|
|
| Favorite Xtal
Set Society Links: The following web sites are some of the best we've found on radio and other topics. Check them out, and please let us know if you find a site of unusual merit or quality that you would like to see added to our list or if you discover an outdated link. Each link will open a new browser window so that you can return to the links list without having to hit your back button a whole bunch of times. Happy surfing!
|
 Crystal Radio Links... So you've built the Oatmeal Box Radio on this site, and you want to improve the design? Go to Owen Pool's site, Crystal Radio Resources for his Peanut Specials. Owen's site also has an extensive list of crystal radio links, tips on things such as bandspreading and DX, and plans for building a convertible crystal radio (you can swap in a simple "triode" detector/amplifier), an RF signal booster, and more. SkyWaves. This is Al Klase's site (he's a member too), and he has posted several pages of interest to the crystal radio enthusiast. You'll find "Crystal Set Design" 102, a crystal set tutorial, and some nice tips for mounting crystals to use in detectors. You'll also find photographs of some of Al's radio reproductions, some communication receivers and gear (the Russian maritime radio receiver is a must-see), and information on designing a SWL antenna distribution system for connecting multiple LF/MF/HF receivers to a single antenna. Check out Ben Tongue's great site while you are at it. He lists many original articles and adds more frequently, also many other great finds on his site. He is also an XSS member. (Thanks for your patience Ben, I finally got your link up!) Another great site worth a visit is www.oldradioworld.de/gollum with historical information on crystal and other radios.
The Antique Wireless Association The Antique Wireless Association (AWA) is a nonprofit historical society founded in 1952 with about 4,000 members. The AWA publishes The Old Timer's Bulletin, a fabulous resource for those interested in the history of radio, television and other electronics, which is available through AWA membership. Phil's Old Radios - Antique Radio Gallery This is a great site, with a gallery of photographs and pictures of radios in Phil Nelson's collection of Trans-Oceanic radios, Bakelite radios, Tube portables, Transistor Radios and more. The site has some radio restoration and building projects, including a nice one for a short-wave crystal radio. You also can place a free radio want ad on the "unclassified ads" page (the list of ads is long, so we suggest using the find function on your browser to find what you want). Explore Jonathan Winter's Bellingham Antique Radio Museum online. This museum, located in Bellingham, Washington, is a must see if you're ever going to be visiting the Pacific Northwest. Here you will find old-time radio broadcasts, a crystal radio project (with a detailed introduction about crystal radio sets), images from the Bellingham radio collection, and technical information for radio collectors. Surfing the Aether is an interesting site with the history of radio from pre-1900 to the present, organized by decade. There are also some wonderful sound clips of radio broadcasts such as a report on the attack on Pearl Harbor, a live radio broadcast about the 1937 crash of the Hindenburg, and the panic-causing "Mercury Theater of the Air" by Orson Wells.
So you've just acquired a set of nice antique headphones? You may be able to rejuvenate them for better performance, if they've lost a little bit of their oomph over the years. Tom Provost and Gary D'Amico tell you how on the NJARC web site. Raindrops are round, or flat, not the shape of a "tear-drop." Lift is not created because air is traveling more rapidly over the curved upper surface of a airplane wing--even a perfectly flat wing can generate lift. Astronauts in the space shuttle are not in zero gravity, rather, they are falling...very fast. Many common misconceptions such as these can be found in textbooks and science lectures. Learn about these and a lot more "Bad Science" on Alistair Fraser's (and friends) very entertaining Bad Science pages. Then, you can help to try to correct the textbooks! Worried about an asteroid impact on earth? Check out the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) home page about the first NASA Discovery Program mission. As the first spacecraft to orbit an asteroid, the NEAR mission promises to answer fundamental questions about the nature and origin of near-Earth objects, such as the numerous asteroids and comets in the vicinity of Earth's orbit. Teachers...check out the Educators Guide. What is the fifth planet from the sun? Which planet in our solar system is the most massive? The answer to both questions can be found at Bill Arnett's award-winning The Nine Planets, an "overview of the history, mythology, and current scientific knowledge of each of the planets and moons in our solar system." Each page has text and images (the images are amazing), some have sounds and movies, and most provide references to additional related information. We highly recommend this site! Bizarre Stuff You Can Make in Your Kitchen. As this site's author says, it is a "warped semi-scientific cookbook of tricks, gimmicks, and pointless experimentation, concoctions, and devices, using, for the most part, things found around the house. This is not about serious scientific experimentation or education. There are many excellent sites for that.... This is for fun. These are the classics. Strange goo, radios made from rusty razor blades, homemade stink bombs...amateur mad scientist stuff." We agree! This is a tip that has been circulating around the web. [We found out about it through PC World (June 1998 issue, p. 278)]. If you're using Windows 95 and dial-up networking (a phone modem) to access your internet service provider, some say that you can double or even triple the throughput of your Internet access...for free...in just a few minutes. Why? Because the default settings for the size of the packets used by your modem were optimized for shared local network users, not dial-up networking. To make the change, back up your registry, download PPP-boost, read the ReadMe.txt file for important pointers, and let it fly. If you want more info first, check out NetPro NorthWest's Techfile. |
© Copyright 1997-2000. The Xtal
Set Society. All rights reserved.
Radio History and Radio Collections... 
Headphones...
Amateur Science...