In 1971, as WN1POI - my Novice ham license
that had a date of Dec. 7, 1971 -
thirty years after Pearl Harbor - I started
fooling around with transmitters. I had
built the very famous $7 vacuum tube 50C5 transmitter
from Electronics Illustrated. That transmitter
was so dangerous! It had no power transformer
and was just hooked into the AC line. It tuned up
fine into a 15 watt light bulb. However - when I
tried to transmit through my end fed wire - the transmitter
went crazy with parasitics on VHF. It turned the TV screen
completely black in the other room. I suppose the antenna
wasn't matched. Maybe it would have worked had I known
how to match the impedance.
Gotta go.
I'll be back. I have a few more goofy ham
transmitter stories somewhere in my memory.
Bruce, DOGRADIO
These comments about lighting bulbs with RF make me think of a 10-foot high light bulb that serves as a Part 15 compliant AM "antenna that lights up."
We used to put flourescent
tube lights next to 2 meter
(144 to 148 MHz) ham antennas -
and they would light up during
transmit.
So Carl, how does this thing work?
Is there really enough energy in a
Part 15 AM field to light a flourescent tube?
Or is this an idea from the KDX files?
If it's an idea it's a cool one, anyway.
Bruce, DOGRADIO
Bruce DOGRADIO, the idea started with YOU right here in this stream.
And I've thought about it some more.
You've heard of a transmitter tube.
A light-bulb antenna would be known as an ANTENNA TUBE.
Oh, and maybe a flourescent bulb could be somehow employed...
Flourescents operate on a plasma excited by the voltage anodes or can openers, I am not sure of anything, and I read somewhere that plasma itself can be used as a radio antenna.
More DOGRADIO inspirations.