WKOX on the air from Newton?

[markwa1ion@aol.com]

Robbins Farm Park would be a good spot.  It's about a mile from you.  
Park on Eastern Ave. by the Brackett School and walk into the park a 
couple of hundred feet from the street.  You will also enjoy the 
splendid view of Boston while you're doing your DF'ing.

I should know.  I played up there all the time as a kid.  See the 
park's web site "http://www.robbinsfarmpark.org".

This would be a bang-up location for FM DX.

I'll take my own DF cuts on 1200 later today and report back the 
results.  The little Sony SRF-59 is surprisingly good for direction 
finding.  The Framingham versus Newton bearing spread isn't quite as 
great here just north of the 3A / 62 junction as it is for you in 
Arlington, but I should still be able to note the difference.

Some radios that also have a telescoping whip antenna aren't too useful 
for nulls because the FM whip distorts the pick-up pattern of the AM 
ferrite rod.

Mark Connelly, WA1ION - Billerica, MA

-----Original Message-----
From: Dan.Strassberg <dan.strassberg@att.net>
To: boston-radio-interest@rolinin.bostonradio.org; markwa1ion@aol.com
Sent: Fri, 1 Aug 2008 1:12 pm
Subject: Re: WKOX on the air from Newton?


Certainly correct in theory. And it often works, too. But sometimes it 
doesn't--and now seems to be one of those times. My Super Radio III, 
which was maybe 18 years old, died a week or so ago and its 
replacement, a CC Radio Plus,=2
0arrived this morning while I was out 
getting breakfast and a newspaper. To its credit, the CC Radio has, in 
its fashion, a signal-strength indicator on its LCD--the indicator 
resembles cell-phone bars. I believe that, like the Super Radio, the 
CC Radio owes its relatively good AM sensitivity at least partly to an 
extra-large ferrite loop antenna. And I believe that the ferrite loops 
in both radios are located at the top of the case with their long axes 
parallel to the case's long dimension. 
 
With the Super Radio, I found that orienting the antenna perpendiclar 
to the front of the house gave the best reception of stations to the 
west. Orienting the antenna parallel to the font of the house gave the 
best reception of WMKI. That made a lot of sense. But before the 
reconstruction of the WUNR site, the best orientation for WUNR was 
pretty much the best orientation for WKOX and WBIX, which makes less 
sense. 
 
With the CC Radio, I haven't found reliable nulls for any of these 
stations. I suspect the problem is reradiation of the signals by the 
house wiring, which is Romex, not BX, and hence is not shielded. If 
I'm motivated, I may try taking the CC Radio into the playground 
behind the house. Around second base in the baseball diamond, I should 
be far enough from the overhead AC power lines and any house wiring to 
get a reliable fix on the20directions from which the signals are 
coming, but the problem is complicated by the fact that the streets in 
my neighborhhod are not even close to "square with the compass," and I 
can never remember which way is north. (BTW, I have not found moss to 
be not a reliable indicator.) 
 
----- 
Dan Strassberg (dan.strassberg@att.net) 
eFax 1-707-215-6367 
 
----- Original Message ----- From: <markwa1ion@aol.com> 
To: <boston-radio-interest@rolinin.bostonradio.org> 
Sent: Friday, August 01, 2008 8:32 AM 
Subject: WKOX on the air from Newton? 
 
> This would seem to be a very easy matter to resolve if one has 
> access to a typical transistor AM radio containing a ferrite rod 
> (loopstick) antenna. 
> 
> You place the radio on a clear table away from wiring and metallic 
> objects and turn it until a null or obviously-diminished signal 
> results. For very strong stations, you may have to tune a bit off 
> frequency and detect the splatter instead of regular audio. 
> 
> WBIX-1060 and Framingham 1200 would null at about the same radio 
> position. WRCA-1330 / WUNR-1600 / Newton 1200 would null at a 
> different position for many of us. The angular spread between 
> Newton and Framingham transmitter site bearings from the Arlington 
> Heights / Lexington area should be significant, over 45 degrees.