Tech Minds tests out the YouLoop HF Passive Loop Antenna
Over on YouTube Tech Minds has uploaded a new video where he unboxes and tests a YouLoop HF Passive Loop Antenna with his Airspy. The YouLoop design is also known as a Möbius loop, or noise cancelling passive loop "NCPL". The passive nature of the antenna means that highly sensitive radios will work best with it, however limited results may still be obtained with other radios. The advantages are extremely low levels of interference pickup and high portability.
In the video Tech Minds explains the specifications of the antenna before demonstrating the antenna receiving the HF bands with an Airspy + SpyVerter. He also tests the loop on VHF, demonstrating its ability to receive a distant 2M beacon.
We note that we sell official YouLoop antennas on our store for $34.95 including free shipping to most countries.
I can’t understand why more people don’t build their own versions of the YouLoop. Virtually any type of coax cable will do, I used RG59 Mini 75 ohm cable, usually used for CCTV installations. The tiny ferrite wideband transformer in the commercial version can be replaced by one using the larger BN73-202 binocular core. 30 awg wire-wrap cable or any 26-30 guage wire, perhaps from Ethernet or phone cables, can be used for the windings. Waterproofing can be added to suit individual requirements. Larger loops do give higher signal levels. I have a 5ft x 3ft one around a window frame that works well with RTL-SDR v3 and upconverter.
i bought one, i think they are great antennas, good clean reception, unfortunately i moved to into a town and i live in a house with a metal roof, and power lines go right through the yard, so reception is not good at my locale, (the youloop still works in these bad conditions) this YouLoop is great for portable operations so i can set it up on a lightweight tripod and run my airspyhf+ to my laptop, looking forward to camping this summer in the rocky mountains far away from noisy civilization and get into some serious DXing and pirate hunting
Why didn’t “Tech Mind” do an A/B comparison between the Youloop and the long-wire antenna he mentioned in the video? As it is, the video really doesn’t prove anything!
It is not waterproof, hanging it permanently outside is asking for it to fail due to water damage.
As far as I know the Youloop was designed to be perfect for the Airspy HF+ Discovery. You will still receive some signals with an Airspy R2 using a Spyverter R2 or a RTL-SDR v3 using HF Direct Sampling Mode (500kHz to 24MHz). But it would have been optimised for maximum performance with a HF+ Discovery. Now you could increase the diameter of the you loop by replacing the two 1 meter semi-rigid coax loop cables, with longer length cables, which should increase signal strength.