On Mon, 27 Apr 2009 09:08:48 GMT, "Brian Gaff"
wrote:

Hi folks, just in the last two weeks I've had some resets of a freeview box,
and decided to listen around the bands to see if it was being caused by
some odd mains borne stuff. It seems it is.
The offending signal is easily detected 24 hours as a kind of arcing noise
every 30 seconds or so. My thoughts are maybe..
Charger trying to see if it needs to charge, plug in air freshener, or
something else. I've tried to locate it with a portable radio as the signal
on medium wave is horrendously loud even on a portable.
Results are inconclusive. Not being on the best of terms with the property
implicated here, I am trying to find some way to approach them and knowing
if there is some device like this might be one of the ways. I'm thinking
along the lines of it might be going to catch fire or similar.
I'd have thought if it is affecting me, its affecting them.

Brian

When you describe the sound, do you mean it is something you can hear
without using a radio? If so it should be easy enough to find.

If not, the medium wave radio can be used as a direction finder
(assuming it uses a ferrite rod antenna). Orient it until the
interference is at a minimum - the rod will then be pointing directly
at the source.

Sounds like the problem could be something like a thermostat, although
the size of the signal makes it sound like the load is inductive
rather than resistive. Whatever, it is quite likely that the problem
will go away soon because I am betting that switch is well on its way
to total failure.

d