1999 Lumina radio setup

[phillydjdan]

My 1999 Chevy Lumina radio setup:

UHF Motorola MCS-2000 Model 2
VHF Motorola MCS-2000 Model 2
Pro-96 handheld scanner
Dual-band antenna

The UHF and VHF radios are connected to the dual-band antenna through a duplexer.
The portable scanner is mounted to the dash by a custom bracket made from scrap pieces of metal banding material. The plastic belt clip has also been replaced by a custom metal clip made from scrap banding too.

 

[Rt169Radio]

Looks good.Do you keep the Pro-96 in the car all the time? Or do you just put it there when your not carrying it around?

 

[phillydjdan]

The 96 stays in there most of the time. I do hide it when I'm not around to avoid theft. I use it mostly when in the car and when I'm out of the car somewhere. I have a PSR-800 in the house, so no need to bring the 96 inside.

 

[Rt169Radio]

How does it (Pro-96) receive in the car with that handheld antenna?

 

[phillydjdan]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 2.2.3; en-us; SPH-M910 Build/FROYO) AppleWebKit/533.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/533.1)

Well, I use it mostly for Philly fire, and I live in the city, so reception is more than adaquate. In fact, I leave the attenuator on most of the time, otherwise the digital cuts in and out. If I'm looking to pickup the surrounding counties I can do so relyably if I'm within 8 or 10 miles of the border. The other 2 radios are for the surrounding areas, which are full analog or digital rebroadcasts on analog channels

 

[Skypilot007]

Nice job on the install. Looks good, nice and neat. MCS2000's are great radios.

 

[62Truck]

Nice set up! I miss my Lumina

 

[phillydjdan]

Yeah, so far I like the MCS-2000's. I lucked out and found a couple sellers on fleabay that had conventional ones with no issues. I have a thread on here where I asked a bunch of questions about them before I bought one. I actually just finished setting up a pair of them in the home shack as well. I didn't think I could do it, but I have all 160 channels occupied

 

[phillydjdan]

UPDATED setup

So, I've done some updating in my car. I got rid of the MCS-2000's in favor of Kenwood NX series radios (UHF and VHF). In order to mount them in a way that I can easily reach them, yet not have them shake on every bump, I decided to get a little creative. I went the the junkyard and pulled a center console out of a Chevy Monte Carlo of similar year. I then chopped off the front portion, right in front of the gear shifter, and mounted it in place. The cassette/CD holder makes a perfect place to mount a radio, or in my case, 2 radios stacked on top of each other. The NX series fit snugly, but I managed to make it work. I had to punch out the back of the cubby hole, to make room for the antenna connectors. Both feed into a duplexer and a dual band NMO mounted on the left rear quarter panel.

I threw in a couple of pics of the home brew mount I use for the Pro-96. I made it out of a piece of banding material.

I still have VHF and UHF MCS-2000's setup in my home shack.

 

[Rt169Radio]

Still looks good.

 

[russellmaher]

Good looking install! I loved my 97 Lumina (it's gone now) for the lots of space for putting scanners and other gear. I'm guessing you're enjoying yours.

Russell

 

[Dann]

Looks Good.