On 15/03/2005 8:33 PM, Richard Clark wrote:
On Tue, 15 Mar 2005 12:53:33 -0500, clvrmnky
wrote:

[...]

I was an Instructor at the Navy's Electronic Technician School at
Treasure Island. Get yourself a copy of Terman's "Electronic and
Radio Engineering" (the 1955 version) to find the level of coursework
that was offered at this school. It is very accessible reading and
noteworthy for being comprehensive without being a sleeping pill.

I'll look for that title. I'm finding some of the older technical
instruction books very useful.

[...]

It follows that all the ground I should need (for good
operation) is a good chassis ground, even if that is only the neutral
side of the wall-wart (is that where it is?).

Well, this is getting close to the mystery of your understanding. As
simple as ground is, it is so often taken for granted that many don't
really understand it at all.

As for the Neutral connection of the mains NO THAT IS NOT GROUND!

DO NOT PROCEED FURTHER with any wire work at that service until you
research this completely.

Absolutely. I actually have home wiring experience (I don't have my
electrician's ticket, but I could wire my own home, and it would pass
inspection.) I'm surmising that the ground my receiver is seeing (at
least the DC components within it) is the neutral wire. My comment was
more of a rhetorical comment, not a threat to use the white wire on my
AC outlet as ground!

However, as a point of intuition, ground is so tightly coupled to this
wire (at RF) so as to be the missing half of the longwire system.
This is why I commented on the distinction of being completely battery
operated (hence no ground coupling).

Other issues like ground
loops, reduction of common-mode noise &etc. is a separate issue; these
can *sometimes* be solved by different devices on the antenna system,
but I see now how they could also add problems.

This goes again to the common misunderstanding. You won't suffer a
ground loop until it occurs. Solving it will be one of life's
greatest struggles, and the solution, if stumbled upon, will appear to
be one of life's greatest mysteries. Again, battery operation creates
its own bubble of isolation from these issues - however, adding a
charger brings the prospects back into the equation.

Fair enough.

I get a bit of a boost in signal running off the wall-wart, but it is
actually more convenient for me to run off batteries. I end up moving
the receiver around quite a bit. I can pick the big blowtorches and the
relays from Sackville quite nicely off the whip, so I often listen to
them in the kitchen or when doing chores around the house. For "DXing"
I settle in near the door where I've got my antenna experiments going.

This month I'm going to rig up that big loop and see how things change
from the random wire.