So I purchased an am tube transmitter on eBay from a gentleman in Virginia who builds them. I paid a fairly high price, but I feel it's worth it. His design involved three tubes. It plugs into the wall, has a long wire coming out of the metal box, a nice audio cable as well. Had a post with nut and washer for grounding. It can be tuned by a nice big knob from about 750 am up to 1100 am. It has a nice glow from the tubes. Excellent audio for am. I'm playing old southern gospel music through it to my antique emerson radio.
The range covers my small apartment building of about 16 apartment units. I haven't put a ground rod in the ground to see if that will extend my range somewhat yet, but I'm happy with housecasting really.
There's not much worth listening to on am around here anyway. Talk, talk, and more talk. A couple classic country stations that play same songs everyday.BBN christian station to the north and that's about it.
I really appreciate the fine American craftsmanship in this transmitter. I'll try to get some pics uploaded later.
I don't have sound boards and other contraptions, i just hook the audio cables to the pc and push the sound until it starts to distort, but honestly it's just as loud as the local talk am without distortion. Much better sound with music than my talking house, but the talking house range seems better. I use radio dj.
I plan on streaming old time radio shows thru it for the elderly neighbors.
Thought I would share.