This four part article describes receiver and antenna options you can try that may improve your reception of FM 91-5. FM 91-5 is a relatively low powered station and reception may be a challenge... especially if you are located some distance from our transmitter in Newbury, OH. But there are many antenna options ranging from simple indoor setups to sophisticated outdoor antennas that can be of great help. In addition, we have found some low/medium priced receivers that do a commendable job. These are listed in Part 3. As a last resort, if you have a computer, don't forget that you can listen to FM 91-5 on-line at WKHR.org.

PART 1: Why you can hear FM 91.5 in your car - but NOT at home
PART 2: The Better FM 91.5 Receiving Antenna System
PART 3: The Better Receiver
PART 4: Bottom Line

PART 1: Why you can hear FM 91.5 in your car - but NOT at home
You may find it frustrating to hear FM 91-5 on your car radio as you are pulling into your driveway and then, in your living room and on all of your home receivers, there's nothing to be heard but static. The reasons for this involve several factors. First and foremost, automobile radios are optimized radio systems designed for pulling in stations on the move, often from weak stations with widely varying signal strengths. And they are equipped with a real antenna... even if the antenna may not be obvious. On the other hand, the average home radio is designed, not for optimal reception of weak signals, but rather to be sold at a low price. Couple this with the fact that most home radios are not attached to an appropriate antenna and you'll see that the car radio has the advantage.

Now, back to the basics. The two basic elements of a superior receiving system are the "tuner" portion of the receiver and the antenna. At the same time, the weakest links in home receivers are typically the tuner and the antenna. Add to this mix of a poorly designed home receiver, connected to a poor antenna (or no antenna), trying to pull in a weak FM 91-5 signal some home-generated electronic noise and electronic shading from metallic surroundings, e.g., aluminum siding, and your listening pleasure is going to be in serious trouble.

So the answer to better home reception involves a home receiver that incorporates a really good tuner section coupled to a really good antenna. Unfortunately, most home receivers are designed to receive only powerful local stations and they use their AC line-cord or a short dangling wire as an antenna. Some higher quality home receivers have a telescoping "whip" antenna, which is a step up, and some have connectors for connection of an external antenna. But when this connector exists, all too often owners fail to utilize it.

So what's an FM 91-5 listener to do?

First, if your receiver has an antenna connector, try to attach a good FM antenna to it. No matter how good the receiver, it's only as good as the antenna used to capture those weak signals. But, be careful here... sometimes a high price tag is NOT necessarily the best antenna buy. The same is true of some highly publicized receivers.

If all you currently have is the typical AM/FM receiver that doesn't allow an external antenna option, you may have to upgrade both the receiver and the antenna.

PART 2: So what's an FM91-5 listener to do?
If you can pull in the station on your car radio outside your home, then all isn't lost for quality home reception. The first step is to give your receiver a good fighting chance by connecting the best antenna possible for your particular situation.

Home FM antennas come in two basic types: outdoor and indoor. And each antenna type comes with several options. There are amplified and passive (non-amplified) as well as directional and non-directional antennas. A major consideration with FM antennas is height. Since FM signals are essentially line-of-sight, the higher the antenna above ground, the better your reception of distant stations will be. Finally, you have to consider how long the cable is between your antenna and the receiver, and the type of cable used. Generally a "TV" type "coaxial cable" is suitable for most FM receiver antenna installations. It is best to keep the cable run to about 75 feet, or less. In this case, less is better.

First, let's consider an outdoor-type FM antenna system. For serious listeners an outdoor, directional antenna is what is required. Put the antenna as high as possible and use the shortest, most direct run of coaxial cable (type RG-6 is good and can be purchased in various lengths with connectors pre-installed) to the receiver. You may have to use a little matching transformer, called a balun, on one or both ends of the coaxial cable. This will allow a proper match to the antenna and your receiver if they aren't designed for coaxial cable directly. You'll need a balun with most antennas and with some receivers. If your receiver has a small round antenna connector you can connect the coaxial cable directly to it. If the antenna connector is a pair of screws about an inch apart, then you'll need a balun at the receiver. The antenna should be aimed toward the FM 91-5 transmitter site in Newbury Township (Geauga County) near the intersection of state routes 306 and 87. You'll probably need a map and compass to do the aiming properly.

If you are unable to mount your antenna outdoors, you can often achieve good results by mounting it in your attic (assuming that the attic is not covered up with aluminum siding).

There are several manufacturers of these antennas. A couple that are worth a look are the Winegard HD6000 and the Winegard HD6055P. According to their advertising "The HD6000 is a four element flat yagi antenna for FM reception. Recommended for suburban areas where a moderately directive antenna is required. Completely factory preassembled, unfolds in seconds for easy installation.  300 ohm input." Price is about $25.00

The Winegard  HD6065P Outdoor FM Antenna is for "the very finest FM and FM stereo reception from stations near or far. Same rugged construction features as outdoor TV antennas including built-in weatherproof 75 ohm downlead housing. Deigned to cut distortion, separate adjacent channels and reduce or eliminate fading and noise." Price is about $75.00.

In the Cleveland area, we do not recommend an amplified antenna of any kind. Often amplified antennas will not only do a fine job of amplifying the FM stations, but they often do a pretty good job of amplifying every other nearby transmitter and all the noise they can find, thereby canceling out any benefit to the amplified FM signal that you are seeking. Stick to a good basic passive antenna and you'll not have to worry about added interference.

Here's another excellent option. Some of you may be able to benefit from hooking your outdoor TV antenna into your FM receiver. Many homes that have since switched over to cable TV may have these vestiges on their roofs waiting to be pressed back into useful service. It is likely you'll have to rotate the antenna to point toward the FM 91-5 transmitter (see above).

Of course not everybody has an unused TV antenna or can put an antenna in their attic or on their roof. You'll have to drop back to plan B: the indoor antenna. If your receiver has the "two screw" antenna connection it may have been supplied with a flat, T-shaped "twin-lead dipole" antenna. If you haven't connected this antenna, now's the time to do so. If you've already connected it, and it's just in a bundle on the floor, try spreading the out the "legs" as far as they'll go and position them broadside to Newbury.

Moving the antenna closer to a window, or higher, will sometimes help too. It may take a little experimentation to achieve good results. In case you don't have a twin lead Dipole and want to try one, they're available at Radio Shack. A mail-order option for this type of antenna is: http://www.mcmelectronics.com/product/30-110&cid=prodCrossSell. If the twin-lead dipole antenna is close, but not quite enough antenna to do the job, your basic TV "Rabbit Ears" antenna is another cost-effective alternative. Several versions are available locally. You'll want to ignore any UHF cables and only deal with the VHF cables for connection to your receiver.

If you're old enough to have grown up with the music of FM 91-5, then you're no doubt familiar with the TV Rabbit Ears routine. But just to review... these rabbit ears antennas will require some experimentation to bring in the best signal. Generally, it's best to pull the elements all the way out. Then rotate the antenna (and the tuning knob, if one is provided) for best results. Some rabbit ear, "HDTV" antennas do not have elements for VHF reception. These are not suitable for FM reception.

Move the receiver and antenna away from devices that might cause radio interference (computers, TV sets, motors, some fluorescent lights, etc.). Again, experimentation may be required to determine the best location for your indoor antenna.

One nice thing about these indoor antennas is that the cable line loss is almost nothing! So all the signal it receives goes right into the tuner. Another feature is, in spite of having to play around with it a bit, installation is easy. (Hey it sure beats climbing around on your roof). But, since an indoor antenna may not provide satisfactory results it's a good idea to purchase it at a store that will accept returns.

If you do nothing more than stretch out whatever antenna is already on your receiver, be it the AC line-cord or a dangling piece of wire, you may help things considerably. If you've never tried this, give it a try.
To review your FM 91-5 antenna options, listed from best to worst:

PART 3: The Better Receiver
If you got to this chapter and still need help, we'll presume that you've exhausted all practical antenna options discussed in Chapter 2 and now are in search of a better receiver.

First let's start with a few basics to be aware of when receiver shopping. As mentioned earlier, a key to good weak signal reception is a good antenna. If the receiver has no external antenna input then you're already in trouble. So rule 1 is always being sure the receiver can accept an external antenna.

Next you'll want to consider the two most important tuner technical specifications: sensitivity and selectivity. Generally, technical specifications are difficult to find for non-professional level tuners/receivers so, if shopping for a new receiver, just be aware that a good receiver should be both sensitive and selective. Sometimes the importance of the selectivity of a tuner/receiver is under-emphasized. In a crowded radio market such as Cleveland, this is a big mistake. Often the receiver with superior selectivity, will outperform the more sensitive, yet less selective one.

We recommend that whatever you end up with, try to make certain that it has either a stereo/mono switch (i.e., the ability to switch to mono if the signal is too weak for good stereo), or is a mono receiver. Weak stereo signals are inherently noisy. Although one of the nice things about FM 91-5 is the stereo presentation, it's better to hear a clean MONO signal than a noisy stereo one. So if the receiver isn't stereo, so much the better. Remember that the goal here is a BETTER 91-5 signal and one that you can enjoy all day long.

Finally, it should be mentioned that if you are tempted to purchase a so-called "HD" receiver, don't bother. It will do no good whatsoever with 91-5 reception. Stick with the best conventional FM receiver you can afford.

So what are some good basic FM receivers? Here are some recommendations... all easily available by toll-free mail-order....or on the Internet. First, there's the RCA Model 7887 Super Radio. Although this radio is very popular with fans of AM radio it's also a excellent FM performer. It's essentially a big portable mono radio with a large, built-in speaker system and bass and treble controls that gives it an impressive sound, especially for the price. It also has that important FM antenna connection on the rear (requires a balun for connection to coaxial cable)... but the built-in whip antenna does a fairly impressive job by itself. It's not a digital receiver which provides the ability to offset the tuning slightly when faced with a strong adjacent channel that's splattering onto 91-5. It operates either from AC power or from batteries which makes it handy when the lights go out. The downside with this receiver is that it's not built for much abuse...so you'll want to set it on 91-5, turn it on and leave it alone! The price seems to typically be in the $50.00 (+ s/h) area. It's available from Amazon.com.

A very good, smaller portable receiver is the Tecsun PL380 available from a reputable seller on ebay for less than $60 shipped. It has amazing new circuitry that offers world class sensitivity and selectivity on FM (and also AM & SW). FM is stereo in headphones and sounds very good. The mono speaker is small and it's sound quality is not as good, but it's not bad. Here's the Link.

If you're looking for something that looks a bit classier then a manufacturer worthy of checking out is Sangean who makes an analog AM/FM table-top radio in a wooden cabinet called the WR-11. This is available at J&R Music A clock radio version is the WR-2

Another good choice is the Tivoli receiver. This is a small mono receiver, with excellent tone quality for its size, in an attractive wooden cabinet. It is available at Amazon.com, Tivoli

The heavily advertised Bose receiver is good but is significantly more expensive than the receivers listed above. All of these receivers have connectors for an external antenna.

Of course, the receivers listed above are just a sampling of what's available. The very best approach is often a separate tuner and amplifier (the two in combination equals a receiver) by a quality manufacturer like Yamaha, Denon or McIntosh, but this is the most expensive approach and generally not necessary. The most important thing for fringe folks to remember is to give that quality receiver a fighting chance by connecting it to a good FM antenna.

PART 4: Bottom Line
The bottom line is this: for the best reception of a weak radio signal (FM 91-5 or any other) you need a receiver with good sensitivity and selectivity coupled to a good, directional outdoor antenna. But there are other options worth trying if your signal is marginal but useable. And, a good mono receiver will generally give better results than a stereo receiver (unless the stereo receiver can be switched to mono). We hope some of this information will be helpful in your efforts to pull in a cleaner, stronger FM 91-5!

And don't forget, no matter where you live, if you have a computer you can listen to FM 91-5 via our audio stream on the Internet at WKHR.org.

WKHR Engineering Staff