Messages

1216

10/11 meters / Re: 11 meter dipole antenna

« on: January 09, 2017, 1515 UTC »

A short answer, as high as possible, and as far from the house and power lines as possible. Last month, I've finally put up a Windom and the big goal was to reduce the noises that I get from the house and the power lines. What's nice about being below 30MHz is that you can run longer runs of coax without much loss. I put that Windom 60ft away from the house and power lines here, and what a world of difference it is to finally hear tough catches. Hope that helps.

1217

General Radio Discussion / Re: 5,000 WATT RADIO STATION FOR SALE. The Catholics will snap it up.

« on: December 22, 2016, 0537 UTC »

   In WV a Catholic network has snapped up a bunch of AM stations around the state. Right where I am I can hear the same programing on 3 stations. Somehow, I don't see them giving Southern Baptists a stiff competition here though. However, you talk about bland radio to listen to on AM. YUK!!!!

1218

FM DX Loggings / Re: FM DX Antenna help! Go cheap, to start with. An old TV antenna modified.

« on: December 15, 2016, 1830 UTC »

You can use a TV antenna. I've done that for years, and you can tweak them. To MAX out FM performance on multi-element antennas, elements towards the front, have each element about 28", behind them make those elements 29", and behind them make those element 30", and finally behind those make those elements 31". And behind those, keep those elements long. That should make the difference.

1219

FM DX Loggings / Re: Can you use a High Gain Dual band 2m-70cm antenna for FM DX? Um, no.

« on: December 15, 2016, 1817 UTC »

I have tried that as an experiment with both a Comet GP-15 tri-band antenna (6M / 2M / 440MHz.), years ago and then later with a discone antenna. On FM radio? It sucked. And, what local stations it did RX was plagued with multipath fuzz noise. The discone wasn't much better. maybe in a crowded, metro area it would be OK to do that, but for FM radio DX? Nope. Now, one thing that the CP-15 did do was RX analog TV CH2. Not well, but watchable.

1220

FM DX Loggings / Re: FM Radio Reception while airborne? I did that, but with TV back in 1988.

« on: December 15, 2016, 1811 UTC »

Neat!!! I've wondered what that would be like to take an FM RX up on a plane with you. Back in 1988, as a birthday gift, I got a 30min local plane ride over the famed ex-P.O. drop of P.O.Box 452-land. However, instead of an FM radio, I took along one of those Citizen pocket-sized LCD B&W TV. That, and my Dad bummed me his camera to take PIC's of areas of interest. Anyway, most hilltops there are about 2,400ft ASL, and I believe that we, (Myself and the pilot.), were about 3,000ft above ground. The pilot wouldn't allow me to extend the TV's antenna, so with a retracted 3" antenna, here's what it received. All of the county PBS UHF TV translators for WNED-TV, Buffalo. That's UHF. On VHF-high, only thing RX'ed was Buffalo's CH7 WKBW-TV CATV quality.  Nothing else, like CH11 CHCH-TV, or any of the Rochester, NY stations. On VHF-low, nothing, not even a hint of Buffalo's CH's 2 and 4. Still, a neat experiment. Makes me only wonder what I would have RX'ed if I was allowed to extend the telescopic whip, or even stick it out the window.