I was wondering: How easy would it be to make a radio at home with common materials? And how cheap? This radio would cover as many frequencies as possible...

And please, I don't know a lot of the things like "Use a ___ resistor," I'm not that much of an electronics person.

Look Here:

 

http://www.scitoys.com/scitoys/scitoys/radio/radio.html

a bit of magnet wire and a germanium diode.....or a piece of galena will make you a workable AM set.

A simple AM radio is pretty cheap in terms of components, although if you want a fairly decent crystal radio you're gonna have to get stuck into some of the electronics a bit. I've found the easiest way to get involved and stuck in is to buy some of the 100-in-1 electronics kits where they have a bunch of stuff from integrated circuits to simple transistors etc that you can attach to eachother by using small bits of wire. They're great fun, cheap, and you can build a lot simple electronic circuits with them.

I was thinking of transmitting and recieving, like from house to house.

I was thinking of transmitting and recieving, like from house to house.

 

Try using two plastic cups and some string

if you want to transmit as well, then you`ve got no chance without electronics knowledge

 

how far is the house? is it line of sight?

would you consider other means of comunication? Infrared or a wired intercom?

 

you could just buy some cheap walky talkies, and convert the antenna to match the frequency, thereby optimising its efficiency and boosting it`s effective range

and you`de not be breaking any FCC regulations either

Transmitter circuits are a bit more complicated than the receiver circuits as well.

if you want to transmit as well' date=' then you`ve got no chance without electronics knowledge

 

how far is the house? is it line of sight?

would you consider other means of comunication? Infrared or a wired intercom?[/quote']

It's just down the street.

 

And by that scitoys page, it doesn't look too complicated to make an AM transmitter. All I need is the parts, and that's easy.

And by that scitoys page, it doesn't look too complicated to make an AM transmitter. All I need is the parts, and that's easy.

that`s great from someone that stated from the start:

 

"And please, I don't know a lot of the things like "Use a ___ resistor," I'm not that much of an electronics person."

 

*Sigh*....

 

anyway, How did you get on with it?

Never bothered. It was a good idea, but I never had the time.

 

I spend a lot of my time programming my calculator to do things, rather than building stuff.

Transmitter circuits are a bit more complicated than the receiver circuits as well.

Actually, they're roughly the same, but fed backwards. In the case of the receiver, it's the antenna, a couple of conversions and a transducer (speaker) for audio.

In the transmitter, it's the transducer (microphone) a couple of conversions, and the same antenna.

1 or 2 watts is fine for house to house communications.

For a single frequency, you could have a high Q antenna.

Whats Q?

Q normally referrs to charge

 

but does "a high charge antenna." sound right?