Artificial Ground Tuner With A Receiver?

[Sherlock]

Has anybody tried an artificial ground tuner with their swl receiver? Is it worthwhile/practical?

[ThaDood]

       Well, if you are stuck in an APT complex, or an H.O.L., it maybe one of the few GND counter poise options out there. Most of the time, the electrical GND sucks by just bringing in more noise, plumbing GND maybe an option, but that may either have power panels GND'ing to it, or might not be all copper, but PVC. So, that MFJ Artificial GND can indeed be useful and make a noticeable difference. I have found that I would need to retune that when switching from one band to another.

[Josh]

When I was a cliff dweller, I was lucky enough to rate the cell right behind the fire alarm control panel, what a mess on hf that was. Only thing that helped was to get the antenna out the window and away from my cell and the other convict's cells. Why are they called apartments when they're all together like that? They shoulda called em togetherments. Anyway, you could try the ground thingy and see if it helps, but to me it's just a antenna tuner attached to your ground post. Why not get the best of both worlds and have a transmatch on the input and ground?

[Sherlock]

Using a "transmatch" will increase the s/n ratio. A "preselector" would be preferable i believe.

[Josh]

A preselector typically only filters out unwanted energies and doesn't increase energy transfer of the desired signal, but they sometimes do. The typical cheap transmatch can increase energy transfer but typically shows a highpass filter effect, considering a T type circuit. A pi type will show a bandpass filter effect but is usually much more costly. Both can be handy, the T types do a good job of greatly reducing ambc power seen by the rig when tuned above ambc. Just some rantings for you.