Indoor antenna advice

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hfflunki

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Hi I haven't done shortwave in a couple years and poped my current radio by hooking it up with an alligator clip I plan on pirate monitoring and am leaning towards a rs 505 clone considering there the cheapest iv seen some on close out as low as 45$ if I can find one if not want a pl 660 my question is if I get a long wire balun can I hook a long wire up safely or would splicing a mone patch wire with the negative lead grounded well please help and keep in mind I don't have a lot of money
 

Boombox

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Hi I haven't done shortwave in a couple years and poped my current radio by hooking it up with an alligator clip I plan on pirate monitoring and am leaning towards a rs 505 clone considering there the cheapest iv seen some on close out as low as 45$ if I can find one if not want a pl 660 my question is if I get a long wire balun can I hook a long wire up safely or would splicing a mone patch wire with the negative lead grounded well please help and keep in mind I don't have a lot of money

The Radio Shack radio is a good radio for the money.

You don't need a balun -- you want to use one, go ahead, but I have never used one, and am not sure how necessary one would be with a shorter wire.

And I wouldn't use a very long wire to start with. The radio you mention here (Radio Shack 20-629, the "PLL Synthesized World Receiver", an updated ATS-505 with a different audio chips in it) is pretty sensitive.

I use mine with a 25 ft. indoor wire and get good results. I've heard a couple pirates on it. But I mostly hear the international broadcasters and some Asian stations, SE Asian stations, and South American broadcasters, as well as some hams. When propagation's good I hear Kuwait OK.

If you try a very long wire, it could overload the radio.

Just rig up a 20-30 foot indoor wire, solder the end of it to the tip of a 1/8 inch mono jack, and plug it in to the Radio Shack radio's external antenna jack. If you want to add a ground, you could add it to the 'shield' side of the mono plug, but if it's a short wire antenna a ground won't really do much.

With any outdoor antenna you'd want some sort of ground available to ground the antenna when not in use. If you try a longer wire with a digital portable, you always have to be aware that they are so sensitive (designed to work with the whip and shorter wire antennas) that they can overload a bit, causing images of stations to appear about 1 mhz lower than they really are. This can be problematic at times, and sometimes it's just a minor nuisance and can be worked around by using the radio's "DX-Local" switch and setting it to "Local". A lot of this also would depend on how strong SW signals are in your area. Some areas of the US have stronger SW reception than others.

If you get the Tecsun, I don't know how an external antenna is connected to one of those.
 

ka3jjz

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Yes the PL-660 does have an external 'SW' antenna jack, at least according to the Universal ad for the radio.

Wire antennas are fine, but in an indoor environment they're apt to pick up noise as much as anything else. If you have a somewhat decent junk box, constructing the Carpet Loop is definitely worth considering and certainly inexpensive. The antenna element can be as big or as small as you need it, and you get the advantages of a loop, which is less sensitive to e-field noise issues.

Another alternative are the small indoor loops like this one from Kaito - the advantage of being portable means that you can move it around to find a quiet spot pretty easily. A little homework on the PL-660 Yahoo group (I'm sure there's at least 1) will bring results as to how well these little loops would work in your situation. Heck I'd even be tempted to get the Sony AN-LP1, if it's compatible with that radio. It's long out of production but I understand can be found on eBay on occasion.

None of these solutions should cost you all that much....Mike
 

shortwaver

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The ParEndFedZ EF-SWL antenna is a bit more than your looking to spend ($75) but has a very good reputation as a low noise antenna; it may be worth bumping up your budget.

I use it with a Tecsun 660 and a Commradio CR-1 with very good results. I haven't used it indoors but a Google search should find others that have, and report it works well strung around a room. Also check out the great reviews on Eham.

LNR Precision End-Fed Half-Wave Wire Antennas Product Reviews

Par EndFedZ® Antennas | LNR Precision Par EndFedz Antennas and QRP Transceivers
 

hfflunki

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Well I just got the antenna made a friend of mine has a electronic shop he took a spool of wire and soldered it to a mono mini plug with a 6ft lead to connect to ground wire it was 20bucks but I stink at solderingImageUploadedByTapatalk1407265571.516868.jpg
 
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