Best radio for Air band?

[Uplink]

Going back to your original question, as an aviator, and amateur radio operator, I'm picky about aircraft radios. I've been thru lots of them. I like to have selectivity, sensitivity, and a quiet-fast AM squelch tail, and good AM AUDIO quality.

As MANY have mentioned, go with a Uniden, such as BCT15X (nice as it has milar too), even the older Unidens, such as the BCT8, and even the little BC355N series (although they have no keypads), all are OUTSTANDING aircraft receivers.

Suprisingly one of the BEST AM receivers I have heard is the ICOM IC-208 tranceiver, I will never sell mine, as I LOVE the sound and quality of it's AM aircraft receiver, and even milar coverage as a bonus.

 

[KD8FSJ]

Recently got a new dedicated air scanner. I almost got a BCD260DN. I felt the BCT15x was a better choice with it's dynamic memory system.

 

[Uplink]

Regarding the filters, the little BNC connector style FM Broadcast-notch filters, or the Aircraft band-pass filters that Scannermaster sells work great when your in a large metro city, they will knock out the adjacent FM broadcasters which will de-sense your aircraft receiver noticably.

I found that my aircraft receiver base antenna in Century city listening to nearby Santa Monica airport was suprisingly weak, and the airport was only a few miles down the road, it was almost like the antenna was broken off. Put the filter in line and bang, made a HUGE differnce.

If your in the suburbs or beyond, you don't need to bother with them.

 

[Ubbe]

Suprisingly one of the BEST AM receivers I have heard is the ICOM IC-208 tranceiver,

I took a look in its schematics and it looks really good in VHF air. It has a varicap filter at the front end that tunes to the frequency, similar to the excellent Uniden BC780, and then one dual gate GaAs fet transistor with a 1dB noise figure followed by 3 different varicap filters in series that tunes to the frequency monitored and then another of the same type GaAs fet transistor. An impressive receiver design for its 118-174MHz range.

What's the scan speed of programmed channels? Is it possible to have a delay after the squelch closes and then continues to scan?

/Ubbe

 

[michaelscoofield]

Many thanks for useful info.
208 and 780 sounds good!

I see some IC-208 on eBay but from Japan. No idea if there is some blocking point to obtain it from Japan for usage in EU…

 

[michaelscoofield]

Many thanks for useful info.
208 and 780 sounds good!

I see some IC-208 on eBay but from Japan. No idea if there is some blocking point to obtain it from Japan for usage in EU…

Btw is it big issue the lack of 8.33kHz step please?

-m

 

[xms3200]

In the U.S, 8.33khz spacing is not yet implemented, you will be fine

 

[Alain]

I took a look in its schematics and it looks really good in VHF air. It has a varicap filter at the front end that tunes to the frequency, similar to the excellent Uniden BC780, and then one dual gate GaAs fet transistor with a 1dB noise figure followed by 3 different varicap filters in series that tunes to the frequency monitored and then another of the same type GaAs fet transistor. An impressive receiver design for its 118-174MHz range.

What's the scan speed of programmed channels? Is it possible to have a delay after the squelch closes and then continues to scan?

/Ubbe

/Ubbe

I've had my 208H for over 20 years. Still performs as it did when I bought it. The owners manual does not offer the scan speed in the specs, but I can tell you that it is v-e-r-y fast indeed. Much faster than my SDS200, in fact.

Yes, there is a delay after the squelch and it is programmable. Page 59 of the owners manual states that you can choose from 2 seconds, 5 seconds, 10 seconds and 15 second delay.

Great, great radio!

 

[natedawg1604]

/Ubbe

I've had my 208H for over 20 years. Still performs as it did when I bought it. The owners manual does not offer the scan speed in the specs, but I can tell you that it is v-e-r-y fast indeed. Much faster than my SDS200, in fact.

Yes, there is a delay after the squelch and it is programmable. Page 59 of the owners manual states that you can choose from 2 seconds, 5 seconds, 10 seconds and 15 second delay.

Great, great radio!

What is the scan list capacity, for memory channels?

 

[Ubbe]

The IC-208H has a total of 512 memory channels (including 10 scan edges and 2 call channels) for storing often used operating frequency, repeater settings, etc.

You misread the user manual. It is the normal Icom way of pausing a fixed 2 sec delay after the carrier drops. The other timing values are when forcing a scan after a delay even when there's a carrier present.

/Ubbe

 

[Gmork]

I ordered a BCD260DN and it arrived yesterday. I wanted a simple old-school memory style analog wide-band scanner.

So far I am very pleased with it's receiving capacities in the air band which I specifically purchased it for. The alphanumeric screen as been great to remember what frequency is what.

 

[michaelscoofield]

In the U.S, 8.33khz spacing is not yet implemented, you will be fine

I am in EU where it is implemented already. That is also why I am worrying which differences are between EU / US / JA versions…

-m

 

[Ubbe]

8.33 are only done to the frequencies used at high altitudes, as an aircraft will cover almost the half of Europe from up at 30.000ft. So they will need all channels possible for that as they cannot reuse frequencies. At lower levels they name the channels as they would be 8.33 but are in reality still using the old 25KHz channel step. There's usually nothing interesting to hear from the 8.33 channels. All the interesting talk are from the chat channels and the company channels and sometimes approach and departure channels if some problem happens like a go around or engine failure at take off and needs to land.

/Ubbe