Unusual Recieving Devices

[Glanceblamm]

Been quiet here for a while so I will ask about unusual radio recieving devices that you have known. My list starts at #5 and ends with #1 as being the most unusual but I am going to skip the chase and go with the
The #1 for now.

My Father worked for  A.E. Staley (basically corn sweetener & starches operation) from 1953 to 1958. They had a large train yard with several spurs and he claimed to know a man who could break & stack those old double edged razor blades on top of a train rail in a fashion with the result being that it would pickup the local AM Radio!...I would have loved to know how this was done but Dad, while impressed, did not take the time to learn how to do this.

Any others out there?

[KeepTryin]

Detectors (IN34A's, galena crystals and cat's whiskers, fixed receiving crystals etc.) depend on a barely-touching contact to a certain sensitive element (galena, etc.) and this is the basis of semiconductors. But you know all this... I've heard tell of using razorblades as in the 'foxhole radio' but have never tried it. I have a Philmore fixed galena crystal from the 1920's or so, when I take a pic of it I'll post it. I also have a chunk of galena about the size of a golf ball, I have chipped pieces off that years ago and used it successfully in crystal sets.

I picked up a local AM station in high school (1979) on my orthodontic braces, it was loud as heck like a 'bone phone'... it was amazing. For like 3 minutes.  Thought I was losing my mind!

73
KT

[trotterlg]

Once while working as the chief eng at a 10 KW AM station in California I got a call from a lady who complained that the station could be heard out of her bath tub, she could "tune" it in by how hot the running water was.  Larry

[Catfish]

Years ago I took a van load of fellow ham for a tour of the Voice of America station. When leaving this guy speaking spainish came blaring in and the raido was turned off. Must have been rectified in the wireing some where, and with the power they run it about blasted us out of the van.

[Glanceblamm]

The #2 on my list was a ground plane antenna that dad had on his roof years ago. It was a CLR Penetrator to be exact and was 22' tall with four 1' arms at the top and four 8' arms at the bottom.

Sometimes, in the wee hours, if one was using the upstairs bathroom on a dead calm night, a radio could be clearly but faintly be heared to be playing and there was no radio at all in the upstairs. We always figured that it was that ground plane needless to say.

[AlbinoAlligator]

Just yesterdat I was playing my electric guitar and I could hear a radio station through the amp speaker. It would go away when I unplugged the cord that connects the guitar to the amp.

[SHOOTALL]

I was on a jobsite once and a guy had a CB radio with a big amp hooked up . He was showing how far he could talk ( Skip) and the garage door opened on the house we were finishing up . So he keys the mike and drives down the street causing several more to open . The lady in the house that lived next to the house we were working on came out and said she could hear him in her TV . She did not say if it was on or off.

[mauser98us]

My wife when I say something I did not want her to hear!

[Rickk]

When I worked for WIXY (AM, 1600 Khz) in Springfield, Ma, I could hear station audio from the chain link fence around the antenna site. All the overlapping galvanized wire connections made little diodes and was demodulating audio everywhere. At night you could see sparking in the fence wire overlaps here and there.