Using a tranciever for shortwave? Possible?

[APSN556]

I'm just now getting back into SWL and am thinking about getting another Kenwood R-5000. I remember it being one of my favorite rigs to use aside from the Grundig's and my all time favorite, the Drake R8B. Recently however, I am seeing more and more of the older transceiver "twins" come on the market for much less than their "receive only sibling" Example: the Kenwood TS-850 vs. the Kenwood R-5000. Or the Icom 745 vs. the Icom R-71A. The list goes on and on. My question is, are these transceiver copies equal in performance to the receive only models?

 

[ka3jjz]

Sometimes they might even be somewhat better. The R8B would be hard to beat, though...Do your homework first...best regards..Mike

 

[ridgescan]

It's just a matter of looking up the receiver specs of the transceiver and see if they match up to the specs of a receiver you like. The guy at HRO in Oakland tried to sell me an Icom 718 when I was shopping for a SWL rig. He said the receiver in that rig would be as good or maybe slightly better than the R75 because they tend to put excellent receivers into these radios, but I got the R75 anyway which I do not regret for a second-I love that thing.
I think he was trying to push me out of the wading pool into the real pool because he did comment upon me deciding on an R75-"aww comon man you don't just wanna listen and that's all"
My own personal gut feeling is that like Mike said, they may even be better in the tranceiver especially the mobile-going ones because of the idea that folks will be receiving off the same antenna they transmit with, and not a dedicated receive antenna? I always wondered this myself, maybe someone can educate?

 

[SCPD]

IMHO, most (newer, year 2000+) "desktop" (note, I didn't say mobile) HF transceivers are way better than any of the shortwave receivers on the market - with the exception of the Icom R9500.)

The best advice: Always try before you buy.

 

[k9rzz]

Some of the newer transceivers with the digital filtering sound 'funny' to this old timer. Read the reviews over on Eham for whatever rig you consider. Welcome back!

 

[p1879]

Using a transceiver for shortwave?

My r-75 and Yaesu 840 do about the same om utilities; but for swbc in am mode the r-75 is best for program listening.

 

[kma371]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 3GS: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8G4 Safari/6533.18.5)

Like ridgescan, I liked my IC718 for monitoring. It was a great radio!

 

[UberGeek]

Sure, they work well enough. Some radios need an extra-wide AM filter if you are into broadcast listening, however.

 

[majoco]

IMHO transceivers are designed as communications devices - they get the message through but they may not give the best audio on quality on a strong AM broadcast station. A good comms receiver will give good audio and still have the ability to winkle out the weak stations. Your R5000 choice is getting on a bit now but if you find a good one that hasn't been abused and the price is right - then go for it! Unfortunately the range of 'desktop' receivers has sadly diminished over the last few years - there's the high end (Icom R9000, TenTec R340) but in the middle range now are the SDR's (Excalibur, Perseus, Quicksilver) but you need a laptop to run them. I still use my old JRC NRD515 and a Kenwood R2000, but a WinRadio G303e SDR gets an airing occasionally - I still like knob-twiddling best!

 

[Turbo68]

I just did an experiment to see if a transivier can pull signals in as good as receiver using a Kenwood TS-480SAT against Alinco DX-R8 both hooked up to an SGC-237 automatic antenna tuner tunning between 300khz-400khz am on ndb the kenwood was on S1 audio wasnt very clear same signal on the Alinco with the attenuator was S20 audio was excellent tried a lot of other frequencies same results the receiver was pull in signal nice and clear compare to the transivier.

Regards Lino.

 

[ka3jjz]

One thing to keep in mind - many radios deliberately attenuate signal levels below 1000 khz (1 mhz) due to the possibility of overloading. So in and of itself, that test on LW was biased. The transceiver might have the attenuation - the receiver perhaps not.

73 Mike

 

[majoco]

...and the auto antenna tuner won't work with a receiver. Needs RF power to tune to a new frequency - hope you are allowed to TX on the NDB band.:roll:

 

[home121]

Above 1.2 gigs

Two questions in one, I hav'nt had a radio that recieved above 1.2 gigs so is there enought traffic up there and what kind is there? Number two is i've noticed some sensitivity issues like the ar8200 470mhz to 2.040gig is 9 micro volts,and from 2.040 to 3.gig is 25 uv / against the ar8600 30 to 470mhz 0.35uv.470 to 820mhz 0.50uv and 820 to3 gig 2.5 uv. now thats a big differance. The IC2500 is 1.8 mhz to 50mhz is 0.63 uv and 50 to 699mhz is 0.5uv. and 700mhz to1.3gig is 0.63uv.and 1.3gig to 2.299 gig is 5.6uv.. 2.3gig to 3.gig is 18.uv To me the 8600 is the best in sensitivity btw its all in nfm signals. Thanks to any who answer these questions and these figures are from the spec sheet for each radio. Thankyou again

 

[k9rzz]

There isn't much above the 1296mhz (1.2Ghz) ham band. Data mostly. Satellites start at 3Ghz and you'll need a lot more than a rubber duck antenna to pick anything up above there anyway. Not sure about the sensitivity question. The only thing I can think of, off the top of my head, is that there are a lot of high powered VHF and UHF transmitters for various services and if you make your receiver too sensitive, you'll just get blown out of the water with images.

 

[ratboy]

I have had many SW receivers over the last 25 years, including the Icom R71-A, Kenwood R5000, Jrc NRD-515 and 525, a Drake R-8A. During that same time, I have owned several transceivers and they are easily a match for the receivers. I had a Kenwood TS-450SAT for several years, and even with it's severely slow AGC, it was a very nice rig. I bought a Kenwood TS-850SAT off Ebay a couple years ago, and after replacing the battery and pretty much all the electrolytic caps in it, it's a great radio. At least the equal to the NRD-515, and way better than the R-8A, a highly over rated receiver, IMHO. It has very nice audio, much better than many of the receivers I have owned.

 

[zz0468]

Two questions in one, I hav'nt had a radio that recieved above 1.2 gigs so is there enought traffic up there and what kind is there?

If you can make it up to 1.3 GHz, there's a smattering of amateur activity in some metropolitan areas. 1296.100 MHz is the weak signal calling frequency, but that's going to be SSB or CW, and you'd need very high performance receivers and antennas to hear any of it. Beyond that, there's little to nothing that's listenable to the typical scanner listener.

Number two is i've noticed some sensitivity issues...

That's some pretty miserable performance, especially considering the performance required to hear anything that high in frequency. I honestly don't know why manufacturers even bother, other than the ability to claim their receiver has a wider frequency range than the next guy. I'm not aware of anyone who has successfully heard anything beyond a nearby ham repeater above 960 MHz without adding really low noise preamps and well engineered antenna systems.

 

[ka3jjz]

Please keep the questions related to receiving under 30 mhz - this is a HF only forum, as is the topic under discussion. We have other forums where questions about radios receiving above this range can be posted. Thanks...

Mike

 

[k9rzz]

Please let the discussions flow naturally. Thank you for not closing this thread because it strays slightly.