Well, here we are again at the end of another month - July (or as my father fooled me one time, when he said, "If MULY is Mulie, then what is July", and of course, I said Julie). But this month is proving to be a controversial one.

We are living in exciting times, and at the same time, we are living in scary times. Each new day, holds something different. If I manage to put my feet on the floor, then it’s got to be a good day.

I must have made some kind of impression with my last "Tech Notes". I have received numerous emails from all over the United States thanking me for putting a subject that has proven to be somewhat confusing to some, in to lay terms, making it easier to understand.

Since that subject went over so well, I think this one will make even more of an impression.

I mentioned that I would explain why adding the old proverbial "3 foot jumper" between the SWR bridge and the radio really accomplishes nothing. It all has something to do with something known as "reactance". We will get into this in more detail later.

First, I would like to stray from the subject at hand, and give you something to ponder about. I will title this subject as:

TRUTH OF MYTH

Question: What do cell phones, 0 to 600 hertz, satellite uplinks and downlinks, 09/11/08 and HAARP have in common?

The premise to this story could begin as far back as 1939. During the reign of Adolf Hitler, his soldiers, engineers and scientists all lived under one rule: "produce or die". Under those conditions, anyone would be surprised at what he or she could do.

During that time, Hitler’s scientists discovered that at certain audio frequency ranges, certain portions of the brain could be affected. This work has continued. I would like to quote an abstract written by Edward Tilton, President of Silent Sounds, Inc:

MIND CONTROL WITH SILENT SOUNDS

The mind-altering mechanism is based on a subliminal carrier technology: the Silent Sound Spread Spectrum (SSSS), sometimes called "S-quad" or "Squad". It was developed in US Patent # 5,159,703, "Silent Subliminal Presentation System", dated October 27, 1992. The abstract for the patent reads:

 

"A silent communications system in which nonaural carriers, in the very low or very high audio-frequency range or in the adjacent ultrasonic frequency spectrum are amplitude-or frequency-modulated with the desired intelligence and propagated acoustically or vibrationally, for inducement into the brain, typically through the use of loudspeakers, earphones, or piezoelectric trans-ducers. The modulated carriers may be transmitted directly in real time or may be conveniently recorded and stored on mechanical, magnetic, or optical media for delayed or repeated transmission to the listener."

According to literature by Silent Sounds, it is now possible, using supercomputers, to analyze human emotional EEG patterns and replicate them, then store these "emotion signature clusters" on another computer and - at will - "silently induce and change the emotional state in a human being".

Silent Sounds states that it is interested only in positive emotions, but the military is not so limited. That this is a U.S. Department of Defense project is obvious.

Mr. Tilton also stated this about S-quad in a letter dated December 13, 1996:

"All schematics, however, have been classified by the U.S. Government and we are not allowed to reveal the exact details… We make tapes and CDs for the German Government, even the former Soviet Union countries - All with the permission of the U.S. State Department, of course… The system was used throughout Operation Desert Storm (Iraq) quite successfully."

OK, are you with me so far? We all know it is possible for in some form, because we all have experienced it. Remember in the early 70’s, when the movie houses were putting subliminal messages in the movies at the theathers, causing us to want popcorn, drinks, etc.? Well, our technology since then has reached new proportions. At any given time, how many cell phones do you think are being used throughout the world? It’s got to be in the millions.

Hypothetically speaking, if one were to create such a thought, transmit using satellite uplink, then use satellite downlink to all the cell receiving antennas around the world, could they send such a message? Not to mention the piezoelectric transducers that are in cell phones have the ability to broadcast down into the 600 hz range.

Of course, as mentioned, this is all hypothetical - or is it?

Now then, what is this word, "reactance"? According to current teachings, reactance is the opposition to alternating current by storage in an electrical field (using a capacitor) or in a magnetic field (by an inductor), measured in ohms.

Its cousin, resistance, is similar. Resistance is the opposition to current by conversion into other forms of energy, such as heat - also measured in ohms. If we keep these two similar definitions in mind, then we can see why adding or subtracting lengths of coax give different readings on such devices as SWR meters.

The simplest way that I have always looked at it, is to look at the SWR meter as an ohmmeter (a device for reading resistance). If we hook an unknown value of impedance antenna to the output of the meter, and run a coax jumper from the input of the meter to the radio, and then we calibrate the meter to show us the forward and reflected values, then the meter is reading a ratio, or if you will, a value. This impedance (or value), can be changed in a number of ways. One of them is by adding or subtracting reactance.

As an example: Lets say that your SWR bridge gave a value of 60 ohms, and of that 60 ohms, two ohms of it is created by the jumper. If it is, say, a three-foot jumper, this would equate to .67 ohms per foot. If we change to a six-foot jumper, then we have 4.02 ohms. The original 60 ohms is still there. We haven’t changed it, we’ve just added to it. The jumper only accomplishes on thing, it causes the meter to change readings. A lot of technicians will disagree with this analogy, but in its simpliest form, this is what happens.

Another prevalent myth is that you can’t "get out" if the SWR on your transmission line is higher than 1.5:1, or 2:1 or some other such arbitrary figure. On the HF bands, if you use reasonable lengths of good coaxial cable (or even better yet, open-wire line), the truth is that you need not be overly concerned if the SWR at the load is kept below about 6:1.

This sounds pretty radical to some amateurs who have heard horror story after horror story about SWR. The fact is that if you can load up your transmitter without any arcing inside, or if you use a tuner to make sure your transmitter is operating into its rated load resistance, you can enjoy a very effective station, using antennas with feed linews having high values of SWR on them.