Airband antenna

Hello,
I am a pilot and avid aviation enthusiast. I was seeing what antennas both mobile and portable you’d recommend for my IC-A6 transceiver to get better RX coverage. I might occasionally use it for TX, but I mostly want it to listen to air traffic and AWOS on the way to the airport for a flight. I know there isn’t a whole lot of aircraft specific antennas with a BNC connector.
Thanks


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WX4BLF said:

Hello,
I am a pilot and avid aviation enthusiast. I was seeing what antennas both mobile and portable you’d recommend for my IC-A6 transceiver to get better RX coverage. I might occasionally use it for TX, but I mostly want it to listen to air traffic and AWOS on the way to the airport for a flight. I know there isn’t a whole lot of aircraft specific antennas with a BNC connector.
Thanks


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You are going to get a lot of replies specifying different antennas. This antenna sounds like it will solve any reception issues while mobile.

https://www.scannermaster.com/WSM_225_Airband_Magnetic_Whip_Mobile_Antenna_p/28-541170.htm

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I have never used one personally, but tons of people swear by these:

https://www.smileyantenna.com/category-s/1477.htm

Easy - you can either use the highly efficient duck that already comes with your A6 - the Icom FA-B02AR, or perhaps order/purchase a spare online or at your local FBO usually over the counter since they are very popular as replacements.

And basically, I'd hate to see you transmit into a "scanner" type of duck that frequently gets touted as being "airband specific", when in fact they are just wideband vhf ducks and the marketing department puts the whammy on the aviation scanner enthusiast. Ie, stick to the Icom duck if you are serious.

Then, get a window mount BNC-to-BNC cable. MFJ, Opek, and others make these. Having the duck, especially at airband vhf freqs at least mostly outside, makes this an easy combo for what you want to do.

The strength of the Icom FA-B02AR duck will survive street and even some freeway speeds without bending too much.

If you want to take it a step further, you can optionally place a few Type-43 clip on ferrites about 21 inches down from the window mount bnc on the cable inside, or wrap it inside one for a few turns.

The nice thing is that with the window mount, you can just exit the vehicle, and put the duck on your A6 without having to dismantle a bunch of stuff if you are worried about theft or vandalism with some other setup like a magmount or nmo-mount in the vehicle.