[TriLUG] OT - AM reception

[sholton at mindspring.com]

Steve Litt <slitt at troubleshooters.com> wrote:
> > Rick DeNatale wrote:
> > The RG6 cables are used for OTA TV and OTA FM, and the
> > twinlead was intended for AM.  The FM feed works well, even though we
> > are less than a mile from the WCPE transmitter. The OTA TV works
> > sporadically for digital TV, and the AM reception is useless.
> I used to DX AM as a kid. What worked well for me was a hundred or so feet of 
> bell wire, thrown out the window and into a tree, and connected to the AM 
> Antenna terminal of my radio through a lightning arrester. I then connected 
> the AM Ground terminal of my radio to a grounding rod sunk 8 feet, and 
> clamped to the wire with a grounding rod clamp.

Rick-

If you're using the twinlead for _both_ terminals of the AM receiver, 
it pretty well explains why you're only getting static.  With a high-
quality antenna on the end, you'd probably only get high-quality
static.  ;-)

AM needs to be biased against ground. The twin-lead is ensuring that
the same signal is being placed against both leads, the only thing you
get is the difference, which doesn't help and isn't what you want.

Try disconnecting *one* of the leads from the antenna in to the AM.

And *don't* connect the other to ground (if it's a recent receiver at all,
it will float properly without it) unless you're using a lightning arrester.
Otherwise you're just creating a lightning rod through your living room
(and receiver, and likely all the other equipment common-grounded
in the stack.)



This was a long time ago when electrical noise was at a much lower level. From 
Chicago I routinely got stations all up and down the east coast, Texas and 
the gulf coast, and several stations from California including KFI Los 
Angeles.

I was lucky to have AM Antenna and AM ground terminals on the radio. Most 
radios don't have that, but I'm sure there's some place in the radio's 
circuitry to attach such wires.

HTH

SteveT


Steve Litt
Founder and acting president: GoLUG
http://www.golug.org
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Steve Holton
sholton at mindspring.com