Active aerial with SMDs

EE 30 February 1986 As stated in Surface-mount Technology (Elektor Elec- tronics, December 1985), all major semiconductor manufacturers are heavily engaged in the develop- ment and production of surface-mount compo- nents. These components are much smaller than conventional ones and have no or very short con- necting terminals, since they are intended to be soldered direct to the cop- per tracks of a circuit board. In general, these boards no longer have holes drilled in them, other than for fixing purposes. It should be noted that, although all major manufacturers have a good range of SMDs in production, these devices may not yet be available from all distributors and stockists. Circuit description The active aerial presented here is a very simple circuit, which is pri- marily intended as a practical introduction to working with surface- mount devices. It has been designed as an add-on unit for a car aerial and for portable receivers where a 12 V supply is available. The aerials ...