Oddity Archive: Episode 155 – The Archive Drive-In Movie Theater

Attempting to realize a viewer’s vision of an old-school, drive-in theater—at home.

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[RadioFreeCedarCity]

Those FM transmitters designed for cars that don't have an 1/8 AUX input are Part 15 compliant (I call them cigarette plug transmitters because that's how they're powered). Pyle Audio and some other companies make them, but I mainly use the Scosche FMT3DR "TuneIt" transmitter for Part 15 broadcasting. With no mods, other than using a cigarette plug to wall adapter to power it, the signal travels a few hundred feet in any direction before fading in my area. Your mileage may vary, but it's worth getting from Walmart or eBay (found some really cheap on eBay).

[JeremyMcCracken]

9:00 TV channel 6 is right off the bottom of the FM band– you should rabbit-ear a tube TV, crank the pot on your transmitter all the way to the low end, and see what you can get

[steveg]

Another great video. Part 15 is fun to mess around with

[jasonhaman]

Kind of a tangent, but I was surprised your receiver tunes the 'even' frequencies (91.2, 91.4, etc. vs 'odd' 91.1, 91.3, etc.). My understanding is that while North America uses odd-numbered FM frequencies, Europe (or at least the UK) uses even-numbered (no idea about elsewhere), and all digital-frequency-display radios I've used here in the US skip over the even-numbered frequencies. So, your receiver, with mains power adaptation, would also work in Europe, where most US-market digital tuning radios wouldn't.

[copperhamster]

That hum isn't coming from a ground loop, as it's a two pin power supply and the cd player is also not ac powered (at least I didn't see a power cord). That power supply is letting too much ripple into the dc side. It's probably a half wave rectifier with a single cap filter.
See if you can find an alternate power supply for it.
BTW something you might want to get as you dig deeper into AV and radio and such, a cheap USB or wi-fi 'PC' oscilloscope. You can get an acceptable one for a few hundred dollars. It's won't do the job of the $12k analyzer/scope we have at work but it'll show things like ripple.
My friend has a Hantek unit and it's pretty neat, it cost like... $200. It does wi-fi and has a built in battery so you can have it completely wireless for monitoring. I think from looking at the site it's the iDSO 1070A
Though from the specs it won't read higher than 70 Mhz (so you couldn't for example, use it to 'see' the rf output of that tuner) But still useful for many things.

[KurisuYamato]

Inflation rates made 5 cents of 1915-1920 dollars about as much as a full dollar today, sooo "Buckalodeon" would work for your crazy end-of-video idea :p

[OfficialDJUnikittyYT]

I remember listening to classic songs before the movie starts at the drive-in theater ! One of the songs i heard is a favorite from Elvis, Suspicious Minds.

[bakonfreek]

Unrelated question, does Z-92 tune where you're at?

[artistwithouttalent]

26:19 Charlie Chaplin and the Cure. Now THERE'S an album I'd like to see :P

[ianlarsen]

Love your content archive, I love coming back to your channel every once in a while, watching my favorite old videos (EBS, EAS, Public Access, Scary Logos, Bert the Turtle, etc.) and then checking out the new stuff. Keep up the good work.

[Roofae]

I had an FM-10 back in the day. They worked.. OK, but it was never all that stable, and had to constantly retune it over time.

[Inspiration_Date]

I wonder if you can connect any of this stuff to a Raspberry Pi. That could make for an interesting project.

[ladylilith]

revenge of the microbroadcast, nearly twice as many episodes later.

[Koutsie]

Keep up man, i hope you all good <3

[chops]

I missed hearing Pavanned in the intro! Awesome episode all in all.

[armron]

I have did it episode about drive-ins on my channel.

Tyler Yaw/Melton YM

[surrodox]

Anyone does hear the intro is a bit noisy today?

[neilforbes]

What you showed as the "schematic" diagram was NOT so. Rather it was the wiring diagram for the home builder, showing him/her where the components go and how to orient them on the printed circuit board. A "schematic" diagram is an abstract drawing using symbols to represent components(a zig-zag represents a resistor, for instance). Electronics used to be a hobby of mine.

[armron]

I love the drive-in movie theaters. I've been to two of them my whole life.

1994 to 2004 the Five Mile Drive in Dowagiac Michigan.

2005 to present the Capri Drive in Coldwater Michigan. They have two screens. I love the drive-in.

[neilforbes]

Third point, if the device is meant to run on 9 volts DC, then you feed it 9 Volts DC. The battery eliminator should be multi-voltage so as to select from 1.5 volt up to 12 volts(or higher if available).