[Milsurplus] [ARC5] Command Receivers on the Broadcast Band

[Hubert Miller]

>Subject: Re: [Milsurplus] [ARC5] Command Receivers on the Broadcast Band

Hello Hue,
57 years ago in Guantanamo Bay, almost 500 miles from the closest point to the United States, I had a Hallicrafters WR-600 (a wood-grain version of the S-120, 4 tube RX) that I used among ham other uses for some BCB DX. That RX used a long-wire antenna, no provision for a loop of any kind. Yet I logged some 40 states across the US. A loop is NOT a necessity for BCB DX. Maybe for vaguely determining direction, or some form of selectivity, but not for general BCB DX. 
>73, Howie WB2AWQ

If you just want to log a bunch of stations, with something like 2500 on the air in USA alone, you can use any radio that works. If you want to log a particular city, state, or country,and there's 1 to 5 others on the same frequency, you use a loop antenna. All the AM DX publications ( are there still any extant ? ) advise and publish loop antenna circuits. This is assuming probably correctly that
you don't have the thousands of feet for the Beverage directional antenna. 
When i lived in Salt Lake City, Utah, ca. 1995, i used  to listen to 'Tales of the Texas Rangers' old time program on KNX LA CA 1070. I could only use a loop antenna, no long wire, because the
wire antenna picked up too much noise. The loop made it perfectly readable. One more big reason for the magnetic loop antenna. 
-Hue Miller