Greetings,
, Very interesting topic. Good information Sky Valley, I found the AM website info. particularly useful although I like printed hardcopy directories like the NRC Log etc. the best. Have many others and older ones too including the M Street Directory, Whites Radio Log, old Vane Jones books, FM Atlas etc. etc.. Yes online is up to date but I like printed books I can take anywhere without the hassle of using any computer or online device whatsoever. However I do thank you very much Sky Valley for the sites , that one AM site I had not seen and its free and quite good.
Now regarding Loop Antennas, that is my specialty , I have built and sold loop antennas both ferrite and air-core since 1978, the first ones we built were on upside down metal cake pans. We greatly improved them since. Sold them in Calgary throughout the 1980s when I had my workshop and office there. Sold them in North Surrey, BC... Built a 12 Foot Air-Core Loop Antenna outdoors in Surrey at the CFAY studios in the summer of 1978 or 79 with my partner Terry K... We used it with a Long Range TRF Realistic AM only 655 Portable and DX-160 Communications receiver to pull in KTOB 1490 Petaluma, California at 1:30 PM to 2 PM in the afternoon in North Surrey, BC. It was outdoor and a triangle loop of my own design. We had it till later in the fall when I dismantled it because of the rain and wind which was soaking the wooden frame and deteriorating it. I never had built a big one like that since but was extremely impressed and will be building a large one like that as soon as I get the new house in Murrayville, Langley Township this spring and get back to Langley. I am also going to build a 10 Foot Long Ferrite Loop Outdoor Antenna too and compare that with the 12 Foot Air-Core Loop Antenna for performance for long distance AM reception at 12 Noon. I have built quite a lot of amplified Ferrite Loop antennas of my own design and sold them to dxers, radio stations across the USA and Canada and people wanting to just improve AM reception in places like Yorkton, Saskatchewan. CJGX 940 is just one station in Yorkton, Saskatchewan that bought some off me quite a few years ago. I have my own designs for Ferrite Loops and advertised them in Popular Communications, Monitoring Times and Broadcasting Magazine in the 1980s and early 1990s! One of my unique Ferrite Loops is called the Tri-Loop Ferrite Antenna and its a hot little loop for dxing! I also worked with and experimented with phasor loops using 555 IC timers in my Calgary workshop with Terry. Using two loops an air-core and ferrite with a communications radio (that Radiofan had loaned us) and the GE Superadio in Calgary we received KGLE 590 Glendive, Montana at 12 Noon with a listenable signal. We were at 12th Avenue near 8th street almost downtown Calgary and reception was pretty good there, amazing with all the apartment buildings etc. in the beltline area there.
Once I get back out to Langley and out of this WInter Hell (the worst winter in my entire life here in the Cobourg area with 3 feet of snow and temperatures from Minus 20 to 0 Fahrenheit at night and very cold in the day too, almost 50 degrees below freezing) I will be back building loop antennas in Murrayville, Langley Township at the new house and workshop there I am buying! I plan on increasing my radio business for loop antennas there even more than what I did in Calgary and Surrey years ago. Have been somewhat inactive building loop antennas the last 10 to 15 years. However I have sold two or three smaller air-core and one ferrite ones here in the Cobourg, Ontario area on my very long 2 and a half year visit. I wanted to build a 12 foot Air-Core Tri-loop here because this is a fantastic dx location 60 miles east of Toronto. However family circumstances and other business prevented me from doing so and certainly cannot do it with this winter hell we are going through the last two months or so!!! Yes Sky Valley is absolutely correct you do not need an antenna jack on portable radios including the G8 to use a air-core loop or even a ferrite portable loop antenna, you just put the radio near it and by inductance they will couple for reception. You can adjust the antenna etc. for various affects by distance with the portable radio. I have a Select-A-Tenna that is no longer made or sold but was for many years and its a great little portable air-core loop too, was made in Wisconsin by a company there. I also have a Palomar Ferrite Loop Antenna from California wwhich is good. But I prefer my own Ferrite Loop designs the best. However one loop I wish I had is the KIWA Air-Core Loop that were built in Yakima, Washington. They were a work of art and performed extremely well. I know some AM Dxers across the USA that have one. i would love to have one and from what I understand they are state of the art air-core portable Loop Antennas. Unfortunately KIWA which moved to Minnesota from Washington State no longer builds loop antennas anymore. I have file folders of loop antenna designs, rf pre-amps (Fet designs etc.) on the topic.
If you would like to see some of the loop antennas we built plus many other radio oriented photos including many of old radio station charts and station links. check out my new website that Jim and I designed and created in August 2014. I had never had a website for my longtime radio mailorder business before but have since August 2014. There are neat old tubes, loop antennas etc. on the site plus items I am selling from Cobourg, Ontario area currently. The site is
http://www.eldonelectronics.wordpress.com Anyway keep up the great topic, great reading. Good dxing everyone and man it sounds like heaven weatherwise in Greater Vancouver and the Fraser Valley compared to this winter hell here, can hardly wait to leave!!!!
73s Eldon