Lets talk about RFI

What about the rest of the frequencies? This is where your light knowledge goes a long way.

I guess way I’m trying to say, and this is just how i feel, more than likely you will never get caught if your careful but I think it would be foolish to think that test equipment capable of finding grow ops doesn’t exist.
When you live where its illegal is best not to never get complacent

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Gimme a second, I’ll grab graph from my cobs

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Follow the purple line, 3000k 90 cri. They are somewhat different from one company to another, but fairly close. This is a very popular home decor spectrum because of crisp color representation. They’re not the ones you buy dirt cheap at menaced, but I’m sure they stock similar bulbs.

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So then wattage and light intensity would play a big role correct? If the lights are emitting the same frequencies then it would come down to a grow light emitting larger levels of that frequency?

My spectrum analyzer will read the the intensity in DB

Good convo :ok_hand: but it’s late ill check back in the morning

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Possibly and probably. I don’t really know all the test components that well. My use of them is limited to checking for interference when there is reason to investigate for such issue.

I would imagine that there are several ways one looking for grows could find them. Which would probably leave the scope of rfi pretty quickly. I’m sure more people are caught from power consumption and heat tracking than rfi.

My involvement was limited to checking how much impact my lights could have on my neighbors, and it’s not going to be an issue. Running, my place didn’t appear any different than the rest of the houses on our block. You could see a brief increase when they fired. But definitely not sticking out like sore thumb. That being said, all of my drivers are listed as being emc complian. Whether the discount drivers are or aren’t, I’m not sure.

I know when I bought my first and only digital 400, you couldn’t talk on cordless phone with lights on. I think that’s what you need to avoid. About the 2nd time your neighbor calls phone company complaining, you’re about to be caught. I don’t have any issues like that, so I’m not sweating it.

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I would agree with this 100%, electrical is something that is tracking us whether we like it or not.

I have no doubt if I had the right equipment in front of me that I could find a grow op.
Thing is, no one would ever need some of this equipment.
You would have to be interfering with someone’s equipment who is licensed by the federal government to operate in that frequency and I dont know of any major equipment broadcasting over light wavelengths.

The only reason I can put together why the police would show up to your house with this equipment is from what you mentioned above, setting off red flags with your electrical bill.

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This is exactly why I only use old school magnetic ballasts… :wink:
Even in a legal state… why would you only limit your misfortune to being busted…? There are also people out there that will rob you just as well as a nosey neighbor with nothing better to do… that doesn’t understand the weird electrical issues they have only at certain times… :wink:
Also if your house isn’t grounded properly , you should be really concerned about this… :wink:

:v: :sunglasses:

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Ok so can I take something like a old computer tower, gut it all but fans wrap in tin foil and cover ballast. Will it still emit enough to get a fella pinched?
Or I’m I beyond stupid
Signed… worried honky

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@peachfuzz that’s a good point!

@Nug-bug I haven’t really looked into trying to disguise it any, but I’m sure there are things you can do. There are some obvious things like making sure everything has proper grounds and such, but I’m willing to bet there are some pretty technical solutions as well.

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Copper mesh of some type is what @stratos934 is saying. I’ve been on broadcast towers that have antennas pumping out 100,000 watts and we have to wear RF suits for protection.
I need to look into what these suits are made of but i never have lol, might be next thing I do when I have down time at work :slightly_smiling_face:

I personally believe you have no reason to be worried @Nug-bug. I promise you no police department in the country has the equipment that i use. HAM radio I’m not so familiar with though.

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This is some of the equipment I carry (sorry, my company name is across the top, had to cover that up). This one in particular does not have the spectrum analyzer integrated in, if it did, all I would need is a small antenna designed for it. I can find any interference within a designated spectrum.

Devices like this are pricey. I don’t really look at police departments as more than a business anyways. They don’t want to buy things like these and wind up losing their money. They would rather wait till they get info via word of mouth from a tattle tail or your local electric company, but even an electric bill would need to be really stand out imo, like that 60,000 dollar one in cali, wow!!!

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Thanks for the info and reassurance

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Sorry bout all the questions @dbrn32 but your level of knowledge about many topics on here is most intriguing to me. It’s more a level of respect than anything. :pray: I’ve been reading more and more of your essays on lights, I guess you could say I’m just trying to dig a little deeper in your brain :wink:

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@TDubWilly As someone who spent a few years in the RF detection business for the government, I can tell you that I would guess that there are zero law enforcement people around me that could even turn on a spectrum analyzer. All of you guys make valid points. I think in most places, you need to be more worried about smell and too high electricity usage. I could understand if a ballast is interfering with the neighbors RF phone handset and they call the phone company and they knock on your door by themselves or with the police.
@stratos934
@M4ur
@dbrn32

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Wow that’s cool, I’ve actually had to deal with the FBI in interference issues before. The agent was cool, bragged about his gun that he would never use lol. This was wifi operating over cellular frequencies though.

And I’m with you, even if they could figure out how to turn it on they could never read it. :joy:

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Light is not going to be detected with an antenna. What they are detecting is the switching frequency in the digital ballast or the LED grow light. Those can run up into the megahertz range these days, because the higher frequency they run, the smaller the inductors and capacitors they can use. And size == cost.

You can use magnetic ballasts for HID, but the arc will still be a bit noisy. Most of the energy would be at 60 Hz though, and nobody is going to bust you for that. Almost everything you plug in emits at 60 Hz.

You can use passive (non-switcher) drivers for LEDs. I have one. The key to efficiency is to run so many LEDs or COBs that your power supply voltage is just over the forward voltage you need. Then you current regulate with a passive voltage drop element (like a resistor or transistor) to give you the current the LEDs need. Zero RFI generated.

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Even the biblical technology that sent man to the moon in the 60s can find your grow op and light with an antenna and a spectrum analyzer.

Light is frequency, it’s that simple. There’s even an equation for it:

Frequency of light = speed of light/ the wavelength of that particular light.

Like @OldSkunk said, chances are slim to none that police will ever show up to your house with this equipment. But it would be foolish to think these tools don’t exist, they do and have been around for a long time.
Spectrum analyzers are what astronomers look for signals from space with. With a spectrum analyzer dialed in to your lights frequency, you can’t hide, this i promise

Scientists use this stuff though, not PD

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The equipment does not exist outside of a few labs. Look up “Optical rectenna” on wikipedia. Visible light frequency is in the hundreds of terahertz. Nobody makes a commercial spectrum analyzer that goes that high, and beside the antenna would have to be some fraction of one wavelength: That’s still a nanotechnology project, and even if you could make such an antenna, it would put out a tiny signal. The few times they have demonstrated this effect in labs they used a very powerful laser as the light source.

Radio-astronomers look for microwaves, much longer wavelength than visible light. Those big radio-astronomy antennas can’t pick up visible light, which is why astronomers build MUCH more expensive optical telescopes.

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I found this simple one in Amazon that reads in half the frequencies that led manufactures claim their visible light operates in

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01GUF2CZE/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_6HGpAbZ5V04HF

That was the first one I searched, I can find more of youd like, something that will get all the led frequencies in there

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These antenna have zero transmit ability or (Tx), they only receive (Rx) when hooked up to a spectrum analyzer.
Furthermore signal is created by radio transmit power, not the antenna. The antenna will determine nothing more than wavelength, that’s it.

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