Oh well... glad they found the issue. The interesting thing here in Korea (and I imagine Americans also have this issue) is that BMW has chosen to occupy an HT frequency for their auto-parking feature, or some such. So anyone can walk by with an HT, key it on the right frequency, and the car will move. No kidding. It's all the talk in the ham community here. Not if it is in the USA, or not.
Yup. 7-series BMW's. 433.920. Here is the story. The key fobs transmit like 10mw. Please forgive Google translate: http://m.gokorea.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=5292 Amateur radio frequency remote control frequency overlap and increase the possibility of a malfunction BMW has revealed the first line remote parking system in Germany, it succeeded in other European countries, subsequently commercialized in the United States. In Korea, however, the frequency of occurrence of the BMW Parking remote overlap the frequencies of amateur radio. The use of RCP mounted on the BMW 7 Series frequency is contained in 433.920MHz, UHF amateur radio frequency band (430 ~ 440MHz). If you are an amateur museonsa to communicate on the same frequency, whether it has emerged as a crucial challenge in the domestic market that BMW is likely to be the remote control to malfunction. Dangdam division of Future Creation Science is to determine whether the risk of interference between frequency and control keys of the BMW national amateur radio frequencies for amateur radio federation Korea (KARL) has come consent. In BMW Korea has conducted several side meetings with Amateur Radio League side. He KARL side and BMW was also attended as well as representatives of research institutes (National Institute of propagation, Korea Radio Promotion Association) specified in the Create the Future Science. In addition, one of the last 10 people attended, including Chairman Hung - Soo KARL in Incheon Yeongjongdo conducted a variety of experiments. Through Amateur Radio League side because BMW uses a fine spread of less than 10mW, also makes a conclusion that we want to use the same band, and BMW signed a Memorandum of Understanding. So far two days was held in ilsacheonri. But the fact MOU Amateur Radio League members became known that arose holding. KARL homepage, every day is filled with global condemning the Union. Injeuk story, the frequency of remote control mounted on the BMW 7 Series aneulji affect amateur radio do not know, it is that the domestic amateur museonsa could lead to a major accident with the BMW 7 Series is malfunctioning when communicating on the same frequency. According to the amateur radio transmission output of the RCP purchased mounted on the BMW 7 Series is 10mW (0.01W) and the transmission output of amateur radio is 50W. That is the transmission power of amateur radio is 5000 times more resistant.  capture video posted on the Korea Amateur Radio League Maybe patience with the museonsa, BMW Memorandum of withdrawal Which amateur museonsa (hl1kkc om) Having lived is actually sent tuned to the frequency of the radio 144.640Mhz, it conducted a more experimental sounds of their voices in the BMW on the remote control (RCP). He is content to take a test video was posted on the Federation website. If you are an amateur museonsa communications in the amateur radio frequency 144.640MHz frequency is 3 chaebae showed that affects the lives 433.920 MHz wireless. 144.640 MHz is called the Korea Amateur museonsa are the most commonly used frequency of 2m band (144 ~ 146 MHz) to. The movie is coming up, members are required to disclose the information, proceed neither known to the members during its first he said that to keep the life and property of the people and to withdraw from the agreement with BMW side. Members of the prophet poured accusations, Chairman Hung - Soo KARL posted on the website article that describes the MOU process inspector days past. President Kim has further aggravated the rage and members of the public who requests it receives figured that promises to serve three years in the advertising bimonthly newsletter of the Federation in the course of an agreement with BMW wind. Gimsonghyeon reporters ksh@gokorea.kr <Copyright © 2004-2012 sympathetic newspapers unauthorized copying and redistribution>
Um... why? It's established that this device is affecting services around it to a degree that causes financial damage and possibly even bodily harm if an emergency were to occur in the vincinity. Why was it not removed right then and there? How can the shop owner "switch it off if problems arise"? By the time he gets to hear about problems, it's likely too late!
Point made on both sides of this.. when asked we render services as amateur radio operators and use our skill sets as needed. Was it within our obligations - no it wasn't until we were asked. 73
I believe it wasn't just "key fobs" those devices used to unlock the doors. The article specifically said that some people had to have their cars towed a block away due to their smart keys not working. As more and more cars now have smart keys there's no way to unlock the doors, pop the trunk/hatch, or start it. There may be a valet feature (key) that will unlock the driver door only on some cars but you're still SOL on driving it with a dead smart key. If you can't open the doors with a button push it's just a minor inconvenience. If the entire car is "dead" you have some real problems to deal with.
I also feel that it is something "fishy" about this story, mainly for that the cellphone carriers appear to have been affected. All reasonably modern cellular systems contain built in performance monitoring that will detect broad-band or narrow-band interference in the up-link direction, and alarms will go off at the carrier's NOC. Cellphone operators are extremely watchful about EMI affecting their systems performance as it cost them a lot by losing traffic revenue if their systems capacity is degraded. They would have started an investigation on their own if the problems had persisted. From own experience in these matters, I would expect an "interference hunting team" from a cellular operator to track down the source in an hour or so. Regarding the use in Korea of the ISM frequency of 433.92 MHz for the BMW autopark system, it is quite unwise, as this ISM frequency range is not recognised outside ITU Region 1. However, the interference potential would be restricted to making the system temporarily inoperative from blocking the receiver, as actual remote control messages are heavily protected by robust RF waveforms paired with error-detecting and error-correcting coding. 73/ Karl-Arne SM0AOM
There is no evidence that mobile phone interference was reported to the FCC. Only the anecdotal mention in the article and reportedly only occurred "within a few feet". The FCC response at least what was published only indicated that key fob interference was reported to them. That's all they responded to. If cell phone interference had actually been reported to the FCC, they would have responded to that. They didn't apparently. Or else the story is leaving it out if they did. It's not even clear that the anecdotal cell phone interference was due to RFI. It could easy have been simple obstruction of the signal, which happens all the time. Solution is to step a few feet in any direction. It's dumb to stand where you can't get a cell signal and then complain that you can't get a cell signal. It's not even clear that a 433 MHz RFI source can even interfere with a cell phone, considering that cells phones work on 800 MHz and up. Mostly Up. And they're digital. This was a simple, routine, ordinary, every day occurrence of a few key fobs not working, that has gotten blown all out of proportion, in an inane attempt to make ham radio appear to be relevant and heroic.
That's a case of "RTFM". Know where the antenna is that picks up the key fob signal and just hold the key fob near it. Most people are clicking their key fobs ten or twenty feet away as they approach. If you can't figure out how to get into your car, call your dealer. If the key fob battery is weak or dead, that's not an RFI problem. I have an RF-rich environment where I work. Most places in the parking lot I use, I can lock/unlock the car from 20 or more feet away. But there's a certain group of parking spaces that I need to be right next to the car. At home, I can lock/unlock from more than 50 feet away and inside the house. Key fob interference is an everyday occurance. Although most people don't experience it and when they do they panic and don't think it through clearly. Key fobs are just magic to them. They don't realize that there's radio involved and therefore a distance issue. As for towing "a block away". That has todo with the towing, not with RFI. I doubt if a towing company would tow a car less than that in any case, especially if there's nowhere else within a block to park it. It's not likely that they had a tow truck show up and have it tow the car 3 feet at a time until the key started working again. It also may have been just one car and the "s" added for dramatic effect.
Watch out Ron-- Theyll discover you are a PhD and thus a know- it -all enemy...who needs to be attacked. Must be in the radio amateur's code...
