| General > General Technical Chat |
| Any Shortwave Radio Tips for a Noob Considering the Hobby? |
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| bd139:
Yeah my newest copy of that is 20 years old :-DD |
| edy:
I have no space in my backyard. The depth is about 30 feet max as is the width. I could theoretically put in a diagonal but then have to put up post extensions on the fence and house...that won't happen until the summer (I'm in Toronto). So instead I got about 45-50 foot single piece of solid core copper wire borrowed from a 4-wire telephone line and attached alligator clips to either end. One end I clipped to a curtain on the north end of the house window. Then I pulled it taught almost to the south end of the house and clipped it to my radio antenna. I pressed the ETM button and waited... it pulled in the following this morning 11am: I used https://www.short-wave.info to try and guess the source... (note I will come back later and edit this list... I am in a kid playground in a strip plaza at the moment... read below... this kids playground has no reception and even my cell phone is one bar... probably enclosed by sheet metal and corrugated roof... terrible)... 7400 - China Radio Intl? Kunming-Anning (can't make out anything) 9330 - Monticello (eastern tip of Maine) 9395/9455 - WRMI Okeechobee (Florida) 9505 - WHRI Cypress Creek (South Carolina) 9565 - Spanish (Radio y TV Marti - Greenville, North Carolina) 9690 - Spanish (R. Exterior De Espana - Spain) ? Huh? :-+ 9830 - CNR 1 Voice of China (Beijing) *could be interference with 9840* 9840 - WHRI Cypress Creek (South Carolina) <-- this one loud and clear 10000 - WWV Colorado Denver (can't make out anything) 11540 - Either France or Moldova (can't make out anything) 11610 - ??? (can't make out anything) 11775 - Caribbean Beacon (Anguilla) 11995 - ??? 12030 - R. Exterior De Espana SPAIN again (like 9690) - fairly good reception 15770 - WRMI Okeechobee (Florida) - like 9395/9455 Of the above a few were religious, a couple Spanish. I think they are from southern states (Bible Belt) and some Spanish ones from Florida. Now many of these channels were "staticky" but I could move around the radio and get some slight changes. I didn't have anything grounded and I may try using a 3.5mm jack with this wire rather than clipped to the whip antenna. I expect at night I may get some better reception. Interestingly I drove a bit away from my neighbourhood and now inside some indoor kids playground with only my whip antenna and got different stations?!?! None of them are clear but the ETM decided they were signals worth presetting. And FM reception is pretty bad inside here... only 5 or 6 stations come in clearly whereas at home and outside I get almost every station (dozens). Will keep experimenting. I don't want to shell out money for a fancy antenna or some powered gizmo unless I know it will make a difference. |
| james_s:
You shouldn't have to spend money on gizmos, half the fun of shortwave is experimenting with antennas. Due to propagation your reception is likely to vary widely depending on atmospheric conditions and location. Even under the best of circumstances it will usually be a bit staticky, that's just the nature of shortwave AM radio. |
| edy:
Thanks, yes I have seen how some of the fun with the shortwave DXing hobby is playing around with antenna "voodoo" and trying different things! :-+ I just have to make sure I don't upset the wife too much with wires and coils all over the house, she will not like that. :-DD I strung up a 35 foot wire from my upstairs window to the backyard fence. It clips on to my radio. It is oriented at a bit of an angle because the fence is not as high as my upstairs window and I can't put up a pole (fence shared with a number of houses). The previously used vertical wire is still out my window and about 20 feet straight down. I'm trying to compare both my angled 35 foot to the fence and 20 foot vertical. Still, I'm getting about 20 finds using the auto-scan tune, mostly a few religious stations out of Alabama, Kentucky, South Carolina and Florida. I've got one out of Maine, and I believe I also picked up Cuba, and Spain (as mentioned in my previous post). One interesting find is 9570 which I've attached the audio file for. I can't figure out what this is but according to my search is could be coming out of Korea. How is this possible? (Does anyone understand the language in the attached mp3)? :-// I wish to build a magnetic loop receiver antenna as outlined here: I will use some refrigeration coil copper tubing (10 feet) bent in a circle for the large loop and the smaller coil (1/5th size) out of thick gauge copper wire (like the grounding wire in electrical cabling). I noticed that most people use a capacitor across the larger loop and it is an AIR DIELECTRIC 2 GANG type. Are other options going to work? For example, what about this: https://secure.sayal.com/STORE2/View_SHOP.php?SKU=217693 It is CAP TRIM 15-160PF 13MM PCST PL. If I connect 2 of them up in parallel, I can adjust to have 30-320pF range. Why is the air type so popular, or is it because it can handle more voltage for transmitting. If I am only receiving, are there any other cheap variable capacitor options? |
| Sal Ammoniac:
--- Quote from: edy on December 17, 2019, 09:18:43 pm ---Thanks, yes I have seen how some of the fun with the shortwave DXing hobby is playing around with antenna "voodoo" and trying different things! --- End quote --- Just about anything works to some extent. In college I wrapped about five turns of wire around my room up near the ceiling and that picked up lots of SW and MW DX. Loops are great for MW DXing because you can turn them to null out stations on the same frequency. I've found that this also works on SW, but the effect isn't as pronounced and the nulls are not as deep as they are on MW. I hate to say this, but you're getting into SWL in its twilight years. Things today are a mere shadow of what they used to be several decades ago. Most of the big powerhouses are gone and what's left is mainly religious crap and second-rate propaganda. It's still fun, though. Have you tried listening for utility stations on SW? Like SW broadcasting, much of this has gone the way of the dodo, but there's still some interesting stuff around, like commercial air traffic, maritime traffic, military stuff, etc. |
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