New CTT Power Filter reduces noise from various sources - free to SensorStation owners

Stations
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Hello SensorStation users!

Today we’re introducing a free upgrade to existing SensorStations in the form of CTT’s Power Filter. CTT’s new Power Filter dramatically improves radio tag detection by eliminating electrical noise interference.With thousands of Sensor Stations deployed across diverse environments, we’ve observed that some sites suffer from significantly more electrical noise than others. This noise can come from power lines, solar panels, or other electronic equipment, and it interferes with your station’s ability to detect radio tags.

The Problem: Long power cables (especially from solar panels) act like antennas, picking up electrical noise and feeding it directly into your sensor station. This noise drowns out the weak signals from radio tags, reducing detection range and reliability.

The Solution: Our power filter combines an RF choke and EMI filter to block this unwanted noise while allowing clean power to reach your station. Think of it as a noise barrier that stops interference at the source.

What You’ll Experience:

  • Detect weaker tags that were previously lost in the noise
  • More consistent performance regardless of your site’s electrical environment
  • Better range and reliability in both noisy and clean locations
  • Instant improvement - benefits are immediate upon installation

Easy Installation: Simply plug the filter between your power source (solar, battery, or AC adapter) and your sensor station. No special tools required, no configuration needed - just plug in and experience cleaner reception immediately.

Whether your site currently has noise issues or not, every station benefits from improved signal-to-noise ratios that lead to better tag detection performance.

If you currently have a SensorStation deployed, or are waiting to deploy a station you have on-hand - you can receive your free CTT Power Filter by filling out the form here: https://airtable.com/app20NXPv7qjXDfBN/pagrBcK1muqejz5os/form

For any stations waiting to be shipped, or any future orders, your station will either include a pre-installed filter, or the filter will be integrated into the new board run (V3.3 and later). In those cases there is no reason to request a filter. Only one filter per station is required.

The form is password protected to keep out spammers. The password is celltracktech2025

Here’s to many more detections in your future!

The CTT Team

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1 Like
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Hi David,

If I understand correctly, this filter prevents noise from entering the signal-bearing coax cables through the power cables that are also connected to the SS. Am I correct in assuming that the filter does not prevent radiative noise from being picked up by the coax cable’s out layer, entering the system that way?

The reason I ask this is that, for our setup, I believe that switched-mode power supplies are a source of radiative noise, being picked up by the coax cables rather than the power cables (or possibly both?). I think this is the case, because the noise levels seem to strongly vary when you fiddle about with the power supply (slightly altering its position and such).

I’m currently in the process of comparing the noise performance of switched-mode power supplies to linear power supplies, expecting the latter to have much better noise performance. They are more difficult to implement in station designs, though, so if this filter also blocks radiative noise from switched-mode power supplies, that would make station design a lot easier.

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Lynn is correct when it comes to switching versus lineal power supplies if there is EMI on the coax from the power supply , It can be reduced by adding ferrites on the coax and good grounding on the coax , If you added a polyphaser or lightning protection inline , That should be sufficient if you have clean, tight connection and used braided copper line to the grounding buss, I wouldn’t recommend adding chokes, inline filtering or any additional connections, This will cause attenuation and signal loss to the station!