PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

vijykrishnans — Sun, 21 Apr 2024 17:56:28 GMT

Hi Shabaz,

Where can I get the PCB from?

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

vijykrishnans — Sun, 21 Apr 2024 17:56:16 GMT

Hi Shabaz,

Where can I get the PCB from?

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

14rhb — Sun, 19 Jan 2020 09:32:08 GMT

Hi [mention:b0bc65b9ecdc4307bd967592f00e340a:e9ed411860ed4f2ba0265705b8793d05],

I obviously got too caught up in the holiday festivities and completely missed this mega-blog by you. I've only been alerted to it as I help judge the RF (Radio Frequency) entries, and then I find you are not actually submitting it.

Had you bought a commercial board then your project blog would still have been really interesting with all the additional explanations, diagrams and info you have provided. The fact that you designed the board from scratch (and this is not a simple board by any means as it wrangles the always troublesome RF signals around) then that is just:

[View:/resized-image/__size/400x223/__key/commentfiles/f7d226abd59f475c9d224a79e3f0ec07-563bb021-fe8a-4820-9941-a1330de2535a/contentimage_5F00_205481.gif:400:223]

[Source Internet: from the Simpson's Movie, 20th Century Fox]

In my opinion you have done a great job of enthusing others to build similar RF projects, well done. I need to now find time now to have a proper read through.

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

neuromodulator — Tue, 07 Jan 2020 15:11:13 GMT

Shabaz do you know of any free tool to perform wave analysis?

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

dubbie — Tue, 31 Dec 2019 11:54:54 GMT

Shabaz,

I'd have to agree with Frank, if you want to save money, don't buy a 3D printer! Only buy a 3D printer if you want to have fun.

I wanted to give some family members gift cards this Christmas but I thought just wrapping them up was a bit boring, so I 3D printed a two piece thin box that they just fitted into. The card just interference fits inside a 2 mm deep hole and a lid interference fits into the top with a 1 mm protrusion. You could not get much simpler. They do not look like a gift card (they just look like a lump of plastic) when opened, but come with the added bonus of the receiver having to work out how to open it (not too difficult - unless glued!) and they can be re-used by the original recipient to give a similar gift card to someone else - so recyclable gift wrapping - all the rage. I'd include a photograph but I've given them all away.

The down side is that each one took approximately 30 grams of material and cost approximately £2.70 each. Each one also took 3 hours to print (that's what I did Christmas Eve) and I slashed by finger cleaning up the print, so one has an added bonus of my own blood.

Still, they were well received and considered a good gift - so were priceless.

Dubbie

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

fmilburn — Mon, 30 Dec 2019 22:28:17 GMT

Not sure I have save money but I have enjoyed mine :-)

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

shabaz — Sat, 21 Dec 2019 13:09:16 GMT

I'm tempted to do another RF project this month, to build an antenna for this project.

Anyway, I do wish to volunteer to vote for the winners since I have a semi-background in RF, so my projects are really just for the fun of working with RF, not entries for the competition! I hope the winners post reviews or photos in action, since they are superbly useful prizes!

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

neuromodulator — Fri, 20 Dec 2019 02:47:40 GMT

Very interesting project! I've always enjoyed listening to distant shortwave radios. I really liked the filtering result, quite impressive!

Some notes on the radios you catched:

7.32 Mhz is spanish. You can hear them say "you are listening to radio abierta" ("radio abierta" means "open radio"). But Couldn't find any "radio abierta" when google, maybe its just the name of the radio show. They present a rumanian living in spain, and the accent is definetely spanish, so the radio is probably from spain.

7.43 Mhz is spanish again, the accent is central-american. They talk about movements, and imposing leaders, "forces" walking in the same direction, etc. I suspect this is from Cuba, looks a lot like political propaganda.

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

three-phase — Thu, 19 Dec 2019 20:29:23 GMT

Excellent project and blog.

Elsie is a great tool, I have also used rf-tools website for online designing of filters. I see the new breadboard has already started to earn a living.

Kind regards

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

DAB — Thu, 19 Dec 2019 19:23:42 GMT

Great project.

Well done.

DAB

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

genebren — Thu, 19 Dec 2019 16:58:00 GMT

Shabaz,

What a great series of experiments with a great write-up of your results! I have always been a big fan of radio (transmitters, receivers and antenna systems). I got my start with simple crystal radio kits and worked my way through to big and better things. My first job out of college was a massive communications intercept, location determination and jamming system with a military contractor, where we covered everything from 10KHz to 10GHz. It was such a great opportunity to learn and explore my aspects of RF. Seeing your project brought back all of that excitement to me.

Thanks for the great read and the trip down memory lane.

Gene

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

phoenixcomm — Thu, 19 Dec 2019 16:26:50 GMT

Supper Project~~ I love the detail on the transformers, etc. WAY OVER THE TOP!!!

BTW It takes up a lot less room then my old Colins!

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

dubbie — Thu, 19 Dec 2019 12:06:31 GMT

A truly astonishing and comprehensive build. I took the Radio Amatures course (and passed - surprisingly) when I was much younger and I could actually follow a little bit of the radio stuff. But still, Analogue ,..... Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah. It has only been when I have reached the more mature part of my life that I have been able to achieve any level of understanding of analogue design and even now, it is very limited. It is a good job that electronics turned digital otherwise I might not have had any career at all.

Dubbie

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

jw0752 — Thu, 19 Dec 2019 03:37:04 GMT

Wow! Another awesome project from the Master.

John

RE: PlanetCatcher: Building a World-Band Radio Receiver

fmilburn — Thu, 19 Dec 2019 01:20:56 GMT

Wow :-)

The PCB has holes directly underneath where the toroids are to be placed; this could be useful for 3D-printed clips to be fashioned to hold the toroids in place perhaps.

If you don't have access to a 3D printer and would like me to try printing some clips let me know.

Frank