Crane control radio interferes with licensed user

Radio Spectrum Management (RSM, the New Zealand government spectrum agency) has reminded industry of the need to obtain proper licences and permissions in order to avoid the possibility of harmful interference.

RSM cites a recent case of a crane’s telecontrol transmissions causing interference to another user, the latter of which had an exclusive licence to use that part of the spectrum. Both the licenced user and the crane operator experienced communications interference as a result.

In New Zealand, there are two categories of licence for radio control or communications involved with industrial equipment - General User Licences and assigned Radio Licences. The former does not attract a fee for use, but RSM cautions they are “not recommended for applications involving safety or critical functions as their use is not coordinated or protected from interference. Instances can occur where many users, including domestic users, can be in the same area using the same frequency bands at the same time.”

Assigned radio licences have channels (12.5 kHz channels in sections of the EEX (VHF) and FNX (UHF) bands) for crane control and bush winching applications. Theses licence are intended to reduce interference and do attract a fee.