Sunday, July 26, 2009

My hastily-drawn block diagram of a superhet receiver


Drawn just now from memory on a scrap of paper:

Now, I know what you're thinking. "He's no Rembrandt". Correct. But the important question is this: is everything right and in the right order?"

RF Amplifier, Mixer with Local Oscillator, Filter, Intermediate Frequency Amplifier, Product Detector with optional Carrier Insertion Oscillator or Beat Frequency Oscillator, and finally the AF Amplifier which produces the end product sound.

Is it right? I think so.

Where does the AGC connect? Out from Detector, to the left with "in" arrows pointing to IF and RF. Hey presto! Not bad eh?

Edit: Just answered the following QADV question. Might be helpful to learn this.

In a receiver, if the first i.f. is high, then:

a) the receiver can cope more easily with very strong signals
b) the usable frequency range is increased
c) the receiver gain is improved
d) the risk of second-channel interference is diminished.

The answer is d) the risk of second-channel interference is diminished.

And this one, again from QADV:

If a mixer is fed with frequencies f1 and f2, one of the IMPs produced is:

a) f1 / f2
b) 2 x f1
c) f1 + f2
d) 3 x f2

The answer is c) f1 + f2

And this one:

Two signals fp and fq are fed into a mixer. One of the intermodulation products is:

a) 2fp
b) 3fq
c) fp x fq
d) fp - fq

The answer is d) fp - fq

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