Bob Chilcoat wrote:

Sorry for the crossposting, but I'm looking for more expertise than I have.
I usually hang out in the aviation groups, but am an engineer by training.
I have a radio problem:

I have just completed a special rig for our local airport, but it has a
problem. I took a rather old but serviceable Sony digital air band receiver
(Air 8), boxed it up in a waterproof enclosure and piped the audio out to an
FM microwatt transmitter. The idea of this is that visitors to our airport
who like to sit in the parking lot and watch the airplanes can listen on
their car radios on FM 88.1 to the radio traffic on our Common Traffic
Advisory Frequency (CTAF), which at our airport is 123.00 MHz (AM).
Unfortunately, while this setup worked perfectly at home well away from the
airport, we have an Automatic Weather Observation Station (AWOS)
transmitting continuously on 120.60 MHz only 50-60 feet from the place I
need to site the receiver. Even though this is only a 5 Watt transmitter,
it overloads the front end of the receiver. As soon as anyone keys on
123.00 and the automatic squelch is triggered, all you hear is the AWOS
recording.

I've tried quick fix by attenuating the input signal by trimming
(shortening) the antenna, but this doesn't really help. This was supposed
to be a quick and dirty (gratis) job for the airport, and I've already spent
more time and money on it than I wanted to. Any suggestions as to how I
might fix this problem? Cheaply? Obviously a better receiver would work
(my Yaesu aviation handheld works perfectly at the same location), but I
have no other (free) receivers handy. I can move the receiver another 50
feet down the fence, which is my next option, but what if this doesn't work?
I can't get it any farther away for several reasons. Anyone have a 120 MHz
preselector they can give me? Any really steep (and cheap) 120.6 notch
filter designs?

Thanks for any help you can offer.

--
Bob (Chief Pilot, White Knuckle Airways)

Rather than building a trap, why not use a narrow bandpass filter?
Also, if you are that close to both transmitters, try attenuating the
signal from the antenna to prevent overloading the receiver.

One other idea. if the signal is from a transmitter at the airport,
why not see if you can take the audio feed to that transmitter and feed
the FM transmitter.

--
?

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida