cops are onto RFI-AM radio and elec. ballasts

I knew it was inevitable,
NOTE
the link below goes to a police website
the link is split but clicking on the top will take you to the site,
not the story
http://www.policeone.com/drug-interdiction-narcotics/articles

/8224280-How-cops-are-catching-grow-ops-with-AM-radios/

here some netherland growers that got busted.....
how they thought all that melted snow on the roof wasn't
a BIG giveaway

I just wanna click that link .....BUT CAN'T ...JUST CAN'T!!!

How cops are catching grow ops with AM radios
Many ham operators can locate a grow simply by taking a radio and portable antennae out into their neighborhood and using the radio to triangulate the exact location of the grow
Feb 4, 2015

With the proliferation of indoor marijuana grows, the indoor “horticulture” industry has been booming. Chinese manufacturers are turning out indoor grow equipment at a rapid pace with little to no regulatory oversight or compliance. Because of this, there has been a significant amount of radio frequency interference (RFI).

Before we get into how to detect a marijuana grow with your car radio, you have to understand some simple mechanics of how a grow operates. To grow marijuana indoors, you need supplemental lighting necessary for photosynthesis. These lights may be fluorescent, LED, and for larger operations, high pressure sodium (HPS) or metal halide (MH).

The HPS and MH lamps may be 1000W per lamp and require a ballast for proper operation. These ballasts were originally magnetic but in the past few years have become electronic. These devices are subject to FCC part 18 rules but there appears to be a total disregard for the FCC rules. Many (if not most) electronic ballasts are manufactured in China and may have little ‘FCC’ stickers on them but there is no evidence of any testing for compliance having been done. Because of this, a large amount of RFI is interfering with nearby electronics. As an example, one grow next to a CalFire station — California’s state fire agency — caused a continuous hum over the station’s callbox speaker and interfered with them receiving radio broadcasts over their station’s PA.

Ham Radio Helpers
Reports have begun to flood into the National Association for Amateur Radio about interference with their ham radios from their neighbor’s marijuana grows. The most complaints come from California and Colorado, for obvious reasons. Many ham radio operators began to see a correlation with marijuana grows and this RFI.

One amateur radio operator located five marijuana grows near his house due to RFI alone! Many ham operators can locate a grow simply by taking a radio and portable antennae out into their neighborhood and using the radio to triangulate the exact location of the grow.

One industrious ham operator went to his local grow shop and borrowed several lights and ballasts to test for RFI. He found that one light and ballast set up would cause interference up to 700 meters. From our experience, we know that most indoor grows have more than one light and ballast, which would amplify the RFI.

Pioneering Field Use
One narcotics officer from the San Francisco Bay Area turns his car radio to 560 AM when he checks out potential indoor grows. He’s checked out seven indoor marijuana grows since learning about the RFI issue. All seven times, the car’s radio showed significant interference from the ballasts inside of the grow location.

One ham radio operator described the interference this way: “It can be pops, it can be a buzzing sound, whistles — just all kinds of different noises that we'll hear.”

Tom Thompson, a ham radio operator, told a Colorado newspaper, “If I can track this down, anybody can track this down. If I listen long enough, I can tell when they turn the lights off... You can tell exactly when the harvest is.”

This method of finding marijuana grows isn’t fool proof, but it can be another useful tool in your toolbox.

Alarmist Crap...so thank you JDole, even in many remote places of the world operating within legal RF limits is a must, I know of only one emitter in 10 years of HID grows, if in doubt have it checked out or just wrap the bulb lead in cooking foil strips for that cloaking look!

ps ... can;'t be sure but this may well be an very old news release?

I had quite a bit of RFI coming out of lumitek 600& 600doubleEnded ballasts from 08

When I doubbled power n switched to the nanotek 1000's my. RFI went away n I could watch antenna tv in my basement again during lights on hrs.

Always figured my neighbor wd come by n complain abt wifi interference or som shit but it never happened n I forgot to ask him if he ever noticed.. Bc I def did!.. Lol

Ps. This is practicaly a how to guide for rippers and the asshats playing cops and robbers.

There is still more safty in med/legal states but there are greedy people everyware!
So this is something we should b aware of n actively try to eliminate jst to protect ourselves and our efforts!

The manufactures need to be told that we don't want this problem bringing anyone w access to a radioshack brought right to our doorstep!

Can't help but say I think it is important to and understand the Who and What the author is : Do click on the link. It is disgusting.
Keith Graves has been a Police Officer in the San Francisco Bay Area since 1990 and is currently a sergeant assigned to patrol. Keith is a Drug Recognition Expert Instructor (IACP #3292) and teaches both the DRE course and the CNOA Drug Abuse Recognition Course. Keith has also taught at the Basic Police Academy and has developed a number of POST certified drug courses. Keith has held assignments as a Narcotics/Vice Detective, COPPS Officer, Traffic Officer, Training Sergeant, Patrol Sergeant and SWAT Team Leader. Keith has taught thousands of officers and businesses about drug use, drug trends, compliance training and drug investigations. Graves & Associates provides training and consulting services to law enforcement, probation, parole, corrections as well as corporate partners.

Contact Keith Graves.
This guy is a consultant advertizing for business .
There is a picture of him also. Looks like the face of junior fascism to me.
Has a very corporate website : http://www.gravesassociates.com/
I find it interesting he out of San Francisco .

mags rule,inmates drool

I think that the compassionate use act is a positive thing and it is good. I think this cop and his corporation are the opposite.

stoned-trout said:

mags rule,inmates drool

Click to expand...

Dont know if you know who Joe Walsh is and his last album??
( just joking---for those who dont.. forget it)

" Im an ANALOG MAN in a digital world."

Could RE-lyric that whole song to Mag Ballasts... but wont!!!

This is why you don't buy garbage equipment.

Damn near every electronic ballast (even higher end units) I've ever played with emits interference to some degree or another.

The problem typically is a result of wiring mess within the house. Bad grounds, unterminated coax cables, etc.


That said, if this keeps up I might be going back to mags myself. Just to sleep better at night. I know of a few people recently who've gotten knocks in the city from the cable company complaining of some interference originating from their house.

One guy switched to mags after having a panic attack. Other guy went an flipped off his new "salt water fishtank light" and they said that did it.


Haven't heard of any busts as a result, but cable co are definitely out an about trying to resolve customer complaints.

sgbfcoop said:

This is why you don't buy garbage equipment.

Click to expand...

i bought a solis tek to make sure no prob due to being in fla and it had the cable co in my neighborhood all day and they pinned my place as the source so i shut down my grow while they were outside and their meters immediately cleared up. they wanted in to try and find the source so im glad the shut down worked.

i thought about diy shielding but went to mag's to be sure.

here is a link to info about interference w/test's on diff. balasts and also how to reduce the interference.

http://www.w0qe.com/RF_Interference/grow_light_electronic_ballasts.html


peace

nukklehead said:

Dont know if you know who Joe Walsh is and his last album??
( just joking---for those who dont.. forget it)

" Im an ANALOG MAN in a digital world."

Could RE-lyric that whole song to Mag Ballasts... but wont!!!

Click to expand...

anyone that don't know joe should be shot....of course I know the album too..technically cd tho nowadays

Morcheeba* said:

i bought a solis tek to make sure no prob due to being in fla and it had the cable co in my neighborhood all day and they pinned my place as the source so i shut down my grow while they were outside and their meters immediately cleared up. they wanted in to try and find the source so im glad the shut down worked.

i thought about diy shielding but went to mag's to be sure.

here is a link to info about interference w/test's on diff. balasts and also how to reduce the interference.

http://www.w0qe.com/RF_Interference/grow_light_electronic_ballasts.html


peace

Click to expand...

vostok said:

View Image
Excellent Link Morch!​

Click to expand...

Those chokes might attenuate some of the RFI from the ballasts cords but digital ballasts tend to turn the buildings wiring into an antenna

Might explain why these guys keep hearing Mozart on certain discreet channels of their radios, as I play classics on my mp3 player in my grow room ....lol

i put my radio to 560 am and i went around my house trying to find interference. when i put the antenna within 1 inch of these different items i can get interference.

light switch for my wall
old magnetic ballast
new digital shielded ballast
power supply for computer
lcd tv
regular cfl bulb
wifi antenna

i doubt you could find most grows with these means. and even if something is giving off a lot of interference doesn't mean anything. most every electronic device you own is designed to ACCEPT any outside interference and NOT CAUSE it. read that fcc label on the plug or the bottom or the back of all the shit in your house that receives or sends a signal. modem, router, tv, radio, lamps, etc. lossy signals just points to bad manufacturing/wiring. america is fulla "cheap chinese junk" who knew RFI would be emits?

if you have a lot of ballasts and they're powerful enough combined to cause a disturbance that extends 700 meters. you might wanna try putting some chicken wire on your walls. for everyone else i really wouldn't worry that much about it. loose lips are gonna sink your ship faster than that.

fwiw putting the radio near my wifi card makes the beep boop modem/fax machine noise from your childhood. if you're old enough to know what modems is.

In 09/10 I ran 4 240v Lumatek 1000w units in a basement of a home on a few acres. I once dialed my truck into a clear AM radio station and waited for my lights to kick on. Sure enough the station went damn near full static. This was at the back of the driveway.. a good distance from the grow in the front basement of the house. Stations would also go static briefly when driving by the house during lights on.

I never attempted to pinpoint it to a specific ballast, but about a year in I am watching my driveway on a remote IP camera app on my phone. Cable company pulls in, knocks on the door for what feels like forever and then eventually walk around to the side of the house. I lose connection and ultimately come home to find the cable has been snipped from the house.

I called the cable company the next day and they claimed to have no record or have no idea why I was cut off (bill current and no payment issues). They reschedule to have me hooked back up and I continued to grow for another year without issue before leaving.


The wiring in this house was a complete mess. Lots of cut cable wires and old splicers everywhere. I would have stayed in it for longer, but water would literally pour through the breaker box down all of the breakers during a thunderstorm. Lost 120v to one leg due to corrosion (came home to a house of half power and no lights or odor control running)... flipped the main back and forth a dozen times and finished out the grow. Moved immediately after that.


I still run these same Lumateks to this day, but a bit more rurally. In the recent year or so I've noticed an increase in the amount of people having trouble with the cable companies searching for interference.

I've heard that the FCC is crawling up the asses of these ballast manufacturers recently. I expect regulation (and increased prices of ballasts) around the corner. Apparently the HAM radio guys and the National Association of Radio Operators (or some shit like that) has documented and exposed the whole digital ballast thing. I saw a report where they purchased a 1K Lumatek from Sears online and ran it through all of their tests and rigors.. failed completely across the board.

my pop was a radio guy. ham, cb, shortwave. i remember him having a big linear amplifier hooked up to the cb radio in the basement. he only turned it on sporadically. would spew over the tv set, lol.