From: peterk@polari.online.com
Subject: Re: Help with commercial short wave radio reception.
Organization: Seattle Online Public Access Unix (206) 328-4944
Distribution: na
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 17:00:07 GMT

In article <1992Aug29.002331.5274@leland.Stanford.EDU> 
>gd@leland.Stanford.EDU (Gideon Friedmann) writes:

>I am trying to get the the voice of Israel on my old (15 year old
>Radio Shack Realistic DX 66) SW radio, and I just barely managed to
>do it several times, but the reception was terrible.

I'm in Seattle. Kol Israel has been rather marginal on the West Coast
lately. The best transmissions here are at 1900 Z (noon PDT) on 15640,
and 0400 (9:00 PM PDT) on 11588. The noon broadcast is usually of
better propogation quality. I suspect things may improve over the
winter, when conditions are better in general. There's been an awful
lot of solar flares lately, and Israel, being in a polar path to us, is
profoundly affected.

A complete schedule is in Monitoring Times, and has been posted here by
several people.

>   I am looking for some advice as to what I need to do to be able >to
receive it. >   Will a new digital radio help very much? 

It might. I use both a Sony 2010 and an Icom ham transceiver with
general coverage. Either work fine when the signal is coming in. The
Icom sometimes has a slight edge because I can manually slow the
automatic gain control when the signal has that polar-path "flutter." 
On the Sony, the noise "pumps" with the flutter. Digital readout does
make things a lot easier to find.

>Or do I need
>an excellent >antena. (up to now, I just hooked up a long wire to the
>radio and >hung it outside the appartment). >   

Try to get the antenna "in the clear" in the direction the signal will
be coming from--Northeast. In other words, try not to have your
building (or another) between the horizon in that direction, and you.
Fancy antennas are usually unecessary for all but the most hard-core
DXing. The main thing is to get 50-80 feet of wire as high and as "in
the clear" as you can.

The Sony is a very good program listener's radio. In general, I have
found that if a signal is worth listening to (for *content* as opposed
to for a DXers ID), I can hear it on the Sony. And the synch detector
really helps with selective fading distortion. Its narrow filter is 4
khz wide--ample selectivity for most conditions. And with the
selectable sideband, you can tune to one side or another to avoid an
adjacent-channel "squeal."

The ham transceiver is only better on *really* tough signals.
Unfortunately, Israel is sometimes in that category. I'm not familiar
with your old Realistic, but it probably isn't as good as what's
available nowadays. A new radio might help. Just remember, if the
signal is really bad, no radio will make it great. My advice is try
before you buy. Talk to some local hams/SWLs and borrow the receiver
you're thinking about, and try it in your location.

-- 
--Peter (Peter A. Klein)
peterk@polari.online.com               :    -----==3==      ___      ___
uunet!polari.online.com!peterk         :   |    |  |  |    |   |    |   |
peterk%polari.online.com@uunet.uu.net  :  @|   @| @| @|   @|  @|   @|  @|
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU