Enclosure material

Hello All.

What material is the enclosure for the 536hp made of? The reason I ask is because I am in a wheelchair and I think my wheelchair causes reception problems with my 536hp. alot of the time Ill be at my computer and the scanner will be scanning and not stopping on any transmissions and yet after I go away from everything for awhile transmissions will start coming in fine. I have my scanner on my desk where my computer is but the tower is on the floor and the 536hp is sitting on the desk about a foot above the tower...I think my wheelchair is made of mostly aluminum. Is there anyway that I can I shield my scanner from this type of interference?

Thanks Sheldon.

Most likely culprit is RF noise coming from your computer. If possible, put your scanner antenna on a cable and locate it away from the PC.

Not likely the wheelchair.

There could be some resonant component of the wheelchair that, when you are in the scanner's proximity, acts as a parasitic antenna element that couples with the antenna on the scanner. However, UPMan is probably correct.

Continuing, a metal object with varying lengths of metal pieces on it that are at different angles to one another can have one of those metal pieces act as a parasitic antenna element creating an unwanted directional antenna out of a normally omnidirectional antenna. You could be accidentally pointing the antenna's directionality away from where it normally is. Also, it can be your body that is the parasitic element. The best solution is to put an external antenna with a coax lead on the scanner and get the antenna away from that computer and away from your chair. You can place the antenna (hopefully with a decent ground plane) in another part of the room.

HI.

Hello.

I have my mini magnet mount antenna stuck right on top of my BCD536hp...And theres no where else I can put it because it tips over sooooooooooooo easy...Is there still electrons shielding spray available on the market?

Sheldon.

There is no spray that can solve your problem, nor has there ever been.

And if a magnet-mount antenna is tipping over, you don't have it attached to a good ground plane, and reception will be crap. Get a pie plate or cookie sheet and put it on top of a bookcase or something, and stick the antenna to that, away from your wheelchair and computer.

There are a lot of RF blocking materials, however I don't think that is your issue.

Off hand - I don't know of any available over the counter for home use in a spray. All I've ever seen were thru industrial suppliers, are in bulk containers. I've seem them used in a lab setting to reduce noise from test enclosures for some equipment. Large special cabinets were fabbed with a lot of Lexan, but there was too much switching noise for the test equipment in the room. It was easier to coat it than re-build it. This was > 20 years ago so it's been around for a while. I've seen plastic cases that had something similar applied at the factory.

We used a product similar to this and just brushed it on as appearance was not an issue. Super Shield

Amazon has this: again not a spray http://www.amazon.com/Y-Shield-Shie...=1417174142&sr=8-1&keywords=rf+blocking+paint

I can't comment on the effectiveness of either - Just know there is "stuff" out there. There are also some that IMHO are junk for the tin foil rf people with there crazy theories that paint an entire house.

RF shielding won't fix the lack of a ground plane on his mag-mount antenna.

Giving the antenna a proper groiund plane, and moving it up and away from sources of interference will do a lot more to improve reception than spraying anything on the wheelchair and/or computer.

Agree 100%, get it outside the house would be 1000% better.

jonwienke said:

RF shielding won't fix the lack of a ground plane on his mag-mount antenna.

Giving the antenna a proper groiund plane, and moving it up and away from sources of interference will do a lot more to improve reception than spraying anything on the wheelchair and/or computer.

Click to expand...

Mini mag could be the issue as well. Many of those have very poor internal connections. The ground braid is often just laying on the magnet.