I agree that the foil inside the telephone is snake oil. However, passive antenna systems do work in the real world. Getting Handy-Talkies to work from well shielded areas is usually a lost cause. If you bring a coax in from a good resonant antenna and let it hang on the wall you notice a significant improvement. Maybe even enough to be considered good! A very good reason for doing this is to keep emergency communications up during lightning conditions. I understand that a loop on the coax makes things even better but that requires handling the coax. I would imagine that the passive Cell antennas that feature an antenna on the roof of a car with a coax inside the car but not directly connected to the phone would provide a marginal boost. I think you could market a foil skull cap and make zero claims for it and still do a brisk business. John Ferrell 6241 Phillippi Rd Julian NC 27283 Phone: (336)685-9606 Dixie Competition Products NSRCA 479 AMA 4190 W8CCW "My Competition is Not My Enemy" ----- Original Message ----- From: "Matthew Fries" To: Sent: Monday, August 27, 2001 12:15 PM Subject: [OT] Internal Antenna baloney! > Alright, I have been seeing so many commercials about this thing and have > wondered how it could possibly work. > > In case you have not heard of it, the "internal antenna" looks to be a > thin piece of gold foil with adhesive backing that you place underneath > the battery of your cell phone. It claims to boost the signal reception of > your cell phone. > > My question is... How? > > The phone that is used in the ad is a Nokia of some sort. Lucky me, I have > a nokia, so I could use it as comparison. I don't even know how this would > work, because it does not appear that the foil is electrically > connected with *ANY* contacts on the phone at all. > > Secondly, the foil does not appear to contain any active components, or > any recognizable components at all. It's just foil. > > Thirdly, the foil does not even seem to be any complete circuit. It > appears to be a collection of traces arranged in a U or C shape. Maybe > this acts as some sort of RF coil or filter? If so, how could it possibly > have an effect since it is neither grounded or connected to the phone? > > Is this in fact just a bunch of hooey, or does it have any credability as > a valid device? > > What do you think? > > -- > http://www.piclist.com hint: The PICList is archived three different > ways. See http://www.piclist.com/#archives for details. > > -- http://www.piclist.com hint: The PICList is archived three different ways. See http://www.piclist.com/#archives for details.