Get a 5 tube superhet at a garage sale. No RF stage and image prone
but very sensitive.

Or an old car radio with a sliderule dial. One of the major
shortcomings of today's AM radios is the lack of fine tuning.

On 10 May 2004 12:22:53 GMT, (WShoots1) wrote:

The best receivers were those of the tube days, and were determined by the
number of tuned RF stages BEFORE the first mixer. (Three stages seemed to be
the maximum, but even one was very good.)

That's where good selectivity began, too. The RF stage(s) kept out the adjacent
signals which cause problems when they are allowed into the rest of the
receiver.

Today's crap, as you put it, lets everything in through the barn door front end
and then tries to sort it out with whiz bang, floor noise generating circuitry.

If I were a DXer and not a SWLer, I would get a WWII military receiver. Those
were no-frills radios that could just about hear anything that was on the air.
And when a band was open, the receiver would sound dead -- except when there
was a signal.

73,
Bill, K5BY