Even though my dream is to one day have some semblance of a real Part15 "community" type radio, my love of radio from the receiveing end first brought me to this site.
I love radio: so simple, yet so brilliantly complex and elegant at the same time. What a wonderful gift to the world Tesla and Marconi gave to the world, a media you can enjoy while doing something else...Who'da thunk it?
What eventually brought me to this this site (which I thoroughly enjoy) was my dissatisfaction of what was offered on the AM Band. I have a few vintage tube radios that deserve to be played with QUALITY programming. This led me to build the simple 1 Mhz crysal oscillator transmitter you all are famillar with, which works great in close proximity to to these radios.
The question is how to get maximum efficiency from such a simply designed transmitter for house/yardcasting?
I request all of you formally trained and self-educated chime in, you guys just baffle me with the vast knowledge you've aquired. You guys are da' bomb.
Thanks,
Chance
Hello Chance.
For a very effective indoor antenna for Part 15 AM use the search tool to find all my postings on my Wintenna, a design that employs a metal window or screen frame to provide indoor/outdoor coverage.
I have two of them in daily use and life is happy.
Chance,
I have had success for both indoor and yardcasting using just a 3 meter long wire as an antenna. You may gain quite a bit if you ground your transmitter to a water pipe.
Be aware that you may hear hum in your signal. Here this happens when the transmitter antenna is too close to the "studio" equipment so if you have hum try moving things around. Especially check for nearby "wall warts" and try disconnecting and moving them.
I also have some old style tube radios and the difference in fidelity between my transmissions and those of commercial stations is noticeable. On one of my receivers the clarity equals that of FM.
Neil
Thank you guys for your solutions. Part of me wants to go out and purchase the best equipment to start a station and the other part want to go slow and learn by tweaking, etc. It's hard to know which is the right course of action, but I know there is always 'learning in the doing.'
There is something about hearing AM on a tube radio that, quite frankly, is awesome. Someday I'd like to get ahold of some of the vintage STL Cards games from former world series just to hear them on a quality radio. It would be a trip. My home town station KSIS used to be an affiliate ( I think it still is.) Nothing like hearing baseball on an old tube radio.
Chance
It is great sending a Part 15 transmitter
through an old tube radio, Whether the AM
signal is going far or not, it just sounds great.
I also have a few pocket transistor radios
from the 1960s, and sending "The Low Power Hour,"
or whatever through them is great fun.
I love the simple AM transmitter designs, such as
the 1 MHz osc. that so many people use.
I'm a minimalist anyway. On the radio table right
now is a DX crystal set, a tube regen HF receiver,
a 1 tube ham transmitter, and a 2 meter/440 HT
for the local "broadcast dudes repeater." The HT
isn't minimalistic by my standards, but some people
might consider it to be. I can pull the 200 watt p.e.p.
HF 9 band base transceiver out of the closet, but I
don't need to. I have a 1296 MHz FM rig for the local
1296 MHz FM repeater - but that repeater is off the air now.
So that rig is in the closet too. (By the way, talk about fun,
THAT was FUN. Because 1296 was a complete mystery to
us - and it brought the magic back.
So I think it doesn't take much to have fun with this
stuff.
I am facinated with Part 15 AM indoor antennas.
I will be interested in whatever design comes along.
And for YOU, Carl, here's my next humorous item.
The FOTACC (FEDERAL OFF THE AIR COMMUNICATIONS
COMMISSION) iissued me this callsign for being OFF THE AIR
I AM:
Bruce, DXW252LSMFT UNIT 41
One More Thing:
I hsve little access to computers right now. I
will try to be on as much as I can.