:
"You have not offered a single reference beyond the ARRL Handbook that
supports your model for noise generation." (Directed to Cecil)

Particle discharge makes radio static noise.

Look at Terman`s description of "precipitation static". Instead of
charged particles blowing in the wind and alighting on stationary
antennas, Terman describes aircraft and their antennas flying through
clouds of charged particles. The effect is the same.

Terman`s solution: keep the antennas away from sharp points on the
aircraft which tend to noisly discharge the aircraft, insulate antenna
wires, and put Faraday shields on the directional antenna loops.

a PDF reference

http://tinyurl.com/h4o6u

I've done a bit of googling on the subject, and find that most seem
to favor this sort of explanation of the phenomenon. A notable exception
is W8JI. To Tom's credit he performs some experiments along those lines.
I'm not completely sure that I buy the conclusions, but I'll digest them
a bit more. I would suggest that Tom may want to experiment with
charging dust particles with that HV source rather than water.

Some have suggested that Cecil's statements are invalid because he
hasn't done the experiments - not so. His view represents the
mainstream. The debunkers have the burden of proof.

- 73 de Mike KB3EIA -


Mike,

Did you actually read the reference you provided? It offers complete
support for Tom's position and zero support for Cecil's position.

As usual around RRAA, this entire matter has morphed into all sorts of
side issues. The original and only point of controversy is whether the
so-called "precipitation static" is related to corona discharge or
rather to some sort of particle-by-particle charge transfer of the antenna.

Cecil claims that corona cannot exist in "fairweather" conditions,
although there is no reason given. Therefore the particle-by-particle
hypothesis is the only reasonable choice as the noise generator. The
ARRL Handbook seems to go along with that idea, although not very
explicitly. Other references, including Terman and the training document
you provided say that corona discharge is responsible for the noise
generation. W8JI agrees with that hypothesis.

73,
Gene
W4SZ