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It's all about the watts baby. When I was a kid I made an AM radio receiver with a safety pin and a piece of zinc and a crystal earphone. Later in life, worki
by zw123456 5y ago
It's all about the watts baby.
When I was a kid I made an AM radio receiver with a safety pin and a piece of zinc and a crystal earphone.
Later in life, working on an experimental MW system at Bell Labs, a fun gag was to put a Neon lamp in front of the transmitter horn antenna and watch it light up when you switched on the transmitter, then nonchalantly say, oh ya she's working.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- hilbert42 5y ago"...a fun gag was to put a Neon lamp in front of the transmitter horn antenna" Years ago, I used to go on field trips in a convoy of vehicles with a group of radio amateurs and we used 2M (146MHz) TXs into 5/8 whip antennas on the vehicle roofs and attached to their tip were NE2 neon indicators which would glow whenever the TX was keyed on. At night the neon glow seemed to hover above the vehicles as if suspended in mid air (it was difficult to see the antenna in the dark). A light suddenly appearing out of nowhere used bemuse other motorists. Trouble was it also attracted the cops although they never took any punitive action.
- zw123456 5y agoYup, it's an age old ham gag for sure. We were doing it to show off the power of our invention of course. The funny part was how when we demo'ed it for some exec's they sort of covered their privates when they saw that neon glow. It was in an anechoic chamber so there was of course no danger anyway. But it was still good fun.