Randomwire madness

[Michiganrailfan]

Hello

I'm new to SWL, but have been addicted to scanning for several years. Not an electrical engineer.

3 weeks ago I got SoftRock Ensemble - my first SW radio - a low cost entry to the hobby.

And I'm hooked.

So now I'm reading a lot about SWL antennas. I put up a Rube Goldberg randomwire, no balun, no grounding, and to me it gets decent reception. But I want more. I'm ready to stretch more randomwire into the big back yard. Behind my house is a 100 foot stretch of open lawn to a single tree. Behind that tree is another 150 feet of open stretch to the property line, which backs up against a forest. Lots of options there.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but from what I gather, random wires are essentially the only poor-man's way to hear multiple bands .....as long as the wire is long enough. But then, to do it right, its important to have the right ground, the right balun, And that's where I'm confused. From what I'm reading, some say one way of grounding is best, others say another. Some say one type of balun is best, some say another is better, and others say no balun at all. Now I'm confused.

So I said, to heck with the forest and instead look at a PAR endfed. Lots of rave reviews. But I'd need to buy more than one .....one for each band. At around $70 a pop, the bill will add up. The wife will rail.

So, now I'm back to the randomwire. I'm thinking of overkilling noise reduction by stretching a coax feed line 100 feet from the shack to the first tree. At that point I can stretch a lot of wire to the forest at the property line. Heck I could stretch 300 feet if needed.

Can you give me advice on grounding & a balun? I'm pretty handy, but I can't see myself wrapping wire around a ferrite core unless the instructions are written for beginners.

Thanks

 

[ka3jjz]

You don't need more than 1 PAR to handle multiple bands. Those are the ham-band models - the SWL model will cover the range fairly well, although to improve reception below about 4 mhz or so, you can make the antenna longer. That's something that, in your case, you probably would want to do.

Getting the antenna away from the house is the number one way to kill as much of the noise as you can. As for grounding, it might be a moot point right now - if the ground is frozen solid, ramming ground rods will mean a trip to the chiropractor, hi. The first rule that I keep hearing over and over again is adherence to your local electrical codes. There have been many threads about grounding in this and other forums...

As for baluns - I'll leave that for those with practical experience - those are your best guides, frankly.

73 Mike

 

[SCPD]

Michiganrailfan i just ordered myself a new antenna. If you want you can have my 9:1 balun and my 50ft wire. If you can use it then its yours. Just pm your address and i will send it out to you as soon as my setup gets jere. the balun in pl259 with a wing nut on the top so you can add any length you want. My new setup does not need a balun.


Your paying the shipping


Mike

 

[kilokat7]

Hello
So now I'm reading a lot about SWL antennas. I put up a Rube Goldberg randomwire, no balun, no grounding, and to me it gets decent reception. But I want more. I'm ready to stretch more randomwire into the big back yard. Behind my house is a 100 foot stretch of open lawn to a single tree. Behind that tree is another 150 feet of open stretch to the property line, which backs up against a forest. Lots of options there.

So, now I'm back to the randomwire. I'm thinking of overkilling noise reduction by stretching a coax feed line 100 feet from the shack to the first tree. At that point I can stretch a lot of wire to the forest at the property line. Heck I could stretch 300 feet if needed.

Can you give me advice on grounding & a balun? I'm pretty handy, but I can't see myself wrapping wire around a ferrite core unless the instructions are written for beginners.

Thanks

FWIW, here's the antenna setup I use with my SDR. If you have access/permission to a large chunk of land behind your place, consider just running a wire on the ground as far out as possible in a straight line. Your layout sounds similar to mine. My suburban house backs up to a large wooded area. I laid about 60 feet of coax that runs from the house to our backyard fence on our property line. The idea is to get the antenna as far away from the house (& electrical noise) as possible. On this fence I have mounted a weather proof electrical box that contains an ICE model 182A longwire matching unit. The ICE unit has a connection for your coax cable, and another for your wire antenna. As for the actual antenna, I'm just using a spool of 500 FT insulated wire that I picked up at the local home improvement warehouse. I run the wire out into the woods, on the ground, as far out as possible (while keeping the wire in a straight line). I leave it out during the fall & winter months and reel it back up in the Spring. For grounding, I'm using an 8 FT ground rod where the ICE unit is, and another ground rod connected the coax shield where the coax enters the house. So far I've been pleased with the results on the lower frequencies. My main area of interest is LW, MW, and the lower shortwave bands where the antenna performs the best. Above 10 mhz, performance seems to drop off, but it still pulls in a lot of stuff. PM me for more details if interested.

 

[N8IAA]

Hello

I'm new to SWL, but have been addicted to scanning for several years. Not an electrical engineer.

3 weeks ago I got SoftRock Ensemble - my first SW radio - a low cost entry to the hobby.

And I'm hooked.

So now I'm reading a lot about SWL antennas. I put up a Rube Goldberg randomwire, no balun, no grounding, and to me it gets decent reception. But I want more. I'm ready to stretch more randomwire into the big back yard. Behind my house is a 100 foot stretch of open lawn to a single tree. Behind that tree is another 150 feet of open stretch to the property line, which backs up against a forest. Lots of options there.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but from what I gather, random wires are essentially the only poor-man's way to hear multiple bands .....as long as the wire is long enough. But then, to do it right, its important to have the right ground, the right balun, And that's where I'm confused. From what I'm reading, some say one way of grounding is best, others say another. Some say one type of balun is best, some say another is better, and others say no balun at all. Now I'm confused.

So I said, to heck with the forest and instead look at a PAR endfed. Lots of rave reviews. But I'd need to buy more than one .....one for each band. At around $70 a pop, the bill will add up. The wife will rail.

So, now I'm back to the randomwire. I'm thinking of overkilling noise reduction by stretching a coax feed line 100 feet from the shack to the first tree. At that point I can stretch a lot of wire to the forest at the property line. Heck I could stretch 300 feet if needed.

Can you give me advice on grounding & a balun? I'm pretty handy, but I can't see myself wrapping wire around a ferrite core unless the instructions are written for beginners.

Thanks

Take it from someone who's made antennas for tranmission and reception for 25 years, a long wire about 40' in length and an inexpensive tuner or preselector, will bring the world to your radio. What I'm saying, is, that an antenna for 40meters can be tuned for lower in the band and highter in the bands. The only problem will be how selective your receiver is. It may get the powerhouse signals and not let you hear many of the lower power stations.
HTH,
Larry

 

[a29zuk]

I agree with kilokat. Although I don't have a permanent setup about 4 or 5 times a year I will go to a nearby park and roll out 400 to 500' of wire on the ground. If you have the room go for it. You won't be disappointed.

 

[RoninJoliet]

I have a Icom R75 and use a 80' and 65' long wire in different directions and a end fed wire on each coming into a small box with each connected to the box...I then have a pigtail wire coming off to the radio with a duel plug on a piece of double speaker wire and connect each one seperate to see the best signal...Its great fun as the bands 80-40- been very good lately....

 

[RadioDaze]

Even if you did go with the PAR, are you sure you're looking at the right one? They do have a wideband antenna (PAR-EF-SWL) that covers 1-30 MHz.
Par Electronics EF-SWL End Fed Dipole SWL Antenna. Par EF-SWL.

 

[kb2vxa]

Before this thread takes off into The Twilight Zone I'll be glad to give you a short and to the point answer.
There are two ways of doing it, the first is to run the wire (normally 50-100') right to the receiver but if that's not practical you have a second option, the wire outdoors with a coaxial transmission line.

Never mind instructions on how to wind a 9:1 un-un since the type of core shows up as rather ambiguous information and even if I could find something suitable and a source for one unit only you'd have to build a clamping device and use a crochet hook. There's another fly in the ointment, no site I checked said anything about the length of the winding wires. That leaves you with your best bet, buy one and they're rather inexpensive.
AtomicAntenna : 9:1 Longwire, Balun, Unun, Adapter, Shortwave, Slinky

"I'm thinking of over killing noise reduction by stretching a coax feed line 100 feet from the shack to the first tree."
That will work and keep the XYL off your neck too. You can use RG-58U up to about 100' without appreciable loss on HF but no matter what you use UV resistant or direct burial type is preferred especially if you want to dig a shallow grave to keep it out of sight. FYI 300' is excessive unless you buy special low loss coax and it's rather expensive, not worth going that route IMO.

You can get coax, connectors, antenna wire and end insulators at any ham radio store, there are plenty on line.
"Can you give me advice on grounding & a balun?"
Sure, you can get an 8' copper clad steel earthing rod and a spool of 12AWG wire at your local electrical supply house. Drive it in under the un-un which BTW should be properly supported to begin with and run the wire connecting it to the ground lug on the un-un and you're good to go. Don't forget strain relief for the grounding wire and coax, we don't want any future mishaps here. One last thought, you can dig a small hole driving the rod below ground and burying the wire also so nobody trips over anything. Frankly I hope if you hit a root you haven't driven the rod too deep, it'll be a bugger to pull out without a tripod and a come along.

Good luck and congratulations on saving a bunch of money, $70 for what you can build yourself from parts is a bit much.

 

[CalebATC]

You also may want to do a fan dipole, one for 160 meters, and one for 10 meters, and another for 30 meters or so. Google fan dipole and you will see what I mean. It will be a good antenna for all your high, and all your low frequencies.


As for better reception, you may be out of luck. Since this is your first SWL- not everything comes in clear. From barley hearing anything, to having an S-20 (Highest I have ever gotten on 40 meters, from a station in Alabama, about 200 miles). Definatley, put it in a inverted V configuration, and get it as high as possible!

It is definitely not like VHF and UHF! Get used to the static !

 

[Michiganrailfan]

Thanks, everybody, for your suggestions. I have some good direction now. I'll keep you posted.

 

[tonsoffun]

I have merged your two threads together, in the future please do not cross post your threads.

Thanks

 

[RadioDaze]

...in the future please do not cross post your threads.

And for Heaven's sake, don't cross-thread your posts. You'll NEVER get the nuts to screw back on!

 

[Michiganrailfan]

Question from Rube Goldberg

Sorry Ron I screwed up on the cross posting.

I understand that the randomwire should be located far from the house to avoid RF noise. To do this, I need to run a piece of coax between the house and the randomwire.

Can you give me some advice on how to ground that coax before it enters the house?

It turns out I have an 8 foot copper ground rod buried in the soil right next to the side of the house where the coax feedline will enter the house.

So, what do you think of this idea? I imagine I’ll end up joining 2 pieces of coax together - a short piece going into the house, and a long piece stretching into the yard, where it’ll eventually connect with an un un. What's the best way to connect these cables to the ground rod? I'm thinking of a small utility box that’ll allow me to connect both coax cables while hard wiring the connection to the ground rod.

Out in the yard, at the un un, would be a second ground rod.

Is this too Rube Golberg?

Does anybody know who Rube Goldberg was?

 

[N8IAA]

Does anybody know who Rube Goldberg was?

Yes. Radiodaze's father:lol::lol::lol:
Larry

 

[RadioDaze]

Yes. Radiodaze's father:lol::lol::lol:
Larry

Yes... his birth-control device obviously was over-designed. Live chickens should never be strapped that close to a man's waist.

 

[kb2vxa]

"And for Heaven's sake, don't cross-thread your posts. You'll NEVER get the nuts to screw back on!"
Are you kidding me? This is Radio Reference, the nuts ALWAYS screw back on!

 

[ka3jjz]

OK guys, let's get this back on topic - enough silliness....Mike

 

[kb2vxa]

Well, you started it! (;->) OK OK, let's wait until Michigan J. Frog gets back to us on how he made out with this fiasco.

 

[Michiganrailfan]

More Rube Goldberg

Well, guys, it's working great.

For my SDR, here's the latest: the feed line is coax, leaving the basement through a window, not grounded, stretching 100 feet away from the house. From there I used plastic fence posts to stretch an additional 100 feet of insulated #12 wire out in the yard.

The plastic posts came with an electric dog fence I bought from Tractor Supply some time ago. The posts are cheap: 3 feet tall by half inch by half inch.....and they have little clips to hang the dog wire. Perfect for a randomwire. Anway, I ended up removing the dog fence and went with Invisible Fence. It gives the little rascals an jolt to remember when they get near the border.

Reception is very good. Better than before. Now I can hear the screaming religious guys loud and clear. Not that there's anything wrong with their message. It's the screaming I want to mute.

Thanks Xeno for the offer of a balun. I think I'll wait....I'm not sure I need it.....I talked with a guy from Associated Radio, and he said said try it without. What do you guys think?

Cheers