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Glenn Ashmore Glenn Ashmore is offline
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First recorded activity by BoatBanter: Jul 2006
Posts: 329
Default Larry, this one's for you.

You are only off by a factor of about a million. The ultra low frequency
Cutter array transmits around 45 HERTZ but as long as a sub's antenna is
less than about 60' below the surface it can receive the signal. I wonder
what the bit rate is. I don't see how they can transmit more than 2 or 3
characters a second.

My neighbors accused me of trying to receive those signals when I hung up a
160 meter delta loop around the yard but it is only 529 feet around. 45 Hz
requires 22,000 feet. They really would get upset about that! :-)
--
Glenn Ashmore

I'm building a 45' cutter in strip/composite. Watch my progress (or lack
there of) at: http://www.rutuonline.com
Shameless Commercial Division: http://www.spade-anchor-us.com

"Roger Long" wrote in message
...
I don't normally get excited by antennas but motoring up to this array as
the turn around point of our trip gave me the feeling you get when you look
at one of the biggest and most impressive of anything. 26 1000 foot tall
towers all interconnected with the most fantastic web of wires and bed
spring like arrangements you can imagine. It transmits at 25 Mhz to tell
our nuke subs which cities to vaporize. If there is a war, presumably a
nuke will go off just above it within one or two milliseconds of the ones
that go off over Washington DC. Strange to think that this wild and remote
spot is Ground 0.1.

http://home.maine.rr.com/rlma/Cutler.jpg

We motored right up to the dock where the sign says, "Do not approach
within 300 feet." With typical government common sense, the type size is
such that the sign can't be read until you are within 100 feet. No signs
of security or any human presence except for a single van parked next to
the administration building. There is a building with about a dozen very
large diesel engine exhausts sticking out of the roof so I imagine this
sucker pumps out some real power.

There is something in the cruising guide about the transmissions from this
facility also being a prime means of measuring sunspot or solar activity
due to their effect on the ionosphere.

You can see the layout on Google Earth right at the end of our trip. They
don't bother to hide the towers on the chart, unlike the more impressive
structure that used to be in Prospect Harbor. In the curious blank spot
on the chart used to be a circle of towers about a mile in diameter and
nearly as tall as these. Around the top of the towers ran a flat coil of
huge diameter cable. The strands were maybe a foot in diameter and the
entire coil was wider than a highway. I don't know when this was
dismantled but I think it was still there when I went through in the mid
80's. No sign of the remains or tower foundations visible on Google Earth
that I can see.

--
Roger Long