Home FM booster?

Sysmod

We get good reception from a roof aerial.
However in the house a freestanding radio with a telescopic antenna has poor reception.
So, is there any way to rebroadcast the signal indoors so that an untethered radio can pick up any FM station?
This is not the same as MP3 retransmitters because we want to be able to tune the receiver to any FM band.
No point in mentioning internet radio or DAB, our rural so-called "broadband" from Eircom tops out at 0.4Mbps and we are in mobile coverage shadow.

watty

No, you can't rebroadcast the FM band.
You need a roof or attic aerial and a coax cable. You must have both as you say you have a roof aerial.

You can clip inner of coax to the telescopic aerial (retracted) and outer to earjack outer. A radio with an external aerial socket will work best.

It also may not be a very good radio. The average 1965 to 1990 AM/FM transportable radio is far better than any that can be bought new. The €140+ priced Roberts Revival is a Glen-Dimplex rebadged €15 Chinese set internally.

Tesco had a not too bad €14 "Kitchen Radio", but they replaced it with a €12 very similar appearance "Portable" branded LW/MW/VHF that's cost reduced to the point where it's junk. The insides are completely different.

Sysmod

The problem of clipping the coax to the aerial is that I'd have to have a coax run into every room that the radio is taken to - bedroom, bathroom, studio, garage, ... you get the idea. Hence my question on an untethered radio.

Thanks for the inside info on radios, Watty.
So, there's no good portable FM models left? Pity.

watty

Look for eBay Sony ICF2001D

Sysmod

Gosh, a world SW radio for the cold war number stations.
We have an Eton G8 Traveller II I got a few years ago and must try again, compared to the little Sony we currently have.

watty

Today Sony, Philips etc are just badges on other people's radios.
Philips are out of home Radio/TV. They sold it off. Lighting & Health is their business.

The Eton G8 isn't very good by quality 1980s /1990s standards. See anyway. It's sort of Amstrad /Harvard level.

The ICF2001D isn't that great a SW set, but does have synchronous AM and SSB.

wiyldrover

You could build a passive repeater!

cut 2 antennas for the fm broadcast band, mount 1 outside and other inside, join together with a length of coax.

watty

The outdoor one needs to be yagi pointed at the transmitter, in correct polarisation.
The indoor one needs to be in a area with NO received VHF (Basement or windows with RF screen).
Some energy saver glasses make Mobile and Radio useless by blocking RF as well as Heat/Infrared. Perhaps Pilkington's design is wrong.

Sysmod

Ingenious idea, wiyldrover, but the only room with tinfoil on the windows is the darkroom :-)

I came across an old idea - so much of this stuff was known during radio's heyday but can still be googled - to wrap several turns of wire around a narrow tube, slide the tube over the telescopic antenna of the little radio, and connect the wire to the telephone socket or heating radiators, or hang it out the window. Again, that's for one room but is not portable.

martinedwards

why not one of those ipod to car stereo radio transmitters?

Sysmod

This is not the same as MP3 retransmitters because we want to be able to tune the receiver to any FM band.

watty

Sysmod wrote: »

- to wrap several turns of wire around a narrow tube, slide the tube over the telescopic antenna of the little radio, and connect the wire to the telephone socket or heating radiators, or hang it out the window.

Not for VHF either. That's for LW / MW /SW

See what the radio is like when at the window, and then you open it wide. If it's Pilkingdon K glass energy saver (usual on double glazing) then the windows may be blocking FM signal

I've tried a 75cm piece of wire on socket of my roof aerial and my radio with signal meter to see if useful FM boost, it does. Obviously it depends how close it is and how good your roof aerial is.

Sysmod

Thanks, Watty.
"I've tried a 75cm piece of wire on socket of my roof aerial and my radio with signal meter to see if useful FM boost, it does."
Could you give a little more detail on that?
Do you mean that if I attach a single-core 75cm wire to the core of the coax plug where it terminates in one room, that that will help reception in another room?

watty

No, only in the same room.