The Magnetic Loop Antenna
Paid a visit to the DIY-shop to collect some copper - about 5 meters of 12 mm flexi tube...
...to make a loop with a diameter of 1.5 meters
Close-up of the wooden isolator
The capacitor to tune the loop. I had to use nails to attach it to the loop because my soldering iron is 15 Watts only - far from ideal, but good enough to do some testing
The initial tests with the shielded pick-up loop were amazing; South American low-power stations came through without problems.
The loop was moved to the window into direction east-west and placed upside down in order to make it tuneable manually. Differences in signal strength were neglectable. The oval shape of the pick-up loop compensated some of the losses.
Eventually the capacitor was attached to the loop by using antenna litze. No solder was used, simply clamped it between the copper tube and the wooden isolator. Easy does it!
With the capacitor this magnetic loop antenna can be tuned between 3 and 15 MHz. The feeder is RG-58 coaxial cable. Very good results with rejecting man-made noise.