This morning I was listening to one of my beautiful old sets and of cause the wife was up making herself beautiful for work. Our bedroom has led lights which causes heaps of noise but I went to another room and switched the lights on and the noise disappeared. Go figure why?

You may well have changed the power factor?

I would agree & have taken a couple of brand new LED spotlights back to point of sale for having RFI worse than the NBN Box.

This RFI is a product of having regulating authorities that only exist in name.

What may be effective, if its coming in via the mains, is to have line caps of 0.01mfd (or less not more) from Neutral to Earth & Active to Earth. Then a line cap of 0.1mfd across neutral & active.

I use that because of the RF floating on the mains here. I also use MOV's due to the lightning & surges. One N to A another A to E. It is interesting to note that while I have been using MOV's since they turned up & added the A to E one for RCD's. I now see many commercial surge boards using that MOV A to E idea. If built in a box, it should not support combustion.

Just a warning on those power boards: I have Tag & Test due to what I do. I have seen several power boards rated at 10A melt at 8A or have switches that burn. That comes back to regulation & how this rubbish gets into the country & gets sold?

I don't understand how those Chinese power boards are allowed into the country.
Often from new they are mechanically faulty.
When you plug a device into them you can feel the plug not engaging properly with the socket and readily falls out if moved.
In my line of work we call them "Show Stoppers" for good reason.

I don't understand how those Chinese power boards are allowed into the country.

Compliance testing has long been in the hands of the manufacturer, hence compliance testing is now a joke. The "authorities" only act after a serious incident, such as a fatality (e.g. USB type chargers). It's the consequence of all such manufacturing being done offshore by thousands of unregulated factories.

As for RFI reporting, take a look at the labyrinthine process that ACMA has put in place to ensure that nobody bothers them with it.

"What may be effective, if its coming in via the mains, is to have line caps of 0.01mfd (or less not more) from Neutral to Earth & Active to Earth. Then a line cap of 0.1mfd across neutral & active. "

Should this be applied to the source of the interference (if known), the sufferer from it, or both.

Yes, back 10 years ago the "overseas" suppliers used to ask what markings do we want on various product to meet various standards?
If we asked for a "c" tick for emissions testing they would put a ctick mark on the product, no problem.
Or any other standards mark for that matter...……………….
Then if you asked for say the the Emissions testing documentation you would get 6 months of run around with no result.
You would have to try and work through all the traders masquerading as manufactuers until you got near the actual manufactuers and then visit them and ask to see the testing lab faciltiys. If they had such facilitys you would use them as a supplier.
Of course they were always dearer then the cowboys so if you bought properly vetted and tested product and try and sell those , you go out of business.
That's why there are so many shonky items available from the net much cheaper than you can buy from decent retailers and trading houses, most of which have gone out of business!! And dumb people still buy rubbish from internet traders and cheap stall holders.
Hence plug in adapters that catch on fire etc ect. We are so stupid in this country and buy such rubbish and then complain about fires and interference and so on. We have mugs and children in government that have no technical knowledge at all and then look horrified when something goes wrong. We used to have testing authorities and Standards in this country, now we have anarchy.
Fred.

We are so stupid in this country and buy such rubbish and then complain about fires and interference and so on

Oz is not alone in that. Most of the world is now beholden to imports from "developing" countries.

Very little is tested now. All someone has to do is provide a page that says, "this device meets the requirements of ASxxxx, C-Tick, A-Tick, etc" and put their signature in black ink on the bottom of the page.

Go and buy a pedestal fan for next summer, take it out of the box and assemble it. Then get Junior to knock it over and whilst it falls, watch it fall to pieces, including the cowling over the motor. Needless to say, the fan is no longer fit to apply power to.

Many electrical items that are made in China do not meet ANY standards. They are, quite frankly, s---, and should never be permitted here.

All of Australia's standards bodies are just letting these rogues trash their brands and standards logos should not be used this way. It is a fraud.

So if I was to use the line caps everytime I do a restoration then the radio would be less prone to interference.

So if I was to use the line caps everytime I do a restoration then the radio would be less prone to interference.

It depends on each radio's inherent/actual sensitivity as well as how dirty your mains are. If a radio is very sensitive, and/or poorly designed, it will pick up RFI via its front end regardless of any line filtering. And if the mains-based RFI itself is strong enough, it will affect all receivers in the vicinity. I have experienced that in my own workshop when what turned out to be poorly earthed CO sensor cables attached to a VFO on a supply fan caused enormous amount of hash on the power lines throughout the complex, effectively turning them into transmitter antennas for the switch mode power supply controlling the fan. Line filters would have zero effect there because the level of EMR trumped everything.

In my experience, line caps are usually placed in test equipment in order to keep random signals on the mains from affecting the required output or affecting the measurements. Personally, I haven't come across a valve radio that was particularly prone to 'normal' line noise, but that's in my neck of the woods.

Make sure that properly rated X-class or Y-class capacitors are used for such purposes.

Apologies to Tallar Carl, I sort of hi-jacked the thread and ranted from the hip!
I'll try and not do that.
Fred.

I have actually put these permanently on some lines & built the caps into susceptible radio's where it solves the problem. In a couple where I did not like the look of the transformer I have put an MOV across the primary in case a spike or surge hits it.

With the RF & spikes (believe I found the cause of the bulk of them) There is a modified & repaired commercial noise suppressor box, feeding the TV (metal) it actually has inductors. The MOV's & caps are placed before the inductor, as it will act as a delay line, giving the MOV more time to sink the spike. The TV one has tripped the RCD & CB's a couple of times: So far so good with the TV.

Marc

It's ok Fred it's all education to me.

Replacing our houses leds with philips units worked for me..so far so good anyway...cant remember the brand that was there...government freebies when they were out door knocking swapping them out via various companies.....did it about a year & a half ago now, not a cheap exercise,hopefully they last long enough to return the cost.
Can't however suppress the RFI from my desk mount led magnified work lamp from jaycar..love the light!! just can't use a valve radio within cooee...literally!! the only thing that works is to move the radio as far away as possible form the lamp, quite unsatisfactory for a supposed laboratory quality light!
Will have to consider changing to a quality fluro type work light if they still exist..:/

Will have to consider changing to a quality fluro type work light if they still exist

Harder and harder to find, especially the magnifying type. I have one, but I think finding a replacement tube will be difficult. LEDs everywhere.