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N4VKF

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I just started expanding my scanner interests to listing to the vhf airband. I am located in the Washington (zdc) artcc airspace. Can someone help me with the geography of the sectors and what would be good to monitor in the Fredericksburg, va region?

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qwho

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Check out skyvector.com you can look at terminal, sectional and enroute charts.. You can pick from there depending on what you want to monitor..
I just started expanding my scanner interests to listing to the vhf airband. I am located in the Washington (zdc) artcc airspace. Can someone help me with the geography of the sectors and what would be good to monitor in the Fredericksburg, va region?

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W8RMH

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Here is an Yaesu Antenna made for their handheld aviation radios which should work well. Sportys carries numerous antenna options.

The Laird Technologies EXB-136-BNX covers 136-144 MHz which is closer to airband than the 771.

I would try an expandable antenna like the Diamond RH789, which covers 95MHz to 1100MHz, so you can tune right to the frequency you want.
 
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N4VKF

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The 771 I purchased was tuned specifically for air band. It is the 771-A version. It's a shame they don't market them in the states like they do for EU countries.

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nanZor

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Just be careful about being "tuned for airband".

Depending on the quality of the front end of your scanner / handheld, merely being tuned for resonance, or some band "near" to it, may still have a sufficiently wide response that overload / desense from nearby bands like FM broadcast, NOAA weather, etc can still pose an issue.

If that is the case, then a very NARROW air-band response (aka "high-q") will help protect your scanner's front-end better and provide a lower noise floor, especially with modern dsp based receivers.

Like W8RMH hinted, ducks designed to operate with actual pilot handheld transceivers usually are narrow like this since they don't need wideband operation to begin with - just the airband usually.

How to test for high-q - these types of antennas are easily DEtuned by being in close proximity to your body or metallic surfaces. It will be very sharp - although not usually noticed if you are actually wearing it close to the body at the airport itself where signals are overwhelming.

The scanner enthusiast test is to place your fingers on the antenna, usually near the top and see if performance degrades severely. That is actually a good sign.

An easily available antenna from most aviation shops that meets this high-q requirement, is the Icom FA-B02AR with bnc fitting. It is designed for their own transceivers. Touch this antenna with your fingers, especially at the top, and you'll know right away. In this case, that's a *good* thing.
 
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