On Nov 23, 4:13*pm, Bill Baka wrote:
Gregg wrote:
On Nov 22, 1:02 pm, Bill Baka wrote:
D. Peter Maus wrote:
On 11/21/09 18:55 , Bill Baka wrote:
Has anyone seen any shortwave radios in cars lately? I remember a few
from across the pond back in the 60's but it seems to have died out as a
fad. I would like to put one in one of my cars rather than a boom box
thing and be able to tune the world from wherever I find myself.
The other advantage is that I can drive to a spot with no power lines
for miles at night to listen relatively static free. I could (in theory)
take a long wire on a fishing pole (28-32AWG?) and put on a disposable
weight and toss it as far as possible into some high trees. Once it is
stuck firmly just back the car up until the whole spool is used up and
connect the car antenna to it.
Anybody tried it or anything like it?
Bill Baka
* I have a Becker 2340 I used in my 308 for years. That was the last
aftermarket radio I saw with SW. I've heard tell of some Sony's, but not
being interested in anything from Sony, I never pursued them.
* The Becker offered excellent SW performance on the car's antenna. A
little ignition noise in deep fades, but not enough to complain about..
The injectors on 18 wheelers were more of a problem than ignition noise.
It has 40 or so memories. And exceptional audio.
* As for driving out into the weeds...we had a member of this group,
living in Colorado, who used to drive out into Wyoming and about two
miles outside of Jackson Hole would hook his SW-2 up to the guard rail
and use that as a makeshift pseudo Beverage.
* With dramatic results.
* But attaching anything to your car radio antenna will not get you
where you want to go.
* A car antenna does not really operate as an antenna. It's too short
for medium wave. It operates more like a capacitive element, and is
trimmed at the input to optimize performance. Attach a wire to the car
antenna, and you'll change it's capacitive value, and throw your input
out of balance. You're also likely to change that whip into something
that behaves more like a real antenna and seriously overload your front
end. On some models this can be disastrous.
* A better option would be to see if you can find an in-dash on the used
market, or take something like an SW-8 with you, mount it underdash and
enjoy it as a real shortwave receiver with a separate antenna system.
That actually makes good sense since I don't want to listen while
driving anyway. The fading would drive me up the wall. I know the deal
on car antenna lengths and the antennas on most cars would probably tune
to 144 MHz or somewhere way up there. Figuring out how to fake a good
earth ground might be a challenge unless the mass of the car would make
it a good ground.
All for now.
Bill Baka- Hide quoted text -

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Just so you know Bill, you *can* listen and drive without fading if
you're listening to a powerhouse. I listened to
China's show from the beginning on my way to Columbus and some hams
for the rest of my hour and twenty minute
drive from Cincinnati.

Like I said earlier, the best way to ground IMO your receiver or
transceiver is too run to the hardware store or your junk box and
pickup a quarter to half inch piece of metal/steel and drill the
appropriate size hole and weld it to the frame of your
car. If you don't know how to weld or don't have a arc welder....go to
any body shop. Either they'll do it for free or throw them a twenty
spot and it's done. Ground - ground and more ground is my motto. Good
luck and let us know what you do.

Just so you know, this is going (eventually) into my 1966 Chrysler
stealth hot rod and I am doing the engine right now so it will be a
while. After 250,000 miles I finally need to bore the block of my trusty
old 440 police engine. I bought the car in 1985 and can't bear to part
with it. It's a tank, but a trusty and fast tank.

Bill Baka- Hide quoted text -

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That's sweet. Even better then. Are you planning on keeping a radio in
there for the 60's
era?