I think Mythbusters botched that one. Had they properly terminated and
combined the magnetrons there should have been some degree of injection
lock and therefore, coherence. I have toyed with this idea for an EME
(moonbounce) experiment. I don't recall what they used to measure power
with, but a thermal power meter would have shown some additive power
regadless of "coherence".

The RFI-EMI Guy

Isaac Wingfield wrote:

In article v1XFd.6954$4I2.3916@attbi_s01,
"chillermfg" wrote:



Watch MythBusters. The guys took out 5 magnetrons from (duh) 5 microwaves,
aligned them all to "air at the same target in a makeshift microwave. As
they measured the microwave radiation from different points, what they
recorded was in fact startling to them. The microwaves cancelled each other
out. The likelihood of the magnetrons starting at the exact same point of
the sine wave is very slim. The misalignment of the waves as they converge
causes a disturbance to the individual waves in turn reducing the overall
"effectiveness" of the microwave radiation.



There is ZERO chance that five magnetrons (or even two) would be
operating at the same frequency, much less the same phase. If they're
not on the same frequency, they cannot operate coherently, and if
they're not coherent, their powers cannot "add".

Isaac



--
Joe Leikhim K4SAT
"The RFI-EMI-GUY"

The Lost Deep Thoughts By: Jack Handey
Before a mad scientist goes mad, there's probably a time
when he's only partially mad. And this is the time when he's
going to throw his best parties.