Tag: Southampton Row

Nostalgic musings

Early days in London

In my recent post Electrosensitivity, I wrote about “spending a number of years studying for a Diploma in Electrical Engineering at Faraday House, Southampton Row, London and becoming a UK Radio Amateur at the age of 17 (G3PUK)“.

In reverse order, I shall start with becoming a UK Radio Amateur, now rather back in the mists of time!

After my father died in 1956 my mother subsequently remarried.  Her new husband was Richard Mills and he was very knowledgeable about radio matters; he was a technical author in the radio-communications industry.  It was Richard, my step-dad, who showed me how to make a crystal set and I started listening to the strange world of wireless radio.  It fascinated me and motivated me to save up my pennies and buy an ex-military radio receiver known as a R1155.

r1155

I had joined the Harrow Radio Society who, amazingly, are still active today, as their website demonstrates.

Under the fabulous tutelage of many of the older ‘hams’ I went on to sit my exams and on Valentine’s Day 1962 was awarded the Postmaster-General’s Amateur Radio Certificate.  I applied for a call-sign and was allocated G3PUK.  I was just 17 years old!

G3PUK0001

oooOOOooo

Now some memories of Faraday House.  I can do no better than refer you to an article that appeared on the Electrical Review website in the UK.  As the article was published over three years ago, I think republishing it on Learning from Dogs isn’t being too naughty.

faradayhouseplaque

Faraday House Association closes after 105 years

FRIDAY, 29 JANUARY 2010

It is with sadness we report the Faraday House Old Students Association (FHOSA) is to close after operating continuously over the last 105 years. It had been host to thousands of chartered electrical engineers. The Association membership is derived from old students of Faraday House.

In 1888 the revised Electric Lighting Act encouraged many local authorities to apply for Parliamentary Powers to establish generating stations to transmit power. Faraday House was founded to train engineers in this new practice. The college started life as the Electrical Standardising, Testing and Training Institution at Charing Cross but in June 1890 used the name Faraday House. It was located in the Charing Cross area, and fees were 100 guineas per annum. The first Faraday House Dinner was held in 1895 – it was free and some 170 attended. In 1905 the FHOSA was formed and 100 old students joined. A move was then made to Southampton Row. By now the college had 110 students.

In 1909 Dr Russell was appointed principal, and pioneered the sandwich course. This meant students had a year or so of theory and then experienced work in industry, returning again to more theory. By 1914 many old students joined up and a crash course was started to aid the war effort. By 1919 some 350 had been in the services and 34 had died. In 1920 the fees had risen to 300 guineas.

By 1928 1000 students had joined the Old Students Association and in 1929 a 40th anniversary dinner was held. In 1939 a discussion with the governors resulted in a decision to evacuate the college to Thurlestone in Devon. A new principal, Dr WRC Coode-Adams, took over from Dr Russell. Faraday House took over the Links Hotel. Staff and students who were married lived in the hotel or in houses that had been taken over by the college.

In 1942 the college returned to Southampton Row. After the war Faraday House had difficulty in recruiting, students were lured to other colleges and universities by grants. In 1957 Mr GH Randolph Martin was appointed Principal. He had been a lecturer at the college since 1948. The college closed its doors in 1967 as losses were now running at £20,000 per year.

During its lifetime Faraday House produced a succession of engineers who attained the most senior positions in industry and electrical supply in many countries, and six old students have been president of the Institution of Electrical Engineers (now the IET).

The Old Students Association has a membership that is steadily growing older and shrinking as members die. The closure was inevitable without younger people coming forward to run it. The FHOSA will shut its doors finally after the Annual General Meeting in March 2010.

Here’s the front of the building.

Faraday House, London
Faraday House, London

How the years have flown by!

Electrosensitivity (EHS)

Musings on the subject of radio frequency energy.

Faraday House, London
Faraday House, London

Let me first be completely open about this.  Despite spending a number of years studying for a Diploma in Electrical Engineering at Faraday House, Southampton Row, London and becoming a UK Radio Amateur at the age of 17 (G3PUK), my memory of this subject has become less focused!  Bit like my eyesight!  (I’ll wallow in this nostalgia for Saturday’s post!)

There’s a wealth of information available if you do a web search on the subject of ‘radio frequency spectrum‘ including diagrams such as this one.

Radio Spectrum in demand

In fact, if you use the image above with this one below, you will get a quick idea of the range of frequencies and how almost every aspect of modern life is connected to ‘RF’.  (NB: I find the one below a little out of focus but hope it’s legible.)

rf spectrum

If you look at the frequency band 300 MHz to 3GHz, known as the Ultra-High Frequency or UHB band you will see that it is used by devices including mobile or cell phones as well as wireless phones and the newer DECT phones; these latest phones operating at 900 MHz.

Now I don’t understand the physics of Radio Frequency (RF) transmissions but I do know that the higher the frequency, the more energy is carried.  Living cells are not happy in the presence of RF particularly at those higher frequencies.  Just go back to that top diagram and think about being zapped by X-Rays, Gamma Rays or Cosmic Rays!  Here’s an extract from a Wikipedia article on Radiation burn.

The most common type of radiation burn is a sunburn caused by UV radiation. High exposure to X-rays during diagnostic medical imaging or radiotherapy can also result in radiation burns. As the ionizing radiation interacts with cells within the body—damaging them—the body responds to this damage, typically resulting in erythema—that is, redness around the damaged area. Radiation burns are often associated with radiation-induced cancer due to the ability of ionizing radiation to interact with and damage DNA, occasionally inducing a cell to become cancerous. Cavity magnetrons can be improperly used to create surface and internal burning. Depending on the photon energy, gamma radiation can cause very deep gamma burns, with 60Co internal burns are common. Beta burns tend to be shallow as beta particles are not able to penetrate deep into the person; these burns can be similar to sunburn.

Radiation burns can also occur with high power radio transmitters at any frequency where the body absorbs radio frequency energy and converts it to heat.[1] The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) considers 50 watts to be the lowest power above which radio stations must evaluate emission safety. Frequencies considered especially dangerous occur where the human body can become resonant, at 35 MHz, 70 MHz, 80-100 MHz, 400 MHz, and 1 GHz.[2] Exposure to microwaves of too high intensity can cause microwave burns.

We marvel at the efficiency of microwave ovens but possibly don’t connect those with holding a cell phone or cordless phone next to the head!  If you didn’t watch yesterday’s film Beings of Frequency then I really do recommend that you put some time to one side and watch it.

Like so many aspects of modern life, once one has been made aware of something one finds a mountain of information.  So it is with Electromagnetic hypersensitivity.

Again, Wikipedia.

Idiopathic environmental intolerance attributed to electromagnetic fields (IEI-EMF) is a descriptive term for symptoms purportedly caused by exposure to electromagnetic fields.[1] Other terms for IEI-EMF include electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS), electrohypersensitivity, electro-sensitivity, and electrical sensitivity (ES).

Although the thermal effects of electromagnetic fields on the body are established, self-described sufferers of electromagnetic hypersensitivity report responding to non-ionizing electromagnetic fields (or electromagnetic radiation) at intensities well below the limits permitted by international radiation safety standards. The majority of provocation trials to date have found that self-described sufferers of electromagnetic hypersensitivity are unable to distinguish between exposure to real and fake electromagnetic fields,[2][3] and it is not recognized as a medical condition by the medical or scientific communities.

The reported symptoms of EHS include headache, fatigue, stress, sleep disturbances, skin symptoms like prickling, burning sensations and rashes, pain and ache in muscles and many other health problems. Whatever their cause, EHS symptoms are a real and sometimes a disabling problem for the affected persons.

Later on that WikiPedia reference states:

A 2001 survey found that people related their symptoms most frequently to mobile phone base stations (74%), followed by mobile phones (36%), cordless phones (29%) and power lines (27%). The survey was not designed to find any causal connection between electromagnetic field exposure and ill health.[5]

A report from the UK Health Protection Agency said that self-described “electrical sensitivity” sufferers have symptoms that can be grouped into two broad categories: facial skin symptoms and more general, non-specific symptoms across a range of body systems. The facial skin symptoms and their attribution to visual display units was mostly a Nordic phenomenon. The report pointed out that it did not “imply the acceptance of a causal relationship between symptoms and attributed exposure”.[6]

Recently a smaller group of people in Europe as a whole and in the USA have reported general and severe symptoms such as headache, fatigue, tinnitus, dizziness, memory deficits, irregular heart beat, and whole-body skin symptoms.[7] A 2005 Health Protection Agency report noted the overlap in many sufferers with other syndromes known as symptom-based conditions, FSS (Functional Somatic Syndromes) and IEI (Idiopathic Environmental Intolerance).[6] Levitt proposed ties between electromagnetic fields and some of these 20th-century maladies, including Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Gulf War Syndrome, and Autism.[8]

Anyone find what was described in that last paragraph touch a sore point! Go here to read the full item and the numbered references.

There’s a host of other websites on the subject.  Just picking one more or less at random reveals this:

Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity (EHS) is a “growing worldwide health concern” according to a December 2005 press release issued by the World Health Organization. EHS can be difficult to understand and even more difficult to diagnose. Many doctors and other health professionals here in North America are not yet aware of the recent scientific evidence surrounding electromagnetic energy (EMF) and its effects on human health.

Symptoms of Electrical Hypersensitivity may include skin rash, sleep disorders, muscle and joint pain (fibromyalgia), chronic fatigue, depression, headaches, dizziness, nausea, difficulty concentrating, memory loss, irritability, anxiety, weakness, muscle spasms, numbness, tingling, leg and foot pain, “flu-like” symptoms and fever.

So that’s enough for today.

Tomorrow, I will explore what we can do to lessen the effects of Electro-Magnetic Fields.