Re: Re Aluminum foil on the walls...

Christian Weisgerber (naddy@mips.rhein-neckar.de)
21 Sep 1999 01:11:53 +0200

<ronkean@juno.com> wrote:

> > So why does my mobile phone (GSM ~900MHz) continue to work when
> > placed inside my microwave oven (2.4GHz presumably)?
>
> Check the signal strength meter on the cell phone when it is outside the
> oven. If it indicates a very strong signal, you may be so close to the
> cell site base that the attenuation of the signal by the oven box is not
> sufficient to stop the phone from working.

Hmm. Right. I didn't think about it that way yet. If the oven provides, say, 30dB attenuation, then this will render the escaping radiation at 600W operation uttlerly harmless. But 30dB should be easy to handle for a phone if it has reasonably good reception.

So much for Faraday cages. 

-- 
Christian "naddy" Weisgerber                  naddy@mips.rhein-neckar.de