Subject:  (Fist) (Lundquist) Iridium mobile phone system (fwd)
Date:     Sat, 13 Mar 1999 053304 -0600 (CST)
From:     "Roy L. Beavers" <rbeavers@llion.org>
To:       emfguru <rbeavers@llion.org>
--------------------------------------------------


.....Note the item about Ross Adey......

Roy Beavers (EMFguru)
rbeavers@llion.org................
...It is better to light a single candle than to curse the darkness... 
.................PEOPLE ARE MORE IMPORTANT THAN PROFITS...............

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1999 13:01:20 +1100
From: Stewart Fist 
To: "Roy L. Beavers" 
Subject: Re: (Lundquist) Iridium mobile phone system (fwd)

The power output of the Motorola Iridium phone at the antenna is about 5.4
times that of a GSM cellphone, and it uses a similar time division technique
(TDMA/TDD) but only one channel to both broadcast and receive.

The head exposure may not be five times that of GSM because the antenna (on
some models at least) are designed to concentrate the power into a wide cone,
vertically -- away from the body of the instrument.  My information is that it
is often necessary to hold the phone vertical to get contact which suggests
that there is a substantial cut-off of power emissions at 90 degrees to the
antenna (horizontal to the ground) where the head is.

Battery life might be the killer with these phones.  They need to be connected
to a car battery to have a standby time more than 24 hours (which will
decrease with age), and they are said to have a talk time of 2 hours
(Motorola's figures).  No cellphone in the history of the world has ever
provided the manufacturer's claimed talk time in real life, so one can expect
the maximum talk time to be 60 or 90 minutes in practice.

Dr Ross Adey was looking at Iridium phones when Motorola cut his funding.

-- 
Stewart Fist - writer and columnist
See http://technology.news.com.au/opinion/ 
       http://www.abc.net.au/http/sfist/         (some archives)
       http://www.electric-words.com              (main archives)
70 Middle Harbour Road, Lindfield, 2070,   N.S.W,   Australia
Phone +61 2 9416 7458                        Fax  +61 2 9416 4582



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Reprinted with permission of Roy Beavers, http://www.feb.se/EMF-L/EMF-L.html