Greater Cleveland Radio Communication Network

wa8pyr

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I was afraid of that LOL. But may go that route soon and bite the bullet.
I would assume the 200 would be better and advanced then the 100?

Not really, they're basically the same radio; one is handheld, the other desktop/mobile.

If you want to tote the thing around with you, go for the 100.
 

Swipesy

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Ron,

I ran both a discone and a YAGI. The discone was outside on a 20 foot pole the Yagi in my attic up 45 feet. For some unknown reason the Yagi was worthless in the attic. I don't know if the rafters knocked down the signal or what. I put the Yagi outside on another 20 foot pole and it came to life.

As to the SDS100 versus the SDS200, I have friends who have both. The 100 and 200 perform identical using identical antennas. Your only decision is portability. One of the owners is in the I-480/Jennings Freeway area and has no issues with his SDS100.
 

ron351

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Ron,

I ran both a discone and a YAGI. The discone was outside on a 20 foot pole the Yagi in my attic up 45 feet. For some unknown reason the Yagi was worthless in the attic. I don't know if the rafters knocked down the signal or what. I put the Yagi outside on another 20 foot pole and it came to life.

As to the SDS100 versus the SDS200, I have friends who have both. The 100 and 200 perform identical using identical antennas. Your only decision is portability. One of the owners is in the I-480/Jennings Freeway area and has no issues with his SDS100.
Swipesy thanks, will look into the 200 model. I can run a speaker to the livingroom rather then buy both at that cost to hear it while I post calls.
 

ron351

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Not really, they're basically the same radio; one is handheld, the other desktop/mobile.

If you want to tote the thing around with you, go for the 100.
Wa8pyr thanks, I didn't look into it before replying. I thought they were both base. Appreciate it.
 

ron351

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You won't be unhappy with an SDS100. I have one and tote it around the house with me; works like a charm.
Thanks, only thing I don't like about the hand held is the antennas don't seem to be any good. I have 3 of them and none are worth a darn. A metal one telescopes up, and the one that came with it, then paid I think $29 for one thats fat and goes thin flexible. So I leave the hand held stationary connected to the coax cable from the antenna in the attic. It splits in the basement to the basement I broadcast from and the hand held upstairs
 

ron351

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One last thing I didn't ask is I split my coax to the base and to my hand held upstairs. I have used a Tee coupler to split to both scanners and have had no problems. I currently use the straight Tee as in the left image which makes it connect to both as if they were connected direct to the coax. Is that ok or should a splitter be used as in the right image similar to what cable tv uses to split the line?8215982160
 

ron351

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Have problem with my hand held BCD325P2
Not sure what I did or didn't do right.
Messed with it all day setting back to factory holding down Hold 2 9 button and hitting power.
I had old files that worked I uploaded to the scanner and still silent.
All I want to listen to is 2 channels
1st District Police
2nd District Police
Cleveland Cuyahoga county.
I attached a file I uploaded to the scanner, any experts see anything wrong?
I tried all day and am at a loss
It scrolls saying ID Scan
Below it has NFM
When NFM goes away it has 855.9875 then goes back to NFM but no sound at all
 

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ron351

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Your file seems to work for me OK here in southern Cuyahoga County
I do appreciate it. Next step is take it to the basement and connect it to a coax on the Tee splitter, I can't see the coax going bad from basement to living room, only 10' long, but if it worked for you then may be the cable. I spent 8 hours today in the attic and factory resetting it and finally turned here. Will let you know what it was when I know. Thanks so much for trying it.
 

W8KIC

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I do appreciate it. Next step is take it to the basement and connect it to a coax on the Tee splitter, I can't see the coax going bad from basement to living room, only 10' long, but if it worked for you then may be the cable. I spent 8 hours today in the attic and factory resetting it and finally turned here. Will let you know what it was when I know. Thanks so much for trying it.
Exactly what type of coaxial cable are you using?
 

ron351

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Exactly what type of coaxial cable are you using?
Same as Spectrum cable uses R6 I believe it is. I also ran a quad shield to the garage but don't use that one right now. Rather then the BNC Tee connector in the previous post I may put regular coax twist ends on and screw it to a splitter like this82199
 

wa8pyr

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One last thing I didn't ask is I split my coax to the base and to my hand held upstairs. I have used a Tee coupler to split to both scanners and have had no problems. I currently use the straight Tee as in the left image which makes it connect to both as if they were connected direct to the coax. Is that ok or should a splitter be used as in the right image similar to what cable tv uses to split the line?View attachment 82159View attachment 82160

If you're only using the scanners one at a time you'll probably be OK, but if they're powered up at the same time, using the one on the left (the "tee") could result in the scanners causing images in each other due to leakage from the local oscillators.
 

ron351

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If you're only using the scanners one at a time you'll probably be OK, but if they're powered up at the same time, using the one on the left (the "tee") could result in the scanners causing images in each other due to leakage from the local oscillators.
It worked fine this way a couple years, then a few months ago seemed to garble so bought another tram antenna and was good again until the other day the handheld went out. I did connect the handheld to the coax running to the base one and it got signal, so thinking the short coax to the living room has a bad contact. I can use single coax to each unit if I have to. Is it best to go coax direct to the scanners or use a splitter? I am no expert how these splitters function but thought cable looses and the splitters boost the db loss or something. In the past I only had it connected to a BNC Tee fitting split to both scanners
 

wa8pyr

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It worked fine this way a couple years, then a few months ago seemed to garble so bought another tram antenna and was good again until the other day the handheld went out. I did connect the handheld to the coax running to the base one and it got signal, so thinking the short coax to the living room has a bad contact. I can use single coax to each unit if I have to. Is it best to go coax direct to the scanners or use a splitter? I am no expert how these splitters function but thought cable looses and the splitters boost the db loss or something. In the past I only had it connected to a BNC Tee fitting split to both scanners

Ideally each scanner would have it's own antenna.

Splitters do cause loss on each of the output ports. Depending on the design of the splitter and the number of ports it could be anywhere from 3.5 to 7dB loss per port; a two-port splitter will typically be around 3.5db per port (which means only half the amount of signal is getting to each port).

A receiver multicoupler (sort of a glorified splitter) includes a preamp to reduce those losses, but on the other hand is amplifying the noise that comes from the antenna as well as the desired signals unless the preamp is at the antenna, which is a lot more complicated than you probably need or want to get involved with.

Update: Forgot to mention that you might also want to try using less antenna, or try turning on the attenuator. Since you're monitoring a simulcast system it's possible that your scanner is not decoding properly, in which case less signal is better so you can limit your reception to a single tower.
 
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ron351

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Ideally each scanner would have it's own antenna.

Splitters do cause loss on each of the output ports. Depending on the design of the splitter and the number of ports it could be anywhere from 3.5 to 7dB loss per port; a two-port splitter will typically be around 3.5db per port (which means only half the amount of signal is getting to each port).

A receiver multicoupler (sort of a glorified splitter) includes a preamp to reduce those losses, but on the other hand is amplifying the noise that comes from the antenna as well as the desired signals unless the preamp is at the antenna, which is a lot more complicated than you probably need or want to get involved with.

Update: Forgot to mention that you might also want to try using less antenna, or try turning on the attenuator. Since you're monitoring a simulcast system it's possible that your scanner is not decoding properly, in which case less signal is better so you can limit your reception to a single tower.
Wa8pyr appreciate the reply. I eliminated the handheld and just going to sell it dirt cheap. Gave up on it. Now I have the coax direct into the main base scanner I am broadcasting from with no splitter. Not sure where that attenuator is in the scanner, will have to read up on the book to see how to mess with that. I am getting some garble even hooked up the way I just mentioned. So maybe that Tram Discone antenna is picking up more then needed and may have to cut down some. I will try moving it a foot or so in the attic and see if it helps.
So frustrating, it was working fine for a couple years until recently
 

budevans

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Ron, your best bet would be a small yagi antenna. Even a small TV desktop yagi (directional) antenna would be better. Another option you might consider, is putting a small antenna in your basement. The lower the better.

Your location puts you in the middle of four Cleveland towers. The closest, just over a mile and a half and the farthest just under three miles. Of the four, only one might not be line of sight. That would be the Cleveland Hopkins Airport.

The other options are all rather expensive. The Uniden SDS 100 or 200 scanners or the Unification G series pagers.

Good luck.
 

ron351

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Ron, your best bet would be a small yagi antenna. Even a small TV desktop yagi (directional) antenna would be better. Another option you might consider, is putting a small antenna in your basement. The lower the better.

Your location puts you in the middle of four Cleveland towers. The closest, just over a mile and a half and the farthest just under three miles. Of the four, only one might not be line of sight. That would be the Cleveland Hopkins Airport.

The other options are all rather expensive. The Uniden SDS 100 or 200 scanners or the Unification G series pagers.

Good luck.
Thanks Bud. What I ended up doing is what you mentioned, but I used the small 6" rubber antenna in the attic that came with the BCD325P2 hand held. It is attached to the coax on a PVC pipe to hold it up in the air.
It is doing much better but may have to try just the coax alone, it gets a little bit of garble but not to bad.
 

ron351

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For now I improved the signal with a rubber duck by putting aluminum foil 3/4 around the antenna. It is not garbled by eliminating signal from the other surrounding towers. So 90% better till I get my SDS200 scanner.82411
 
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