Does anyone else like FM?

[Mark1]

The RCA rabbit ears seemed like it could be such a good FM antenna I couldn't resist ordering it. It's still in shipping.

I think there's something else going on with the FM signal not really related to my current antenna or tuner. Monday I was getting a lot of interference on one of the normally strong stations, and some other stations' reception wasn't as clear. Today all the stations were coming in about perfectly even the most distant one. With all the wireless devices today I wonder if it isn't some other signal(s) interference. Although Monday probably was a heavier vehicle traffic day on the nearby freeway.

Anyway, maybe the rabbit ears with all of its adjustability can cut out the occasional interference. Plus being a half wave dipole it should have a little more gain than the smaller eight wave dipole antenna.

 

[EJ3]

The RCA rabbit ears seemed like it could be such a good FM antenna I couldn't resist ordering it. It's still in shipping.

I think there's something else going on with the FM signal not really related to my current antenna or tiuner. Monday I was getting a lot of interference on one of the normally strong stations, and some other stations' reception wasn't as clear, Today all the stations were coming in about perfectly even the most distant one. With all the wireless devices today I wonder if it isn't some other signal(s) interference. Although Monday probably was a heavier vehicle traffic day on the nearby freeway.

Anyway, maybe the rabbit ears with all of its adjustability can cut out the occasional. Plus being a half wave dipole it should have a little more gain then the smaller eight wave dipole antenna.

I'm looking forward to you having a good result.
My issue is not traffic/interference so much as it is distance or low power from the station that I want to receive.

 

[Doodski]

Monday I was getting a lot of interference on one of the normally strong stations, and some other stations' reception wasn't as clear, Today all the stations were coming in about perfectly even the most distant one. With all the wireless devices today I wonder if it isn't some other signal(s) interference. Although Monday probably was a heavier vehicle traffic day on the nearby freeway.

Could it be weather related? FM is directional and localized weather in it's path could screw it up I suppose.(?)

 

[Mark1]

I'm looking forward to you having a good result.
My issue is not traffic/interference so much as it is distance or low power from the station that I want to receive.

Yeah I'm looking forward to seeing how the rabbit ears with all the adjustability fare when interference crops up . They probably wouldn't do much in a distant/weak signal situation like yours but maybe in an interference situation.

 

[Mark1]

Could it be weather related? FM is directional and localized weather in it's path could screw it up I suppose.(?)

I wondered if interference could be weather or maybe solar activity related. Although as I recall the weather was clearer earlier this week when I was getting worse signal. Probably was all the sunshine .

 

[Head_Unit]

Yeah I'm looking forward to seeing how the rabbit ears with all the adjustability fare when interference crops up . They probably wouldn't do much in a distant/weak signal situation like yours but maybe in an interference situation.

Good luck! Really you just can't buy good FM antennas any more...some used 8' from argh who was that famous tuner maker? Magnum Dynalab?

 

[Mark1]

Good luck! Really you just can't buy good FM antennas any more...some used 8' from argh who was that famous tuner maker? Magnum Dynalab?

Yeah and never was a good antenna need as much as now. That's why I'm thinking and hoping this rabbit ears will be as good as it gets in an indoor FM antenna. And seems you just can't get as good FM tuners anymore, or as good FM broadcast signal in the first place with all the interference today and HD Radio noise. It seems in the past I always got great FM reception with just a wire antenna or a simple dipole.

 

[mhardy6647]

Good luck! Really you just can't buy good FM antennas any more...some used 8' from argh who was that famous tuner maker? Magnum Dynalab?

that's the Metz antenna I mentioned earlier. Not sure if it's available under any brand name any more, though.
Big ol' FM Yagis have gotten to be hard to find (and hella 'spensive), too.
I've gone to 1/4 wavelength "monopoles" on a couple of FM receivers here -- for convenience and hideability.
Piece of wire and an F-connector.

 

[flightops]

Yeah I'm looking forward to seeing how the rabbit ears with all the adjustability fare when interference crops up . They probably wouldn't do much in a distant/weak signal situation like yours but maybe in an interference situation.

Best indoor fm antenna I’ve ever had is a ota TV one I found at the thrift store one day:

It had that same uhf loop. 40” antennas. RCA branded.

Brought it home and pulled the uhf loop off, opened it up and bypassed all the other “hoopla” in it to go direct to each antenna and then just a flat 2 wire ribbon cable to the fm antenna lugs on the back of the receiver:

Glued that center dial back on for appearances sake. The “gubbins” are all gone.

It usually sits in the shelf you see behind the receiver.

Pulls in local stations crystal clear as well as distant ones.

I keep my eyes open for another one anytime I’m walking through the thrift store…for $4.99 you just can’t loose.

 

[Mark1]

Best indoor fm antenna I’ve ever had is one I found at the thrift store one day.

View attachment 425195

It had that same uhf loop. 40” antennas. RCA branded.

Brought it home and pulled the uhf loop off, opened it up and bypassed all the other “hoopla” in it to go direct to each antenna and then just a flat 2 wire ribbon cable to the fm antenna lugs on the back of the receiver.

Pulls in local stations crystal clear as well as distant ones.

I keep my eyes open for another one anytime I’m walking through the thrift store…for $4.99 you just can’t loose.

Nice. It'd be nice get a deal that good. I'm hoping my new RCA rabbit ears works as good as that vintage one. So you don't think the fine knob tuning circuitry was worth keeping? I picked out a new one with the tuning knob hoping the adjustability would be beneficial.

 

[flightops]

Nice. It'd be nice get a deal that good. I'm hoping my new RCA rabbit ears works as good as that vintage one. So you don't think the fine knob tuning circuitry was worth keeping? I picked out a new one with the tuning knob hoping the adjustability would be beneficial.

Don’t quote me on it, but I think thats more applicable to trying to tune out the “snow” you used to get in OTA tv signals:

https://www.rcaantennas.net/docs/common/ANT111F/ANT111F_OM.pdf

I just wanted a decent dipole without anything getting in the way of the signal.

Positioning the rabbit ears does all the signal “fine tuning” for me and I was pulling out the UHF wiring anyways. I can’t remember much of the stuff I pulled out other than recalling it was a board with a rheostat like printing on i and a couple wire takeoffs at different positions. Wasn’t much of anything worth keeping for FM reception from what I could tell. I’m not a rad tech either though.

I believe I also read somewhere that dial is more for the uhf than vhf. Now that I think about it, the knob/board might have been connected mainly to the uhf loop. Dunno for sure, as I wasn’t planning to hold onto that information about “the guts” long.

I also wanted to toss the coax it came with for the flat ribbon style to simplify hook up to the back of the Sansui.

Nothing to say you can’t try that dial and see if it helps any though…

 

[Mark1]

Don’t quote me on it, but I think thats more applicable to trying to tune out the “snow” you used to get in OTA tv signals:

https://www.rcaantennas.net/docs/common/ANT111F/ANT111F_OM.pdf

I just wanted a decent dipole without anything getting in the way of the signal.

Positioning the rabbit ears does all the signal “fine tuning” for me and I was pulling out the UHF wiring anyways. I can’t remember much of the stuff I pulled out other than recalling it was a board with a rheostat like printing on i and a couple wire takeoffs at different positions. Wasn’t much of anything worth keeping for FM reception from what I could tell. I’m not a rad tech either though.

I believe I also read somewhere that dial is more for the uhf than vhf. Now that I think about it, the knob/board might have been connected mainly to the uhf loop. Dunno for sure, as I wasn’t planning to hold onto that information about “the guts” long.

I also wanted to toss the coax it came with for the flat ribbon style to simplify hook up to the back of the Sansui.

Nothing to say you can’t try that dial and see if it helps any though…

I still haven't figured out what the fine tuning knob really does, whether it adjusts the antennas impedance or what. My thinking was if it does help tune in the tv VHF signal it should help FM, but I don't remember back in the day the dial doing much for even the tv signal lol. I'm planning to keep the antenna intact in case it ever gets used as a HDTV antenna. Well hopefully if the tuning knob doesn't help it won't hurt reception.

 

[EJ3]

I still haven't figured out what the fine tuning knob really does, whether it adjusts the antennas impedance or what. My thinking was if it does help tune in the tv VHF signal it should help FM, but I don't remember back in the day the dial doing much for even the tv signal lol. I'm planning to keep the antenna intact in case it ever gets used as a HDTV antenna. Well hopefully if the tuning knob doesn't help it won't hurt reception.

All radio/TV antennas are HD antennas. There is nothing special about an HD antenna except the marketing. Don't let that marketing scam fool you. A radio/TV signal is a radio/TV signal, the only difference is for your radio/TV to be able to decode the signal.

 

[Mark1]

All radio/TV antennas are HD antennas. There is nothing special about an HD antenna except the marketing. Don't let that marketing scam fool you. A radio/TV signal is a radio/TV signal, the

only difference is for your radio/TV to be able to decode the signal.

Right, I meant there's just HD digital on TV broadcast nowadays, and I'm going to keep the UHF loop and tuner knob circuitry intact in case the antenna ever gets used for TV. Or if I sell or pass it on, I figure most people would just want it as a HDTV antenna. I'm hoping upgrading to one with a tuner will improve FM signal gain and interference or at least not hurt reception lol.

 

[JeffS7444]

I still haven't figured out what the fine tuning knob really does, whether it adjusts the antennas impedance or what. My thinking was if it does help tune in the tv VHF signal it should help FM, but I don't remember back in the day the dial doing much for even the tv signal lol. I'm planning to keep the antenna intact in case it ever gets used as a HDTV antenna. Well hopefully if the tuning knob doesn't help it won't hurt reception.

You might not notice much difference if your signal strength is already pretty good. But some older deluxe set-top antennae had not one, but two dials! I suspect that one acted as a preselector, and the other, a tuner, but it's been a long time since I've fussed with one of those beasts. Antenna tuners and preselectors are still pretty common in the world of ham radio.

 

[mhardy6647]

Don’t quote me on it, but I think thats more applicable to trying to tune out the “snow” you used to get in OTA tv signals:

https://www.rcaantennas.net/docs/common/ANT111F/ANT111F_OM.pdf

I just wanted a decent dipole without anything getting in the way of the signal.

Positioning the rabbit ears does all the signal “fine tuning” for me and I was pulling out the UHF wiring anyways. I can’t remember much of the stuff I pulled out other than recalling it was a board with a rheostat like printing on i and a couple wire takeoffs at different positions. Wasn’t much of anything worth keeping for FM reception from what I could tell. I’m not a rad tech either though.

I believe I also read somewhere that dial is more for the uhf than vhf. Now that I think about it, the knob/board might have been connected mainly to the uhf loop. Dunno for sure, as I wasn’t planning to hold onto that information about “the guts” long.

I also wanted to toss the coax it came with for the flat ribbon style to simplify hook up to the back of the Sansui.

Nothing to say you can’t try that dial and see if it helps any though…

Should/could help with multipath -- although I think fundamentally it might have fine-tuned the antenna resonance, which, again wouldn't be a bad thing.
Of course, adjusting the length of a pair of collapsible rabbit ears will tune the resonance, too.

 

[Mark1]

I just got the rabbit ears connected today. It seems to have more gain. Adjusting the element length, angle, rotating the whole antenna position and the tuner knob all have an effect on signal reception.

There's a lot of adjustability and it can usually get out most all of the interference a channel might be having, but that amounts to a lot of antenna adjusting and what's best for one channel isn't always good for another. It does seem there is a compromise position that gives decent reception for all of the channels. It seems with more signal gain there might be a gain with the interference too, and the tuner wants to hover at stereo where it would be clearer if it just switched to mono.

I guess the rabbit ears is an overall improvement left in a best overall adjustment plus adjustability for when there's more reception problems. I think I have other signal interference and maybe vehicle interference at times that no antenna can really eliminate at least not an indoor one. Yesterday and on the weekend, I was getting clear strong reception on all channels and Monday has been a bad signal day. I think there is a lot of interfering activity at times on weekdays. It doesn't seem my car radio is very affecting by interference. Although it is outside as far as I know it just has a very short dipole antenna. I think my home receiver's FM tuner isn't what it could be with sensitivity but especially selectivity and rejecting interference.

 

[Doodski]

I just got the rabbit ears connected today. It seems to have more gain. Adjusting the element length, angle, rotating the whole antenna position and the tuner knob all have an effect on signal reception.

There's a lot of adjustability and it can usually get out most all of the interference a channel might be having, but that amounts to a lot of antenna adjusting and what's best for one channel isn't always good for another. It does seem there is a compromise position that gives decent reception for all of the channels. It seems with more signal gain there might be a gain with the interference too, and the tuner wants to hover at stereo where it would be clearer if it just switched to mono.

I guess the rabbit ears is an overall improvement left in a best overall adjustment plus adjustability for when there's more reception problems. I think I have other signal interference and maybe vehicle interference at times that no antenna can really eliminate at least not an indoor one. Yesterday and on the weekend, I was getting clear strong reception on all channels and Monday has been a bad signal day. I think there is a lot of interfering activity at times on weekdays. It doesn't seem my car radio is very affecting by interference. Although it is outside as far as I know it just has a very short dipole antenna. I think my home receiver's FM tuner isn't what it could be with sensitivity but especially selectivity and rejecting interference.

I picked up a smaller maybe about 1.5 meter long Yagi antenna from a Chinese discount website and it worked. The price was astoundingly low too.

 

[EJ3]

I picked up a smaller maybe about 1.5 meter long Yagi antenna from a Chinese discount website and it worked. The price was astoundingly low too.

Are you using it inside your living room (or otherwise inside, in an attic or outdoors?

 

[Doodski]

Are you using it inside your living room (or otherwise inside, in an attic or outdoors?

I test drove it in the living room near the window. It was about 15 years ago.