Chris Campbell wrote:
I'm trying to get a radio clock to sync up with WWVB
(60 kHz out of Colorado). ...

From experience there are also differences in the performance
of WWVB clock receivers of the same brand and model
from opening the box and later from differences in aging.

Several years ago I ordered a wris****ch and two travel clocks
from one of then and still prominent "atomic" clock outfits.
One of the travel clocks locked up soon (overnight? - brain cells
fade) and the second shortly afterwards. The wris****ch
just would not lock up - very small antenna, so I wasn't
surprised that it would take longer. I tried leaving
it overnight in parts of the away from PC, TV, radio, ...
and orienting it in various ways to point it to Colorado.
After about two weeks, when I had given up and was ready
and call the company, I went on a trip from northern NJ
to California. Somewhere, sometime during the trip
it locked up. Then after returning home... nothing.
Making a very long story short, the company _finally_
sent me a replacement wris****ch. The new one
locked up nearly every night for the next 2 years
and then, after any guarantee was gone, it quit.
It still runs, just has long since drifted off time.
Nothing since in the last 3 years, despite the deal
of trying to find a 60-kHz quiet place, reorienting it...

In the meantime, the travel clocks were doing fine,
no matter where they were left or what part of the
country I was in. Then about 2 years ago,
one of them quit. Again - try finding that sweet, magic spot,
leaving it side by side with its brother, oriented
in the same direction. Always the same result -
one fine, one deaf.

I have thought about building a loop antenna
like as has been disussed here to see if I could
get at least the deaf travel clock locking.
Tek makes tunable AM Loop antennas where the AM radio
sits next to the loop and they do work
out here in rural New Jersey.
This discussion may yet spur me
to physical wire and solder,
not just typing, action.

Somewhere I did have the URL of web page
where a fellow built a shielded loop
with an amplifier and all. The passive design,
using Reg's program as a start, is simpler.

I have several of the Sam's Club US$23 atomic wall clocks
that lock up just fine, mounted on walls facing
every which way. The outside temperature reading
433MHz receiver seems to be a flaky, marginal design,
but that's a different story.

Cheers, 73

Ron McConnell



N 40º 46' 57.9" W 74º 41' 21.9"

FN20ps77GV75 per w2iol
or FN20ps77GU46 per K2RIW

http://home.earthlink.net/~rcmcc