Looking to tweak out my FM reception.

[Magus]

My first was 6" of unshielded wire and a gator clip.
Then this.
https://www.radio4all.org/homemade-...ooster,cable and wrap the point with... More
Any better ones? (???)

 

[kd4ulw]

What the article is describing here is a dipole antenna. As long as your radio has two connectors to attach both leads of the wire to they work well. One of the drawbacks is that it is a directional antenna and you might not receive stations in a certain location relative to the outstretched portions of the dipole.

If your radio does not have an external antenna connector you can do what you said and attach a piece of wire onto the antenna and stretch it out as far as you can. That is known as a long wire antenna and usually the longer the better.

The only drawbacks to external antennas are that some radios are very sensitive but not very selective. If you hook up a longer antenna and you receive the same strong station at different points along the tuning dial (not just their broadcasting frequency) then you have a radio that is over-driving the receiver’s tuner.

 

[backlash]

I haven't listened to the radio in years so I'm no help.
I even went so far as to remove the antenna from my F150 and replaced it with a hex head screw.
In the old days we would put tin foil flags on the TV rabbit ears. Might work for FM radio.

 

[Magus]

My radio has an old cell phone type antenna, but I'm replacing it, it no longer holds my frequencies.

 

[Cabin Fever]

I've used a metal Slinky toy.

 

[Bacpacker]

I've used a metal Slinky toy.

Slinky makes a pretty good antenna

 

[Biggkidd]

My radio has an old cell phone type antenna, but I'm replacing it, it no longer holds my frequencies.

Not holding frequencies doesn't sound like an antenna problem to me.

 

[Magus]

Its not, the 0bama power surge that fried the AC got the radio too, but my reception here would suck if I had a 1000$ Grundig or Sangein.