Like so many other ham radio operators, I was first bitten by the radio bug when a friend of mine showed me his portable AM/FM/Shortwave receiver. Knowing what to expect on the AM and FM bands, I quickly tuned to the shortwave bands. The rest is history. There was just something special about receiving stations broadcasting from other continents; something intriguing about hearing the world news from the places where it was actually happening.

My first shortwave radio, the venerable Knight-Kit Star Roamer, was quickly replaced with ham band only receivers and transceivers; but I never lost my interest in listening to foreign broadcasts and utility stations.

My current shortwave receiver is a Radio Shack DX-440 portable (aka Sangean 803A), but I also use the general coverage functionality of the TS-570D. Typically, the primary antenna that I use is a 25 foot long wire clipped to DX-440's whip antenna; or in the case of the TS-570D, the dipole with the antenna tuner turned off.

Simple, but very effective.

Created using: Lightning HTML Editor Version 2.20.1997