How would I best eliminate engine noise while listening to SW? I spend
about 24 hrs a week on the interstate between Dallas and Austin and
would love to be able to listen to SW. I rigged up my windup antenna by
running it out the window of my truck and routing it around the bed back
to the other side. The problem is that when using the external antenna
I get very prominent engine noise unless the station I am listening to
is quite strong. How would I (or can I) reduce or eliminate the noise?
Is there an elegant way to implement a crude sw antenna on a vehicle?

Clear Skies and 73,
-Al

Al Arduengo wrote:

How would I best eliminate engine noise while listening to SW? I spend
about 24 hrs a week on the interstate between Dallas and Austin and
would love to be able to listen to SW. I rigged up my windup antenna by
running it out the window of my truck and routing it around the bed back
to the other side. The problem is that when using the external antenna
I get very prominent engine noise unless the station I am listening to
is quite strong. How would I (or can I) reduce or eliminate the noise?
Is there an elegant way to implement a crude sw antenna on a vehicle?

Clear Skies and 73,
-Al

You should run the radio on batteries. Try a basic whip antenna. I use
one with a magnet mount base. Put it on the roof of the cab. Don't use a
CB antenna, just a long whip. Connect the coax of the whip to the
receiver's external antenna jack with the appropriate plug. Also try
grounding the hood of the truck better. Do this by connecting a flexible
grounding strap conductor between the hood and the body under the hood,
such as the firewall area. If the truck has a diesel engine (no ignition
system) the grounding strap probably won't help much but you still might
be getting some noise from the engine's computer control system, so the
strap is worth a try. Let us know how it goes.


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starman wrote:
Al Arduengo wrote:

How would I best eliminate engine noise while listening to SW? I spend
about 24 hrs a week on the interstate between Dallas and Austin and
would love to be able to listen to SW. I rigged up my windup antenna by
running it out the window of my truck and routing it around the bed back
to the other side. The problem is that when using the external antenna
I get very prominent engine noise unless the station I am listening to
is quite strong. How would I (or can I) reduce or eliminate the noise?
Is there an elegant way to implement a crude sw antenna on a vehicle?

Clear Skies and 73,
-Al


You should run the radio on batteries. Try a basic whip antenna. I use
one with a magnet mount base. Put it on the roof of the cab. Don't use a
CB antenna, just a long whip. Connect the coax of the whip to the
receiver's external antenna jack with the appropriate plug. Also try
grounding the hood of the truck better. Do this by connecting a flexible
grounding strap conductor between the hood and the body under the hood,
such as the firewall area. If the truck has a diesel engine (no ignition
system) the grounding strap probably won't help much but you still might
be getting some noise from the engine's computer control system, so the
strap is worth a try. Let us know how it goes.


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I do use batteries and without the external antenna there was little or
no noise. Would connecting my trucks whip to my sw rado's whip do the
same thing?

Thanks for the help!
-Al

Al Arduengo wrote:

starman wrote:
Al Arduengo wrote:

How would I best eliminate engine noise while listening to SW? I spend
about 24 hrs a week on the interstate between Dallas and Austin and
would love to be able to listen to SW. I rigged up my windup antenna by
running it out the window of my truck and routing it around the bed back
to the other side. The problem is that when using the external antenna
I get very prominent engine noise unless the station I am listening to
is quite strong. How would I (or can I) reduce or eliminate the noise?
Is there an elegant way to implement a crude sw antenna on a vehicle?

Clear Skies and 73,
-Al


You should run the radio on batteries. Try a basic whip antenna. I use
one with a magnet mount base. Put it on the roof of the cab. Don't use a
CB antenna, just a long whip. Connect the coax of the whip to the
receiver's external antenna jack with the appropriate plug. Also try
grounding the hood of the truck better. Do this by connecting a flexible
grounding strap conductor between the hood and the body under the hood,
such as the firewall area. If the truck has a diesel engine (no ignition
system) the grounding strap probably won't help much but you still might
be getting some noise from the engine's computer control system, so the
strap is worth a try. Let us know how it goes.


I do use batteries and without the external antenna there was little or
no noise. Would connecting my trucks whip to my sw rado's whip do the
same thing?

Thanks for the help!
-Al

The truck's whip would probably help but a seperate (longer) whip would
be better. The problem with using the existing truck antenna is finding
a way to connect it *just* to the shortwave radio while it's
disconnected from the truck radio. That can be a hassle and it's why I
recommend a dedicated whip for the shortwave radio.


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Al Arduengo wrote in message ...
How would I best eliminate engine noise while listening to SW? I spend
about 24 hrs a week on the interstate between Dallas and Austin and
would love to be able to listen to SW. I rigged up my windup antenna by
running it out the window of my truck and routing it around the bed back
to the other side. The problem is that when using the external antenna
I get very prominent engine noise unless the station I am listening to
is quite strong. How would I (or can I) reduce or eliminate the noise?
Is there an elegant way to implement a crude sw antenna on a vehicle?

Clear Skies and 73,
-Al

I think the antenna and feedline, or should I say, lack of one, are
the main problem. If I understand it correctly, you are running a
random wire of sorts strung from the radio, and then around the bed of
the truck. If you want to cut the noise, you need to mount an antenna
that uses a well grounded mount, and is not coupling to the body of
the truck. It's quite possible your MW antenna on the truck would be
better than the wire being it has a grounded base. Or I assume
anyway... What you really want, if you want top results, is a loaded
whip much the same as a ham would run mobile. A hamstick "helically
wound loaded whip" would be great as a mobile SWL antenna. You can buy
them for each of the ham bands, and tuning and match for just
receiving is not critical at all. So lets say you like 31m SW as an
example...A 40, 30, or 20 meter hamstick would work fine. The 30 meter
stick giving the best match. But the real secret is having a good well
grounded base under the whip, and coax feeding the antenna. Being a
ham, I have a 80-10 meter mobile antenna. "Works nearly all the HF
bands". It's great for SWL, and noise is not a real problem. In fact,
I get more noise generated from my tires at high speeds, than I do
ignition noise. The hamsticks mount about the same as a helical CB
antenna, and are cheap. Maybe 15-25 bucks apiece...Depends where you
buy it...You want to keep the antenna itself as far away from the body
of the truck as possible to avoid coupling to it. You really need a
vertical whip to do that...
MK

You must have a Ford truck. I have that problem in my Bronco.

To my knowledge, Chrysler Motor Co. is the only vehicle manufacturer that
bonded every metal contact and filtered every device. I loved operating HF
mobile in an old Dodge camper I once had.

Bill, K5BY

How would I best eliminate engine noise while listening to SW?

This might have already been mentioned to you Al, but I know from experience
on this one.

First, go with batteries and the best SW antenna (which most won't go to this
extreme) is a 108in. steel whip. ;-)

There's other antenna setups you can use in a car, I've tried em' all. Steel
whip hands down wins.

~*~*Monitoring The AirWaves~*~
*****GO BEARCATS*****
Hammarlund HQ129X /Heathkit Q Multiplier
Hammarlund HQ140X
Multiple GE P-780's(GREAT BCB Radios)
RCA Victor *Strato- World*
RCA Victor RJC77W-K(Walnut Grain)
1942 Zenith Wave Magnet 6G 601M
Cathedral/ Ross#2311/Rhapsody-MultiBand
DX100/394/398/399/402
OMGS Transistor Eight/Realistic 12-1451
Henry Kloss Model One/Bell+Howell
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Alpha Delta DX Sloper 57ft.
600ft. 12AWG. (non-terminated)
120ft. 12 AWG Sloper
2 Radio Shack Loop Antennas
Radio Shack Amplified Antenna
30X30 DiamondLoop(six section 830pf Cap)
* Diamond Loop mounted to Lazy Susan TurnTable*

The noise you're picking up is obviously radiated and being picked up by
your antenna and not coming thru the power lead, as you have
demonstrated by using a separate battery. If you're using the wind-up
antenna, it's picking up every single ounce of stray radiated rf energy
from all the noise sources in the vehicle. You don't want the antenna
to receive anything until it gets outside of the vehicle, so you need
shielded coax from the radio to the antenna on the outside. But given
the confines of space, you obviously can't throw out 100' of wire, so
you're limited to some sort of vertical whip antenna...a 108" steel whip
is about as long as you can practically get - but that's still pretty
short for a shortwave antenna. So the way antenna manufacturers get
around that is to add a loading coil to make the radio "think" the
antenna is longer than it actually is...kinda'/sorta' what a hamstick
is. BUT - - you get them on a frequency other than where they're
designed and they suck! So to cover the shortwave spectrum, you'ld have
to get a BUNCH of hamsticks. I'd opt for a 108" steel whip plus a small
antenna tuner at the end of the coax by the radio.

Now, back to the noise problem...

I just picked up an MFJ-1026 "Noise Canceller" that I've experimented
with in the shack for both my ham rig as well as general coverage
receiver. I bought it as somewhat of a "crapshoot" figuring that I'd
throw something new at the noise and if it worked...fine; if not...it
was worth a shot. Few things you gotta' know about this noise
canceller...it's not like a noise blanker or DSP. The receiving antenna
and a 2nd antenna (to pick up the noise) are each plugged into this
unit, then a cable goes from it to your receiver. The way it works is
to "mix" the signals from the 2 antennas after it changes the electrical
phase of the signal from the noise antenna so it is knocked way down.
So it does require another antenna (can simply be a piece of wire) and
also quite a bit of a learning curve - - you tune this thing - carefully
- you don't simply switch it on and off. But it DOES work (at least, in
the shack). My next step will be to try it with my hf mobile rig (the
infamous Ford Explorer) - I *think* it should work but just haven't
tried yet. If so, it should make a dramatic improvement.

(*HEY* - Just happens that I'm also in Dallas - if you want to compare
notes on this down the road, OK to contact me directly at )

Carl - W5SU
Dallas TX


Al Arduengo wrote:

How would I best eliminate engine noise while listening to SW? I
spend about 24 hrs a week on the interstate between Dallas and Austin
and would love to be able to listen to SW. I rigged up my windup
antenna by running it out the window of my truck and routing it around
the bed back to the other side. The problem is that when using the
external antenna I get very prominent engine noise unless the station
I am listening to is quite strong. How would I (or can I) reduce or
eliminate the noise? Is there an elegant way to implement a crude sw
antenna on a vehicle?

Clear Skies and 73,
-Al