C Crane Radios

[ivantherussian03]

I want to direct to people who know about C Crane Radios.


I live on the coast of Western Alaska, at a remote location in the Wade/Hampton District. We have one Am station (AM 640) that is weak, located in Bethel about 100 miles away. Nome's radio and powerful (AM 780) about 4 or 5 hundred miles away. I have a 20 dollar radio from Radio Shack, and use a Select- A- Antena. I can recieve the Nome station, but only rarely get the Bethel station, extremely rarely.

I have thought about C-Crane radio for years, but the reviews are mixed, and dont seem to live up to people expectations. I have been wondering if I could benefit from one. What do you guys think?

I listen mostly to Anchorage based AM 680 or 690, i cant remember which, and that is only when night falls. I would listen to more dx, but this radio does not pull in the stations. Anchorage is 500 plus miles away.

With my Grundig 8000 I got all kinds of station: New Zealand, Australia, Russia, Ecaudor, Cuba, even San Francisco AM stations frequently.. But that is a big radio......I want something smaller.

Thanks for your help

Ivan

 

[SAR923]

Check out the GE/RCA Super Radio III. Much better than the C Crane radios for less money. Not small, but better than your Grundig. It has external antenna terminals for both AM and FM. An external wire antenna is what you really need to pull in AM DX, but the Super Radio with your Select-A-Tenna will certainly do a much better job than your $20 radio.

 

[jackj]

I own this radio as a GE Super Radio. It is a good radio with good sensitivity but it is an old design. The tuning is analog but uses a potentiometer that varies the voltage across tuning diodes, not a variable multi-ganged tuning capacitor. My radio seems to 'drift' a bit. I'm not sure if it is temperature induced drift or the tuning voltage isn't stable enough. I think the tuned RF stage is a bit of overkill. A tuned RF stage can't add much of anything to the radio's selectivity. It's main purpose is to reduce the radio's image response. A 455kHz IF with high-side injection means the image at 1 MHz will be almost 2 MHz (1.910 MHz) which would be far enough away from the desired frequency that it would be attenuated a great deal by the input tuning of the mixer. All of this may be moot now anyway, the radio has been discontinued.

 

[Northe]

Ivan,

CCrane will allow you to return their products if they aren't satisfactory.

If they are within your budget, I'd try the CCRadio2 and the Twin Coil Ferrite antenna and see what happens.

You might also discover that the Twin Coil Ferrite antenna boosts the performance of your current radio enough so that you don't need the CCRadio.

Northe

 

[ridgescan]

I would try the CCrane with the twin coils because they have been touting this radio's AM DX abilities for many years and they still sell them under that claim. I have been getting their catalog since 1994 but never bought one from them. Tell them your location and limited AM accessability when you order and see what they say their radio will do for you. They have a good return policy so if it dont work you can send it back...they will add it to their "out of the box" sale items.
As stated above-a quality receiver with a random wire up top is the best bet. I run two Icom receivers with a 50' wire on the roof and get AM stations from Washington to San Diego all the way to Colorado here in San Francisco. The Icom R75 is not that big a receiver that being 9-1/2" across by a bit over 9" back and a bit under 4" tall. You can find them used for a few hundred and get a rig that does SO much more than a CCrane. Just a thought. Given your spot in the world you are an excellant candidate for a serious receiver like your 8000 but smaller

 

[GTO_04]

I've had very good AM reception with the Sony ICF-36. It has very good sensitivity for an inexpensive radio.

GTO_04