I spend a fair amount of time at a friend's mountain cabin, about 80 miles northeast of my favorite radio station's transmission tower. The reception on my truck radio is high fidelity, but the reception I get on my Sony boombox a few feet away is finicky, location sensitive, and usually plagued with scratchy, noisy reception. Anyone have suggestions as to how to improve reception on a battery-powered/portable FM radio? (Portability is important, as I want to listen in various areas on site) Or, is there some particular brand or model that has reasonably high fidelity for music, that I should be considering? I don't want a rig requiring earbuds, headphones, etc., as I sometimes listen while shooting and wearing my electronically gated muffs. Can I attach a reception-enhancing antenna to my existing (or other) receiver? Suggestions appreciated!

Your truck has a better antenna. You might try some sort of antenna for your portable.

I take it your box has an internal antenna. Does it have an auxiliary antenna jack? If not, there may be no cheap and simple way to fix the problem, though if you were willing to cut your way into the case, find the antenna, and connect an external antenna to the leads, maybe you could get improved reception.

It may be time to get a better box. Be guided by reviews, not manufacturer claims.

No that I'm an expert. I can't even improve the hometown FM reception on my supposedly upscale Japanese SUV. I bought it used, but might have bought something else if I had known how limited the reception was. My old Camry had significantly better reception.

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David Wilson

Metal slinky is what you need. Experiment with stretching it out - and remember that they come in both large and small size - and attaching it to your external antenna. You can also try just a length of wire, a coat hanger, etc.

From Ebay you can get a relatively inexpensive Coby brand radio that gets not only AM/FM but the Shortwave bands. Radio Croatia has some interesting music at night and the Cubans have some good jazz mixed in with the propaganda.

Or you could get an Ipod or some such and bring your music with you.

Just buy a cheap radio that works with XM. I wish my truck radio would receive XM. So much better than AM-FM. No commercials, reception is anywhere you and the radio might be.

I have a basic problem with XM and Ipods. That is the lack of breaking news. I need to know what is going on, especially local. I listen to CD's, etc, but from time to time, I go to a fm or am station just to see what is happening. The day of the Virginia Tech shootings, I was driving a top of the line SUV with XM and was listening to the Elvis channel. I didn't know what was going on until I got to a VA hospital and some of the guys had a tv on in their game room.

The Crane CCRadio2 has great AM and FM reception and selectivity, and has external antenna jacks. It also receives NOAA weather and the 2M Amateur radio band. Look up the reviews on it.

The Crane website also sells the Terk tunable loop antenna for AM. I own one and it does wonders for AM signal strength.

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VIVERE MILITARE EST

Electronics-DIY.com - Electronic Schematics Antennas

I havnt seen any of these on the market in a long while ... but then I really havnt looked since I'd just build my own anyhow.
Parts can be had at Digikey online
circuit boards can be etched using a 50/50 mix of muriatic acid and hydrogen peroxide after you draw the traces with a sharpie in a few passes for a good thick ink coat

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it just needs more voltage

(Portability is important, as I want to listen in various areas on site) First determine if YOUR Sony has provision for connecting an external antenna. (Do you still have owners manual? - probably not) Look on the back for connections for an external antenna. For an FM antenna might be two screws or a coaxial jack like cable connection at home.

Since your want PORTABILITY will not consider multiple element antennas.

TWO SCREWS - get two lengths of THIRTY INCH insulated wire. (Telephone wire works fine). Attach one wire under a screw head (terminal) and check reception. If not better move the wire to under the other screw head. Last test would be with both wires attached ( one under each screw head). This antenna will be directional. If wires are horizontal have the wires directed apart with their sides toward the station. You might try a single wire oriented vertically. (Like antenna on your truck).

Coaxial jack - first try using THIRTY INCH small solid wire. (Telephone wire again) strip short section and insert into center of the jack. Try various orientations for best signal. IF this works, suggest that you either fabricate a thirty inch wire with coax connector or modify a store bought cable.

THIRTY INCH is quarter wave resonate length for center of the FM band.

I give my advice based on twenty five years experience as broadcast engineer.

Bekeart

Update: Radio Shack sells a FM antenna.

Folded Dipole FM Antenna for $7.29

Model: 42-2385 | Catalog #: 42-2385

You can make your own with 300 flat lead.

Or you could try sitting it on a plate of metal, such as a garbage can lid, or even a grill rack might help, this would be sort of like radials and be somewhat like the metal surface under the trucks antenna.

Even if your portable has no external antenna connector, having it close to another antenna, will allow your portable to tap it as a signal source via inductive coupling. Sitting one next to a hard wired telephone will often increase signal. The copper phone lines act as an antenna, and the phone circuitry will radiate to your portable. Have an outside TV antenna? Try winding a dozen or so turns of small gauge wire in a loop, hook it across the TV twin lead, and place it against the portable case. Try different places on the portables case until you find the internal antenna, to get the best coupling. I worked at a remote area and my office was in a steel building that blocked what little radio reception was available. My radio had a small telescoping antenna that did not help on its own, so I kept a length of wire with alligator clips on each end that I would clip between the antenna and the aluminum window frame to get enough usable signal.

Thanks for all the advice --- I infer that I left out some important information, namely, that my reception problems are with a boombox radio with onboard, telescoping antenna, used within an entirely metal structure --- shipping container set on a steel structural frame and expanded metal deck, covered by corrugated steel roofing, seemingly the worst possible site for FM reception... Looks as if I'll need to a remote antenna... Wish me luck!

...or as Confucius might of said, "He who live in Faraday cage cannot expect to hear music".

You might try 2 alligator clips and a length of wire (any size). Clip one end to the radio's antenna and the other to your shed.

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In dog years I'm dead.

Take a look around here.

How to Make an FM Antenna - wikiHow

XM has many news channels, such as 115 for CNN, 116 for HLN Headline News, etc. It even has channels dedicated to the large cities, such as 135 for Chicago/Detroit. Details at
Channel Lineup - SiriusXM Radio

Most Ipods have built-in FM receivers that can pick up local stations - perhaps there is something wrong with yours?

The "Elvis" channel that you mentioned is dedicated to only broadcasting Elvis-related items. It would likely never be broadcasting news items unless Elvis returned from the dead.

There are days I want to hear breaking news, and others where the rest of the planet can get on without me.