Thanks for the vote of confidence. But, I actually dont know how much
improvement the CCCrane add on antenna provides. That might be a 'fix' for
the Andrew V's poor reception. I understand their advertisement for their
$100.00 Twin ferrite antenna indicates that it will double the reception.
I would think doubling the output would be about 3 db. I didnt realize a 3
db gain antenna would be something that would be worth $100.00.
I'd like to hear from someone who has tried the CCCrane AM antenna.

Jerry

The CC Crane is a ferrite antenna and RF amplifier. It requires a
9-volt battery and claims 32 dB of gain. The primary value of (low
noise) gain is to overcome noise and lack of gain in a mediocre
receiver -- so the worse the receiver the more it helps.

Being ferrite, it is probably an H-field antenna which would exhibit
some directionality. That's good: helps prefer a given signal over
external atmospheric and galactic noise.

Once an antenna captures enough signal + external noise to provide
signal significantly greater than the receiver's (or amplifier's)
internal noise, more antenna doesn't help until it is large enough to
have significant directional gain. At broadcast band, that's
hundreds of feet.

Making a low-noise broadcast band RF amp is simple, but probably more
than $100 worth of screwing around unless one enjoys building elex.