John, it seems to me that your statement that earth tides are simple, and EQFs that they are easily predicted, should mean that EQF could proceed. I don't get why you have to include ocean tides. Sure, there will be some load along the coasts, but it would seem logical that this would be secondary. Also, yes, maybe tides would favor quakes of a certain type, but for small quakes, you might have faults in all different orientations, and it might be too hard to predict how tidal stresses will behave. I know I brought this up, but perhaps the way to go is to look at possible relationships by area-area X tends to be affected by maximum gradients, area Y is unaffected.....I think this has been done by some. I better quit now as I don't know what I'm talking about-just using some logic. Chris