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After listening all summer to my Delhi sitting about 3 feet off the ground,I put up a thirty foot tower this week with a rotator.Much quieter background noise and better range.
I now have a remote controlled tuner and remote control rotator.
So spoiled I am.I can channel surf and rotate at the same time.
A friend and Myself did all the installation..
Follow Ups:
My QFM9 is going up tuesday but it will be on a tripod or mast on the roof which should put it the range of 30 to 40 feet off the ground with a rotator as well.In my basement the antenna hanging from the ceiling gives me a 5 to 6 on 10 signal strength meter reading on my fav station, so if I can get 8 or more for the same station, it will have been worth it.
Well,it is done... QFM-9, Ken W's low loss balun, belden 7915A, heavily modified and perfectly aligned tuner Sony ST-S555ES. This FM chain is amazing, no noise, no hiss and wide sound stage. It took me 4 years to get to this point. But I can stop now and enjoy.
Oh and as perdicted the signal strength meter now reads 8.5 where it read 5 before, full quieting on all the stations I care to listen to.
cheers
paba
If that's the one I read about on the Web, just how much difference does this make? Did you buy it made or kit or cobble it together yourself completely? Can you give Web URL, please?Thanks.
I'm using the RS FM specific antenna and having a blast with the newfound reception. Also using RS higher quality balun, RG6 quad shield, and current baluns per Brian Beezley.
Hi,bought the balun from Ken W...here
homepage.mac.com/kenwetzel/Low_Loss_Balun.htmcoax is Belden 7915A
Does it sound better than a good quality commercial version?
Hi
what is a good quality commercial version? All the commercial ones I've seen are like 2$. haven't done any real comparisons because I can't go up on the roof and do a swap that easily since I don't own a ladder that size.Never saw any specs for the 2$ units, are they flat on the full 88 to 108 Mhz? I suspect that is where the difference is but you should email Ken and ask him what the delta is between the 2 options.
He told me what the essential difference would be for reception, after detailing the numbers and the theory: for difficult stations and distant stations a significant improvement, but for closer stations probably not. Bottom line seems to be that if I already get it in stereo, I'm not going to notice much difference; had I only received scratchy stuff in mono, probably a lot. My problem isn't the latter, so I'm going to just stick with what I have.In fact, since the new RS antenna and the minor Beezley mods, I'm not having ANY problems whatsoever! Was just trying to figure out if there was any major benefit left in fooling with this thing before I brave crawling into my attic crawlspace to place it.
Ken's design uses the same essential Radio Shack parts as an ordinary Radio Shack balun, probably only improved upon by the gold coating in the RS Gold version for whatever that's worth. The difference is the small coil he constructs out of the Belden wire and the Amidon core, which he has taken pains to match for this purpose.
I have a lot of respect for Ken for his prompt, imformative and honest reply and the pricing he puts on his efforts if you want to buy either the kit or the finished product.
I sure hope your dwelling is more than thirty feet in any direction from that tower!Just kidding.
Can you give some more details on the product/installation? Photo(s)?
What did you put on it for antennae? I want to raise a tower but I think I may really need more than one. I want some directionals, one for AM and one for FM, maybe one for SW too, and I think I need a vertical too. I am concerned that all that on one tower might self interact or something bad and nothing will work as well as it could. I guess I will still have the option of switching to the eartth bound antennae I already have, namely a long wire strung out back along the fence. I suppose I am somewhat of an aspiring radio operator but I haven't tried getting my ham licens or anything, just stick to CB bands for now. Problem is there are no universal antannae to cover all the bands I want to cover since I want to DX on every band while at the same time I have the conflicting desire to have great omnis as well. It should go without saying that above all I would like to improve sonic performance of whatever programming I decide to partake of.You can now see my tendencies to mix hobies here. I guess there are worse problems to have. Just curious how you might have dealt with this type of thing if you did.
You'll need at least two different antennas- one for TV/FM/UHF, one for AM/SW.I put a big combo (TV/FM/UHF) antenna on the roof with a rotor, and strung a separate AM/SW antenna wire around the yard (about 175 feet long), high in the trees. Reception on both is excellent.
I terminated the AM antenna at a 9:1 balun, grounded to an 8' ground rod, then fed by underground coax to another ground rod right outside the house, then coax to the receivers. You'll probably need a balun to 'tune' (impedance matching, really) the antenna, especially if you're using it across several SW bands.
The FM antenna is also fed by coax to the second ground rod (ground the outer shield, not the inner wire, obviously), then coax into the receivers/TV. The antenna mounting tripod is also grounded to the mentioned ground rod.
All your grounds must be connected to the ground at your electrical service box. Otherwise, you're more at risk of frying equipment (there isn't a whole lot you can do to protect against a direct hit). Again, one ground for all equipment and antenna lead shields.
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