Scanner range

[taja2]

I own a small scanner...BC72XLT..and it's my first. Do scanners have a limited range? I live near Detroit..is there any point putting in a Toledo police frequency?

Second and last question: Some of the Detroit airport systems use the word "trunk"...will my scanner handle those?

[mciupa]

Hi taja2welcome to RadioReference

The limited range you are speaking of is reception, I assume.
Yes, the antenna on your portable will probably be good for 20-30 mile reception. Think of attaching an external antenna and mounting it as high as practical to the scanner.
You could put in the Toledo freq. for later use ( in case you take a drive over Toledo way).
Your scanner doesn't appear to have trunking capabilities or go beyond 512 MHz in it's freq. range so those trunk systems are not monitorable .
What you could do is search the Aircraft band and see what is active, or use Close Call and see what comes up.

[jclarkr6]

Taja2, I own a similar radio, the BC95XLT, and I use a Watson W-889 as my antenna. It's not an external antenna, it would simply replace the stock antenna that came with the scanner, but the W-889 performs much better. I recommend the W-889 only because hooking up an external antenna to such a small scanner can be cumbersome and you have to be careful not to overload the scanner.

Other than that, I just wanted to say that everything mciupa said was good advice.

[DPD1]

Best way to tell if you can get something is try... Sometimes you'll be surprised at many miles... Other times you'll be dismayed at very few miles. It all depends on a lot of things.

[mdulrich]

Toledo uses the Lucas County digital trunked system that your scanner is unable to receive.

Mike