Ferrite antenna in the Sony ICF 2001

[nevesjerry]

Hello to all,
I have several shortwave portable receivers including the older Sony ICF 2001 which I just obtained on eBay. It works fine on all bands.My question is when on the MW Band, i.e. Broadcast Band I notice that when tuning a station which I know where it is located, let’s say North of me, if I place the radio facing the station, like all other radios I have, in which the Ferrite antenna runs along the length of the radio, in my SonyICF 2001 the signal strength gets stronger only when radio’s end is facing the station and Flat. Does anyone know if on the Sony ICF 2001 it’s ferrite antenna is positioned vertically inside the radio and at tthe the end of radio? That’s what it seems to me!!??? I have never opened the radio, therefore

 

[nevesjerry]

Hello, sorry I didn’t complete the sentence on the above, here it goes: therefore I don’t know the orientation of the ferrite antenna on this Sony ICF 2001 model!

 

[WB9YBM]

Hello to all,
I have several shortwave portable receivers including the older Sony ICF 2001 which I just obtained on eBay. It works fine on all bands.My question is when on the MW Band, i.e. Broadcast Band I notice that when tuning a station which I know where it is located, let’s say North of me, if I place the radio facing the station, like all other radios I have, in which the Ferrite antenna runs along the length of the radio, in my SonyICF 2001 the signal strength gets stronger only when radio’s end is facing the station and Flat. Does anyone know if on the Sony ICF 2001 it’s ferrite antenna is positioned vertically inside the radio and at tthe the end of radio? That’s what it seems to me!!??? I have never opened the radio, therefore

I used to have the very same radio; best luck I had improving the received signal was hooking up a very long length of wire to the antenna input screw. Don't waste time on the short antenna wire that came with the radio; I got a spool of hook-up wire (stranded, NOT solid), mounted that under the peak of the roof for the whole length of a ranch-style home, fed it into the living room (with a strain-relief where it goes through the wall). At that point I noticed that the antenna was finally long enough so that the antenna tuning control actually functioned (it didn't on shorter antenna lengths). Alternatively I was thinking about running an antenna wire around the entire property line (and get some serious capture area, even on lower frequencies), but haven't gotten around to that yet...).

 

[majoco]

It would appear from this pic from the service manual that your assumption is correct - it appears that the ferrite rod is vertical at the end of the cabinet.

 

[GB46]

Hello to all,
I have several shortwave portable receivers including the older Sony ICF 2001 which I just obtained on eBay. It works fine on all bands.

Does that radio have a small thumbwheel fine tuning control on the side panel? I'm just curious, because I have that radio's successor, the ICF2002, which has such a control on the right side panel. It's rather tricky to use for tuning SSB signals, but it works.

I bought that radio new in 1986, and it has worked fine ever since. The radio pulls in lots of SW stations on just its whip antenna, although the little screw at the bottom joint for tilting the antenna keeps loosening up, so sometimes the antenna flops right over. I have to keep tightening it back up with a small screwdriver.

 

[nevesjerry]

Does that radio have a small thumbwheel fine tuning control on the side panel? I'm just curious, because I have that radio's successor, the ICF2002, which has such a control on the right side panel. It's rather tricky to use for tuning SSB signals, but it works.

I bought that radio new in 1986, and it has worked fine ever since. The radio pulls in lots of SW stations on just its whip antenna, although the little screw at the bottom joint for tilting the antenna keeps loosening up, so sometimes the antenna flops right over. I have to keep tightening it back up with a small screwdriver.

Yes, it does have the fine tuning wheel on the front panel which acts up as an Antenna Tuner for a particular frequency. It has to be re- adjusted every time you tune a different frequency, on Broadcast band and Shortwave. I wish all radios had that feature.
Jerry

 

[GB46]

Yes, it does have the fine tuning wheel on the front panel which acts up as an Antenna Tuner for a particular frequency. It has to be re- adjusted every time you tune a different frequency, on Broadcast band and Shortwave. I wish all radios had that feature.
Jerry

Well, the thumbwheel I was referring to on the ICF-2002 is not an antenna tuner, but a fine tuning control for the frequency, shifting it by as much as +/- 5 kHz. The control is quite small, making it pretty tricky to adjust the voice pitch accurately on a sideband signal. There's no antenna tuner as such, although I notice that the frequency tends to get slightly pulled if the whip antenna is touched. That shows up especially on sideband. It's pretty crude by today's standards, but hey, the radio was produced during the 1980s, way back in ancient history when digital tuning was quite new in portable radios.

I haven't used the set very often over the past few years, having been spoiled by more recent technology, but it works like new, except for a couple of scratchy slide switches. I'm not crazy about the linear volume control, by the way. Round knobs are much easier to use.

 

[Patch42]

Well, the thumbwheel I was referring to on the ICF-2002 is not an antenna tuner, but a fine tuning control for the frequency, shifting it by as much as +/- 5 kHz.

The ICF-2001 has two separate thumbwheels on the front panel. One is for tuning the AM antenna and the other is for SSB fine tuning, which it labels a "compensator". As you point out, the sensitivity of the adjustment is not remotely as fine as one would like to have for SSB and virtually useless for CW. It's better than nothing at all, but not remotely as well thought out as should have been for a radio that cost that much. I bought mine not too long after they were released, probably '83 or thereabouts. I found it to be highly impractical on SW given the lack of a tuning knob that would allow band sweeps. Mine eventually became a very expensive FM radio for use in my bathroom.

 

[GB46]

I brought my ICF-2002 out of its hiding place in the storeroom today out of curiosity, and was amazed by its sensitivity. I had previously left it tuned to CB channel 6. When I switched it on today, some skip activity came blasting in before I had even tilted the antenna up and extended it. As difficult as SSB is with that radio, I managed to clarify some stations on channel 38, as well. All of this was without using an external antenna. The whip is very directional, too.

Yes, it's hard to do some serious SW monitoring without a tuning dial, so I've usually just keyed in familiar frequencies hoping for some activity. My go-to portable is a Sangean ATS-909x, with its tuning dial and loads of memories, but the old ICF-2002 surpasses it in sensitivity. My tabletop receiver is an Icom R75, which hardly ever gets used in AM mode. I prefer the Sangean's audio for that, so the R75 is usually in USB or LSB mode for amateur, utility and digital monitoring. There's very little to listen to on HF in AM mode these days, anyway.

 

[WB9YBM]

Well, the thumbwheel I was referring to on the ICF-2002 is not an antenna tuner, but a fine tuning control for the frequency, shifting it by as much as +/- 5 kHz. The control is quite small, making it pretty tricky to adjust the voice pitch accurately on a sideband signal. There's no antenna tuner as such,

The antenna tuning pot's one of two vertically-mounted pots towards the right on the front panel, and is labelled "AM Antenna Adjustment", it's right above the + 5KHz pot you mentioned.

 

[GB46]

The antenna tuning pot's one of two vertically-mounted pots towards the right on the front panel, and is labelled "AM Antenna Adjustment", it's right above the + 5KHz pot you mentioned.

OK, thanks, I found a picture of it at Universal Radio. Seems some of the features were eliminated in the ICF2002, but maybe that one was lower in price as well. I can't remember how much I paid for it at a Sony store in Vancouver, but Canadian prices were often higher than those in the U.S.