Best radio for Air band?

[merlin]

Back to beginning.
Any receiver made to cover the whole air band. It should have decent sensitivity and decent dynamic range.
Audio should be powerfull enough to clearly hear voice with minimal distortion.
Best antenna is a 1/4 wave ground plane up as high as you can get with good coax.

My setup, I use a BCT-15X. Very good on air band. Antenna is 55 foot up with RG-117 coax.
Regional airport is 6.5 miles, flat land and can't hear the tower at all. Maybe sporatic squelch breaks.
Airborne, I have pickd up aircraft out as far as 100 miles.

Best thing antenna wise is antenna made/cut for air band. Direct, through a switch or coupler. Preamps are bad for scanners, maybe a BC/FM trap

 

[spongella]

I found the Airspy HF+ Discovery works very well in the VHF aircraft band. It's not a scanner though and you'll need a computer. I use it mostly to listen to ATIS from Newark, LaGuardia and Trenton, NJ. My antenna's a chimney mounted 2m/440 Slim Jim.

 

[Icanhearit]

I own bct125at, bct15x (have 2), and Icom R-15. If you ask best of those, l will pick the Icom one(sensitivity, scan speed, dual watch), but is also 2.5 -4 times more expensive than the 2 uniden ones.

The two uniden ones are not bad, consider their price, are good. I do not have luxury setting up discon/external antenna. In terms of indoor or portable antenna, many warship diamond rh-77ca which I have 2. To me, it is ok, not great. The smiley antenna, either the rubber duct or the stick one , both optimized for 122-125mhz (but great across 118-136 airband) are way better, same price (the portable rubber ducky one also has smaller profile than RH-77CA).
If you go with the uniden bct15x or to the friend who says bct15x is 😕, try the non portable smiley antenna stick for 121-125), while RH-77CA may struggle with some tracons , the similey stick not only pulls in clearer talk, but also can pickup quite some control tower and ground channels while rh-77CA is totally deaf to.

 

[xms3200]

I fully agree with the Icom IC-R15 with all its qualities for a scanner, and, personally, the Smiley Antenna is amazing. When I first got my IC-R15, I spent a lot of time trying antennas, I got the Smiley 8” ducky (125 to 132Mhz) and couldn’t be happier. The Diamond name seems to carry a lot of weight, just try Smiley.

 

[G7RUX]

I’m sure the Smiley antennas work well (although I have never used one myself) but I have a lot of difficulty accepting the claimed performance given on their website…

 

[xms3200]

I know, they use dbd for gain….too much instrumentation, let the audio quality and signal strength be the judge.

 

[G7RUX]

To be honest even 3 dBi would be more gain than is reasonable for a radial mode helical.

 

[oaktree_b]

I've used the BC125AT for aircraft, works fine. Got a 70cm/2m dual band antenna off amazon, some nameless company for like 15 bucks. Seems to work fine.

 

[Kiniutech]

Hi I have Watsons, Diamonds etc. I also have Yaesu Air Band transceiver antenna and I found that it beats any other antennas I have on Civ Air.
I would invest in one Yaesu or iCom tranceivers antenna for dedicated Air Band Scanning.

 

[xms3200]

The Icom FA-B02AR antenna that comes with their airband transceivers are excellent.

 

[michaelscoofield]

OK folks, thanks for all comments but let's go back to the initial question please...

What is the best radio for Air band long distance reception please? I mean sensitivity / selectivity/ breakthru immunity / audio / scanning…
Some hints posted, anybody else with own experiences into big antennas please?

Antenna is not in question as it is already installed:
The 3.4/5.5dBi (5/8, 2x5/8 in 1.7m length) from Diamond mounted at 12m height on the house roof.
Following the air-band BPF filter and switchable preamp close to antenna and H400 Ultraflex coax feedline down to the shack.
Optionally FM band-stop filter.
In the shack will be splitter to four receivers.

Thanks,
-m

 

[Ubbe]

As you are going to use an antenna amplifier you can save some money by using RG6 coax. Coax are a non issue when using preamplifiers at the antenna. Then also use a splitter at the receiver as a buffer to keep the impedance more constant to the coax as scanners impedance at their antenna input can vary considerably.

Icom receivers/scanners have a tendency to overload very easily. A Uniden BCT15x are pretty much impossible to overload and can handle most of the gain from a preamplifier, but always use an adjustable attenuator at a receivers input when dealing with external antennas, to be able to adjust for an exact level where the receiver are as sensitive as possible.

As you will have some gain from the amplifier the supposed lower sensitivity from a BCT15x are compensated for. It has it's own bandpass filters for 108-137MHz and 225-320MHz. Always use an external FM broadcast stop filter for VHF air as broadcast transmitters can produce very high signal levels and a scanners 108MHz filter range doesn't stop as a brick wall and will let the FM broadcast band pass thru without much attenuation.

As aircrafts are up in the air it will probably be line of sight to them and can be received with pretty much any antenna. It's more difficult to receive ground stations like the tower at an airport. If you are close to an airport I would suggest to get a directional gain antenna pointed at the airport to receive the tower more clearly and any aircrafts will still be received. But those directional VHF antennas are single banded so probably not an option for you, if you don't install a diplexer at the antenna to allow two different antennas to be connected to one coax. Diplexers for HAM radio amateur use are probably fine as they split for signals at 145MHz and 440MHz usually using a crossover frequency at 200MHz, like the Comet CF-142.

/Ubbe

 

[jeepsandradios]

As many have mentioned the BCT15x is an excellent receiver. I got mine via online auction site for $50. If you dont mind used they are out there.

 

[michaelscoofield]

As many have mentioned the BCT15x is an excellent receiver. I got mine via online auction site for $50. If you dont mind used they are out there.

Many thanks, could you send me the link for auction like that please? I never seen for this price

 

[michaelscoofield]

As you are going to use an antenna amplifier you can save some money by using RG6 coax. Coax are a non issue when using preamplifiers at the antenna. Then also use a splitter at the receiver as a buffer to keep the impedance more constant to the coax as scanners impedance at their antenna input can vary considerably.

Icom receivers/scanners have a tendency to overload very easily. A Uniden BCT15x are pretty much impossible to overload and can handle most of the gain from a preamplifier, but always use an adjustable attenuator at a receivers input when dealing with external antennas, to be able to adjust for an exact level where the receiver are as sensitive as possible.

As you will have some gain from the amplifier the supposed lower sensitivity from a BCT15x are compensated for. It has it's own bandpass filters for 108-137MHz and 225-320MHz. Always use an external FM broadcast stop filter for VHF air as broadcast transmitters can produce very high signal levels and a scanners 108MHz filter range doesn't stop as a brick wall and will let the FM broadcast band pass thru without much attenuation.

As aircrafts are up in the air it will probably be line of sight to them and can be received with pretty much any antenna. It's more difficult to receive ground stations like the tower at an airport. If you are close to an airport I would suggest to get a directional gain antenna pointed at the airport to receive the tower more clearly and any aircrafts will still be received. But those directional VHF antennas are single banded so probably not an option for you, if you don't install a diplexer at the antenna to allow two different antennas to be connected to one coax. Diplexers for HAM radio amateur use are probably fine as they split for signals at 145MHz and 440MHz usually using a crossover frequency at 200MHz, like the Comet CF-142.

/Ubbe

Many thanks for very useful info.
I have installed the Ultraflex LNR(H)400 so it should be even better than RG6. The pre-amp is switchable remotely so I can bypass it if not needed. Stop-band FM VHF filter is ready so I will use it at the antenna side.
Nearest airport is about 20km away, but it is only VFR so no continue service here.
Prague Airport is about 60km away...

Again, many thanks for all detailed information.
-m

 

[K9KLC]

"Best" is subjective. Desktop I'm assuming since you have an antenna installed at your home. To be honest of all the "newer scanners" I've tried, I have a 30 or so year old Relm that I use for air band when I'm in the mood to listen to that and it outdoes them all. You will basically get opinions here which is great but none of those will tell you which is "best" for you.

 

[Ubbe]

Probably any receiver will work fine if you use a narrow enough bandpass filter. There are VHF airband filters for 118-137MHz that only pass the airband where there are no high power transmitters, helped by a dedicated FM broadcast filter. For mil UHF you'll need a 200-400MHz filter where you probably also have no other high power transmitters.

It's your local RF environment that dictates what filters, if any, that will be needed and we all have different conditions where we use our receivers and we will then also give different recommendations. There no single antenna or receiver that will be the best for everyone.

/Ubbe

 

[bearcatrp]

depending how deep your pockets are, get either the 160DN for $249 or a R15 for $559. The 125 is good for civilian air. For mil air, it lacks 380 to 400 MHz. Just depends how much you want to spend.

 

[G7RUX]

What you will find in the 200-400 range is DAB transmissions so that *might* give you some issues but it is unlikely to be a major problem unless you are very close to a transmitter site.

 

[jeepsandradios]

Many thanks, could you send me the link for auction like that please? I never seen for this price

My link is gone. But I just searched and there is one for $85.00 right now on there. These are used. Takes a bit of time but if you watch the sites they do pop up all the time.