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Shortwave for cars?
On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Excellent. |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. Excellent. |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Excellent. |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? |
Shortwave for cars?
What if the car has no frame?
I am talkin about metal frames. Seen any Morgan cars lately? They build them in Limeyland. Guten Tag,,, Guten Morgen. cuhulin, the ass, but not a drug addled ass |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/23/09 16:12 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I've only encountered dramatic rust like that once. On a Renault R-5. |
Shortwave for cars?
Places where they use salt on the roads, bridges, wherever, Coastal
areas too, in the Winter time, cars and trucks rust out pretty fast.(Rust Buckets, Rust never sleeps) Around here they use sand instead of salt.Howsomever, about a year or so ago, I read somewhere they might start mixing salt into the sand.That is a DUMB idea! Y'all should look around under your vehicles every once in a while and spray that salt s.hit off of there. cuhulin |
Shortwave for cars?
Geoffrey S. Mendelson wrote:
Bill Baka wrote: I looked and like the radios but I am only looking for a receiver and don't want to spend a ton of money. Also, any decent mobile should have a noise blanker, not just a limiter. I did like the built in antenna tuner but it seems a transmitter would be needed to optimize things. Thanks, Those were just examples. There are many old rigs, Icom's 706 has gone through 3 or 4 generations, the low power version (703) has gone through 2 or 3, Alinco and Kenwood have also made similar rigs, Yaseu has made 2 versions of the 817 and so on. While the new ones are expensive, some of the older ones may be available a lot cheaper. Depending upon which one you get, you can get various filter options or DSP. For example, there were two Kenwood TS-50s HF rigs which sold on eBay for less than $500 in the last week. While I am not a fan of eBay, that should be a good guage of the price. An original (no DSP) IC-706 sold for around the same price. It adds VHF coverage and possibly can be used as a scanner. The latest version (mark IIG) includes VHF and UHF, DSP and receives from .03-199 and 400-470 MHz. The ICOM and Kenwood are two piece units, the front panel comes off and can be mounted in the passenger compartment, while the transmitter is mounted in the trunk. The Yaseu is one single unit. Geoff. Geoff, Think receiver and we are on the same page. If I got into chatting on a transceiver my wife would have to send out the search party. Some of the rigs you mentioned I have seen, some not. Thanks again, Bill Baka |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote in message ... Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I've only encountered dramatic rust like that once. On a Renault R-5. Fiat must have had a real issue with rust. I had a 128, cute little car. Was driving it to work one day when it just stopped moving, but the engine was still running. Pushed it the rest of the way to work (only 4 blocks or so) and had a look at it. The front behind the bumper had rusted out and the strut that held the engine up and fallen, allowing the engine to drop, disengaging the transaxle from the wheels.. Fortunately, we had a metal shop where I worked at the time, and I was able to fabricate a fix and got to drive home. |
Shortwave for cars?
dave wrote:
http://www.shortwavestore.com/sws/mf...er-pr-506.html This site just got bookmarked. That one URL just made this thread worth the bother for me. Cheers, Bill Baka |
Shortwave for cars?
Gregg wrote:
On Nov 22, 12:08 am, RHF wrote: On Nov 21, 6:03 pm, Bill Baka wrote: Brenda Ann wrote: "Bill Baka" wrote in message ... 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 Sony still makes some really nice AM/FM/SW radios for cars (with the requisite CD/MP3 player, etc.) that have, although not full coverage, at least pretty decent coverage. I will go look. A CD/MP3 player would be wasted on me since I prefer to listen to the sounds the car and road make while I am driving. Was going to look. The Sony home page won't work with my version of Firefox and IE will never be allowed to slime my drive. Maybe Egghead or Frys or some other large consumer place. As for the antenna, car radios are made to impedence match to the relatively short standard car radio antenna, and usually do not respond too well to additional antenna length. You CAN, however, place a variable capacitor between the car antenna and your random longwire, and tune it for best reception for a given frequency. This would at least give you the advantage of the extra capture area. As a rule when I buy a car one of the first things I adjust is the antenna trimmer, which is usually a bit off anyway. Funny how most people don't even know these things exist. - Thinking about it, - an MFJ tuning box sitting under the dash - should be a real conversation starter. - - Cheers, - Bill Baka They ask "What's THAT For ?" Your reply "Oh THAT Helps me to Hear . . . the Aliens Landing at Area 51."http://www.gamerevolution.com/images/violence/area_51.jpg .- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - Ha! Yeah, back when I had my "fun car" with six antennas, I'd always hear the response from truck drivers. I had my regular car antenna in the front that I replaced with a larger - more sturdy antenna. I had three scanner antennas, one antenna each on the far outside corner of the trunk drilled through the trunk lid and the other antenna was a glass mount that I put directly in the middle of the rear window. Then I had a seven and a half foot skipshooter mounted (drilled through) right in the middle of the trunk and lastly - the 108" steel whip on the rear quarter panel. I think I may go more covert this time around, the only problem would be the shortwave antenna. Six antennas? I'll bet they thought you were some kind of government *super smokey* or something. Did truckers slow down around you? Grinning at the thought. Bill Baka |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/23/09 17:46 , Brenda Ann wrote:
"D. Peter wrote in message ... Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I've only encountered dramatic rust like that once. On a Renault R-5. Fiat must have had a real issue with rust. I had a 128, cute little car. Was driving it to work one day when it just stopped moving, but the engine was still running. Pushed it the rest of the way to work (only 4 blocks or so) and had a look at it. The front behind the bumper had rusted out and the strut that held the engine up and fallen, allowing the engine to drop, disengaging the transaxle from the wheels.. Fortunately, we had a metal shop where I worked at the time, and I was able to fabricate a fix and got to drive home. Well, that sounds like a bad day. I've not had anything like THAT much fun. I did strip the splines off the input receiver on the torque converter of a '71 Torino, and went freewheeling through South St Louis one afternoon. But nothing like that kind of rust failure. There for awhile, I guess FIAT was getting their engineers and manufacturing techniques from Peugeot: The cars showed rust on the showroom floor. Sure saved a lot of time. My uncle sold Peugeots and Renaults in the 50's and 60's. So, he always had one in the driveway. Fun little cars. Not exactly quality, but seriously fun little cars. One of the reasons I've always wanted a Dauphine. Pre rusted, or not. |
Shortwave for cars?
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 - - Show quoted text - 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 |
Shortwave for cars?
Brenda Ann wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote in message ... Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I've only encountered dramatic rust like that once. On a Renault R-5. Fiat must have had a real issue with rust. I had a 128, cute little car. Was driving it to work one day when it just stopped moving, but the engine was still running. Pushed it the rest of the way to work (only 4 blocks or so) and had a look at it. The front behind the bumper had rusted out and the strut that held the engine up and fallen, allowing the engine to drop, disengaging the transaxle from the wheels.. Fortunately, we had a metal shop where I worked at the time, and I was able to fabricate a fix and got to drive home. Fiat provided rust as a factory fitment, not an optional extra, back in the seventies. That said, I owned 3 of the 128s, the last being the 3P, a nice little hatchback bought new in 1977. I kept the hatch the longest, passing it on to one of my nephews in about 2000. Apart from a couple of stretched valves, a common habit I'm told, we did nothing to the engine in 200,000 kilometres. Only rust it seemed to have was around the hatch glass. It was still a runner when my nephew onsold it to someone in N.S.W. about 2 or 3 years back. I rarely drove it in all the time we had it as I had a work supplied vehicle for most of my working life. It was just a glorified family shopping trolley. Probably did less than 3,000 of the odometer total and a thousand of that was when we delivered it to my nephew in another state. It was on that trip that I discovered the standard fitment radio had good AM dx qualities. Picked up stations from all over when we were miles from any nearby towns. Could even pick up Melbourne station from the middle of N.S.W. Don't know what brand it was but suspect it was some Italian variant. All the electrics on the Fiat were Italian manufacture so reasonable to assume the radio was as well. Krypsis |
Shortwave for cars?
On Nov 22, 7:38*pm, Gregg wrote:
On Nov 22, 12:08*am, RHF wrote: On Nov 21, 6:03*pm, Bill Baka wrote: Brenda Ann wrote: "Bill Baka" wrote in message ... 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 Sony still makes some really nice AM/FM/SW radios for cars (with the requisite CD/MP3 player, etc.) that have, although not full coverage, at least pretty decent coverage. I will go look. A CD/MP3 player would be wasted on me since I prefer to listen to the sounds the car and road make while I am driving. Was going to look. The Sony home page won't work with my version of Firefox and IE will never be allowed to slime my drive. Maybe Egghead or Frys or some other large consumer place. As for the antenna, car radios are made to impedence match to the relatively short standard car radio antenna, and usually do not respond too well to additional antenna length. You CAN, however, place a variable capacitor between the car antenna and your random longwire, and tune it for best reception for a given frequency. This would at least give you the advantage of the extra capture area. As a rule when I buy a car one of the first things I adjust is the antenna trimmer, which is usually a bit off anyway. Funny how most people don't even know these things exist. - Thinking about it, - an MFJ tuning box sitting under the dash - should be a real conversation starter. - - Cheers, - Bill Baka They ask "What's THAT For ?" Your reply "Oh THAT Helps me to Hear . . . the Aliens Landing at Area 51."http://www.gamerevolution.com/images/violence/area_51.jpg *.- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - Ha! Yeah, back when I had my "fun car" with six antennas, I'd always hear the response from truck drivers. I had my regular car antenna in the front that I replaced with a larger - more sturdy antenna. I had three scanner antennas, one antenna each on the far outside corner of the trunk drilled through the trunk lid and the other antenna was a glass mount that I put directly in the middle of the rear window. Then I had a seven and a half foot skipshooter mounted (drilled through) right in the middle of the trunk and lastly - the 108" steel whip on the rear quarter panel. I think I may go more covert this time around, the only problem would be the shortwave antenna. http://76.163.38.81/images/N7EMW%20M...e1_outside.JPG |
Shortwave for cars?
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 - - Show quoted text - 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 - - Show quoted text - That's sweet. Even better then. Are you planning on keeping a radio in there for the 60's era? |
Shortwave for cars?
On Nov 23, 6:56*pm, RHF wrote:
On Nov 22, 7:38*pm, Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 12:08*am, RHF wrote: On Nov 21, 6:03*pm, Bill Baka wrote: Brenda Ann wrote: "Bill Baka" wrote in message ... 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 Sony still makes some really nice AM/FM/SW radios for cars (with the requisite CD/MP3 player, etc.) that have, although not full coverage, at least pretty decent coverage. I will go look. A CD/MP3 player would be wasted on me since I prefer to listen to the sounds the car and road make while I am driving. Was going to look. The Sony home page won't work with my version of Firefox and IE will never be allowed to slime my drive. Maybe Egghead or Frys or some other large consumer place. As for the antenna, car radios are made to impedence match to the relatively short standard car radio antenna, and usually do not respond too well to additional antenna length. You CAN, however, place a variable capacitor between the car antenna and your random longwire, and tune it for best reception for a given frequency. This would at least give you the advantage of the extra capture area. As a rule when I buy a car one of the first things I adjust is the antenna trimmer, which is usually a bit off anyway. Funny how most people don't even know these things exist. - Thinking about it, - an MFJ tuning box sitting under the dash - should be a real conversation starter. - - Cheers, - Bill Baka They ask "What's THAT For ?" Your reply "Oh THAT Helps me to Hear . . . the Aliens Landing at Area 51."http://www.gamerevolution.com/images/violence/area_51.jpg *.- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - Ha! Yeah, back when I had my "fun car" with six antennas, I'd always hear the response from truck drivers. I had my regular car antenna in the front that I replaced with a larger - more sturdy antenna. I had three scanner antennas, one antenna each on the far outside corner of the trunk drilled through the trunk lid and the other antenna was a glass mount that I put directly in the middle of the rear window. Then I had a seven and a half foot skipshooter mounted (drilled through) right in the middle of the trunk and lastly - the 108" steel whip on the rear quarter panel. I think I may go more covert this time around, the only problem would be the shortwave antenna. http://76.163.38.81/images/N7EMW%20M...1_outside.JPG- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - Ha! That was good. I think mine looked cooler though, I had an actual truck in the rear. I really need to do that again, I miss it no doubt. |
Shortwave for cars?
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 - - Show quoted text - 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 - - Show quoted text - That's sweet. Even better then. Are you planning on keeping a radio in there from the 60's era? era? |
Shortwave for cars?
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 - - Show quoted text - 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 - - Show quoted text - That's sweet. Even better then. Are you planning on keeping a radio in there from the 60's era? |
Shortwave for cars?
Bill Baka wrote:
dave wrote: http://www.shortwavestore.com/sws/mf...er-pr-506.html This site just got bookmarked. That one URL just made this thread worth the bother for me. You could just go to the MFJ web site. There you will find the converter, a download link for the manual and a place to send them a message asking them any question you want. You can also call them. Geoff. -- Geoffrey S. Mendelson, Jerusalem, Israel N3OWJ/4X1GM |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 16:12 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I was actually quite fortunate that it let go where it did in Muskegon, MI. On a certain city street there one has (or had) to cross four or five railroad tracks in rather rapid succession, at not a high rate of speed. It let go then. Another two or three miles and I would have been on the highway to home probably doing 70 MPH. Had it all came apart then I might not be here now. dxAce Michigan USA |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/24/09 06:28 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 16:12 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I was actually quite fortunate that it let go where it did in Muskegon, MI. On a certain city street there one has (or had) to cross four or five railroad tracks in rather rapid succession, at not a high rate of speed. It let go then. Another two or three miles and I would have been on the highway to home probably doing 70 MPH. Had it all came apart then I might not be here now. dxAce Michigan USA Yeah, probably would have turned you over. |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 06:28 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 16:12 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I was actually quite fortunate that it let go where it did in Muskegon, MI. On a certain city street there one has (or had) to cross four or five railroad tracks in rather rapid succession, at not a high rate of speed. It let go then. Another two or three miles and I would have been on the highway to home probably doing 70 MPH. Had it all came apart then I might not be here now. Yeah, probably would have turned you over. Yeah. I did get a lot of use out of that car though! And, it still had its original exhaust system on it. A poor man's Ferrari! |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/24/09 09:01 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 06:28 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 16:12 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I was actually quite fortunate that it let go where it did in Muskegon, MI. On a certain city street there one has (or had) to cross four or five railroad tracks in rather rapid succession, at not a high rate of speed. It let go then. Another two or three miles and I would have been on the highway to home probably doing 70 MPH. Had it all came apart then I might not be here now. Yeah, probably would have turned you over. Yeah. I did get a lot of use out of that car though! And, it still had its original exhaust system on it. A poor man's Ferrari! Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 09:01 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 06:28 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 16:12 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I was actually quite fortunate that it let go where it did in Muskegon, MI. On a certain city street there one has (or had) to cross four or five railroad tracks in rather rapid succession, at not a high rate of speed. It let go then. Another two or three miles and I would have been on the highway to home probably doing 70 MPH. Had it all came apart then I might not be here now. Yeah, probably would have turned you over. Yeah. I did get a lot of use out of that car though! And, it still had its original exhaust system on it. A poor man's Ferrari! Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. The only thing I did to the car later on was remove the catalytic convertor and put some slightly larger jets in the carb. It was indeed a very fun car and I miss it like I miss my Dodge Dakota. |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/24/09 10:25 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 09:01 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 06:28 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 16:12 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I was actually quite fortunate that it let go where it did in Muskegon, MI. On a certain city street there one has (or had) to cross four or five railroad tracks in rather rapid succession, at not a high rate of speed. It let go then. Another two or three miles and I would have been on the highway to home probably doing 70 MPH. Had it all came apart then I might not be here now. Yeah, probably would have turned you over. Yeah. I did get a lot of use out of that car though! And, it still had its original exhaust system on it. A poor man's Ferrari! Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. The only thing I did to the car later on was remove the catalytic convertor and put some slightly larger jets in the carb. It was indeed a very fun car and I miss it like I miss my Dodge Dakota. Ooohh...no doubt. |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 10:25 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 09:01 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 06:28 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 16:12 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I was actually quite fortunate that it let go where it did in Muskegon, MI. On a certain city street there one has (or had) to cross four or five railroad tracks in rather rapid succession, at not a high rate of speed. It let go then. Another two or three miles and I would have been on the highway to home probably doing 70 MPH. Had it all came apart then I might not be here now. Yeah, probably would have turned you over. Yeah. I did get a lot of use out of that car though! And, it still had its original exhaust system on it. A poor man's Ferrari! Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. The only thing I did to the car later on was remove the catalytic convertor and put some slightly larger jets in the carb. It was indeed a very fun car and I miss it like I miss my Dodge Dakota. Ooohh...no doubt. Damn near got killed in the Dakota on a Saturday afternoon just minding my own business. Only two cars, well maybe three, I ever had totalled. My Opel GT was also totalled by a gal who was 'running late'. |
Shortwave for cars?
Foreign made, foreign name brands vehicles I have owned before, I still
own one now, a 1976 made in Germany Hercules Moped, it has bicycle pedals on it. 1957 BMW Isetta car, 1961 VW van, 1963 VW beetle car, and a 1970 VW van. I still have the big thick operators manual that came with the 1957 BMW Isetta car. cuhulin |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 10:34 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. The only thing I did to the car later on was remove the catalytic convertor and put some slightly larger jets in the carb. It was indeed a very fun car and I miss it like I miss my Dodge Dakota. Ooohh...no doubt. Damn near got killed in the Dakota on a Saturday afternoon just minding my own business. Only two cars, well maybe three, I ever had totalled. My Opel GT was also totalled by a gal who was 'running late'. That's gotta hurt. I've only totalled one, myself. A '62 Studebaker GT Hawk. White over Riviera blue. 289 Quad/4 speed, floor shift, and Twin-Trak Spicer (Dana) 44 rear axel. About 10 years ago. I'd just finished the restoration. Like 24 hours before. Was driving it to work when I was at CBS, and I got run into a bridge abutment by a guy in a Tundra who ran me off the road on the Ohio feeder. Screw yer crumple zones. That 900lb cast iron block/tranny damned near wound up in my lap. That's kinda what happened with the Opel! Wasn't going very fast, the gal I could see was looking right at me in her station wagon, then suddenly pulled out from the stop sign. Nailed her right between the doors. Engine in the Opel was coming up through the dash. And, she had I think two kids in the rear seat. I had just had the car rebuilt. |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/24/09 10:34 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. The only thing I did to the car later on was remove the catalytic convertor and put some slightly larger jets in the carb. It was indeed a very fun car and I miss it like I miss my Dodge Dakota. Ooohh...no doubt. Damn near got killed in the Dakota on a Saturday afternoon just minding my own business. Only two cars, well maybe three, I ever had totalled. My Opel GT was also totalled by a gal who was 'running late'. That's gotta hurt. I've only totalled one, myself. A '62 Studebaker GT Hawk. White over Riviera blue. 289 Quad/4 speed, floor shift, and Twin-Trak Spicer (Dana) 44 rear axel. About 10 years ago. I'd just finished the restoration. Like 24 hours before. Was driving it to work when I was at CBS, and I got run into a bridge abutment by a guy in a Tundra who ran me off the road on the Ohio feeder. Screw yer crumple zones. That 900lb cast iron block/tranny damned near wound up in my lap. |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/24/09 11:22 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 10:34 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. The only thing I did to the car later on was remove the catalytic convertor and put some slightly larger jets in the carb. It was indeed a very fun car and I miss it like I miss my Dodge Dakota. Ooohh...no doubt. Damn near got killed in the Dakota on a Saturday afternoon just minding my own business. Only two cars, well maybe three, I ever had totalled. My Opel GT was also totalled by a gal who was 'running late'. That's gotta hurt. I've only totalled one, myself. A '62 Studebaker GT Hawk. White over Riviera blue. 289 Quad/4 speed, floor shift, and Twin-Trak Spicer (Dana) 44 rear axel. About 10 years ago. I'd just finished the restoration. Like 24 hours before. Was driving it to work when I was at CBS, and I got run into a bridge abutment by a guy in a Tundra who ran me off the road on the Ohio feeder. Screw yer crumple zones. That 900lb cast iron block/tranny damned near wound up in my lap. That's kinda what happened with the Opel! Wasn't going very fast, the gal I could see was looking right at me in her station wagon, then suddenly pulled out from the stop sign. Nailed her right between the doors. Engine in the Opel was coming up through the dash. And, she had I think two kids in the rear seat. I had just had the car rebuilt. Oh, now that's just a crime. |
Shortwave for cars?
D. Peter Maus wrote:
On 11/24/09 09:01 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 06:28 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 16:12 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 13:44 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 09:24 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 08:18 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/23/09 01:19 , Gregg wrote: On Nov 22, 8:44 am, "D. Peter 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 was a great post Peter. I liked the guardrail story.:-) My friend hooked onto the railroad tracks once before keying up a lot of wattage on his CB, he used the RR tracks as his ground.shaking my head I really never thought about hooking to the RR tracks for a shortwave antenna, what do you think the results would be? Not sure. That would be the fun of the experiment. It may be little different than the guard rail. It may be something entirely different. The results should be unexpected and dramatic. What type of car were you refering to when you said "308"?? Just curious. Think "Magnum PI." Great car. As I recall it was a 308GTBI, or like that? I went to the factory and saw them built right along with my once loved FIAT X1/9 !!! Magnum's was a 308 GTS. The 'B' was for the Berlinetta, the hard top, and 'I' was for injection. His was a GTS(pyder), carbureted. Mine was the 308 GTSI-QV. Mine was injected, 32 valve on the same 3.0L V-8. It wasn't quick, but it was FAST. And serious fun to drive. You had an X1/9? Yeah, metallic black, 1979 version as I recall, with the more integrated bumpers. A great car, put at least 170k plus on it from coast to coast. That's actually pretty good for that engine. It wasn't known for longevity. 170k is a serious amount of driving fun. I'd say you got your money out of it. You got everybody's money out of it. Nicely done. Thanks. The car always started with just a click of the key. Never a problem. It was the undercarriage that failed. Really. In what way? If you recall the design it had a trunk in the front as well as the rear. What happened to mine was that moisture up under the front apparently rotted out the area that supported the front struts. No kidding. Damn. You're lucky something didn't let go on the road. I was actually quite fortunate that it let go where it did in Muskegon, MI. On a certain city street there one has (or had) to cross four or five railroad tracks in rather rapid succession, at not a high rate of speed. It let go then. Another two or three miles and I would have been on the highway to home probably doing 70 MPH. Had it all came apart then I might not be here now. Yeah, probably would have turned you over. Yeah. I did get a lot of use out of that car though! And, it still had its original exhaust system on it. A poor man's Ferrari! Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. Almost bought one when I bought the 3P. Kids were getting too big by then so wasn't much use to the little woman as a shopping trolley. The X19 really is a 2 seater, definitely not a 2 + 2 Krypsis |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/24/09 13:18 , Krypsis wrote:
Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. Almost bought one when I bought the 3P. Kids were getting too big by then so wasn't much use to the little woman as a shopping trolley. The X19 really is a 2 seater, definitely not a 2 + 2 Krypsis Then the practical solution would be to let the wife take the station wagon, and you take the X1/9. When I was married, we had three cars. A 4 seater sedan, her MG and my MG. After I got divorced I had 7 cars. Lots of choices. Too much fun. And a whole lot less maintenance. |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 13:18 , Krypsis wrote: Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. Almost bought one when I bought the 3P. Kids were getting too big by then so wasn't much use to the little woman as a shopping trolley. The X19 really is a 2 seater, definitely not a 2 + 2 Krypsis Then the practical solution would be to let the wife take the station wagon, and you take the X1/9. When I was married, we had three cars. A 4 seater sedan, her MG and my MG. After I got divorced I had 7 cars. Lots of choices. Too much fun. And a whole lot less maintenance. I'm no longer limber enough to shoe-horn myself into a X1/9. |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 15:09 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 13:18 , Krypsis wrote: Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. Almost bought one when I bought the 3P. Kids were getting too big by then so wasn't much use to the little woman as a shopping trolley. The X19 really is a 2 seater, definitely not a 2 + 2 Krypsis Then the practical solution would be to let the wife take the station wagon, and you take the X1/9. When I was married, we had three cars. A 4 seater sedan, her MG and my MG. After I got divorced I had 7 cars. Lots of choices. Too much fun. And a whole lot less maintenance. I'm no longer limber enough to shoe-horn myself into a X1/9. That's a shame. How's that back doing, btw? Not good. |
Shortwave for cars?
On 11/24/09 15:09 , dxAce wrote:
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 13:18 , Krypsis wrote: Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. Almost bought one when I bought the 3P. Kids were getting too big by then so wasn't much use to the little woman as a shopping trolley. The X19 really is a 2 seater, definitely not a 2 + 2 Krypsis Then the practical solution would be to let the wife take the station wagon, and you take the X1/9. When I was married, we had three cars. A 4 seater sedan, her MG and my MG. After I got divorced I had 7 cars. Lots of choices. Too much fun. And a whole lot less maintenance. I'm no longer limber enough to shoe-horn myself into a X1/9. That's a shame. How's that back doing, btw? |
Shortwave for cars?
"D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 15:20 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 15:09 , dxAce wrote: "D. Peter Maus" wrote: On 11/24/09 13:18 , Krypsis wrote: Indeed. I had a g/f years ago, with an X1/9. She couldn't keep it running for love or money. I spent a weekend going through that drive train and rebuilt everything I could put my hands on. Fired it up and took it out for some break-in driving. VERY serious fun. Not too unlike that 914/6 I was driving at the time. I wouldn't mind owning one, myself, today. Almost bought one when I bought the 3P. Kids were getting too big by then so wasn't much use to the little woman as a shopping trolley. The X19 really is a 2 seater, definitely not a 2 + 2 Krypsis Then the practical solution would be to let the wife take the station wagon, and you take the X1/9. When I was married, we had three cars. A 4 seater sedan, her MG and my MG. After I got divorced I had 7 cars. Lots of choices. Too much fun. And a whole lot less maintenance. I'm no longer limber enough to shoe-horn myself into a X1/9. That's a shame. How's that back doing, btw? Not good. Gee, Steve, I'm sorry to hear that. Having broken mine, myself, I understand how miserable that can be. Yeah, I think most of my current problem may just be due to the weather. Kinda damp it seems, and I'm sure that you as well as I will be getting some rain soon, at least according to the radar picture. |
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