Helicopter Radio Equipment/Accessories

[KG5HHS]

Hello everyone,
I apologize if this is not the correct place for this thread. I have a few questions about EMS/Law Enforcement helicopter radio equipment and accessories pertaining to the airborne FM radio's not the aviation band radios. From what I have seen, the pilot has access to multiple radios and has multiple PTT switches while the crew can only hear the air band radio but only transmit on the FM radio. I have only seen Medevac helicopters up close and personal. The majority of the helicopters I have seen have technisonic tdfm series radio's where the flight crew can access them. My questions are, what other airborne FM/P25 radio manufactures are there? and what is the device called that is the Flight Helmet connection/PTT Switch? I have tried to look it up online but haven't found what I'm looking for. The ones I have seen look like Plantronics PTT Switches like the picture attached. The device I'm talking about stays in the aircraft and the flight helmet is disconnected from it at the top. Also, What type of connection do flight helmets use?

 

[MtnBiker2005]

Some helicopters use this company products.

Cobham Aerospace Communications Product Lines.
Link: Products

The last FAA report I got for this CHP aircraft had these listed.
CHP N137HP equipment:
Technisonic TFM-30
TFM-30 – Technisonic Industries Ltd.

Technisonic TDFM-9300 - (CHP N979HP helicopter also has it)
TDFM-9300 – Technisonic Industries Ltd.


You can request the info from FAA for any aircraft.
It will tell you most of the equipment installed on the aircraft.
Request Aircraft Documents

 

[ab5r]

Hi John. I cannot advise you on manufactures as you ask or identify the devise shown, but can tell you that some years back the Dallas PD helo WAS able to talk & hear on FM. In fact, one of the pilots was a ham and occasionally communicated. They were able to communicate with other agencies too. However today, the the Fort Worth Regional Radio System (FWRRS) it is more sophisticated digital equipment & I don't know their capabilities.
73,
Jerry AB5R

 

[KM4OKT]

These are the best drop switches you can get.

https://www.wysongusa.com/products/drop-switch-cord/

The connectors for the helmets go into a U174.

The connector looks like this-https://www.ttiinc.com/content/ttii...MIpfWL8e_k4QIVxZJbCh2eaAIIEAYYBCABEgIV9vD_BwE

Almost all LE and Medevac that I have witnessed use the Technisonic models with exceptions being mobiles and portables tied into the aircraft intercom.

Check here too for radios.

Transceivers, Audio Communications|Avionics, Transceivers, Satcom, Antennas, Annunciators, Displays

 

[KG5HHS]

Thank you very much guys. I appreciate all the info

 

[petnrdx]

There are still a lot of Wulfsburg FlexCom and UltraCom radios out there. Now Cobham. And Bendix-King made a very nice VHF/UHF two band FM radio that worked great, and was inexpensive.
Most aircraft audio systems allow the pilot (and co-pilot) to select which radio or radios every one hears, and select which radios different positions in the aircraft might be allowed to transmit on.
Even the old military system select box allowed about 4 audio sources.

 

[mm]

Please do not use the great WULFSBERG name in the same sentence as useless Corn-COBHAM because they aren't especially after working for Wulfsberg Electronics for 21+ years and now retired thanks to the useless turd -Arse Britts.

Cobham is simply a UK holding Co. that buys thriving American companies and runs them into the ground and nothing else.

Back to tactical helo radios history, originally it was Wulfsberg radio in overland park Kansas in the 70's then mid 80's we moved to prescott AZ and in the earl 90's we merged with a Arizona loran-c/gps Mfg. called Global Nav to become Global-Wulfsberg.

Our only competitor at the time(circa early 1990's) was NAT, NORTHER AIRBORNE TECH. IN BRITISH COLUMBIA which Cobham would also later buy out in the early 2000's, and attempt to merge with Wulfsberg but eventually run NAT into the ground.

In the late 1990's NAT's traitorous GM left BC to go work with TAC-FM RADIO startup TIL, TECHNISONICS INDUSTRIIES near TORONTO..

Wulfsberg used to be the namebrand in tactical aviation FM/P25 RADIOS until the usless Britts from Cobham were let into Arizona circa 1998 and went amock never putting a dime back into Wulfsberg.

As an example, up until 2011 we still had test equipment from circa mid 1990 due to Cobhams neglect.

As to WULFSBERG USERS, Most natl guard, border patrol, coast guard, marine 1, etc helos still use the WULFSBERG RT5000 LINE or the WULFSBERG P2000 LINE.

Some USDA fixed wing and helos also use still use 30 year old Wulfsberg radios.

As is evident I refuse to call WULFSBERG by the name of those usless Britts/Cobham and prefer to still refer to our radios as Wulfsberg's.

The useless Britts from Cobham also almost destroyed the great american aviation beacon/plb manufacturers ARTEX from Aurora Oregon and ACER from FT. LAUDERDALE.

Apparently they are still mad at us for thing that occured in the years 1776 and 1812.

 

[petnrdx]

Back in my flying days we LOVED the Wulfsburg. We had one with every bell and whistle in our 206L3.
They were the cats meow.

 

[mm]

YOU PROBABLY HAD THE RT5000, 29.7 TO 960 MHZ WITH a AT5000 TUNEABLE BLADE ANTENNA.

That was a fun radio to work on, I designed the transmitter /low pass filter/pin switching stages for the RT5000 over a 3 year period.

I used that radio on 6meters, 2meters, 220 MHZ 440 AND 902-928 MHZ from 1991 to 2010.
My only complaint was that I never could talk the C5000 control head nor THE RT5000 SOFTWARE engineers into lowering the 29.7 range down to 29 MHZ so I could use it on 10 FM.

 

[petnrdx]

I forget which RT's we had, but I know there were three. LB, HB and UHF. With separate "guard receivers" on HB and UHF.
Hopefully I am remembering that correctly. It sure seems to me we were able to monitor 5 different things on that radio. And we had two VHF AM radios. Was not much we could not do with that setup.
All of it ran thru the NAT boxes.
Most of the channel changing could be done on the "china hat" or the other buttons on the cyclic.
Was well planned out by the previous flight crews.
I used to like getting up as high as I could get, then dialing up the CA repeaters from above WA and working some 6M DX.
We had the CRT display with all the goodies. Even airborne repeat, and record of the last 20 or so seconds.
COMPLICATED radio, but once you got the hang of it, it was truly spectacular.

 

[speedway_navigator]

I wonder if Viavi bought Aeroflex/Cobham because it was losing money.

 

[poltergeisty]

You can request the info from FAA for any aircraft.
It will tell you most of the equipment installed on the aircraft.

Does this also apply to DHS and FBI aircraft, etc, or is that sealed shut for obvious reasons?

Check here too for radios.

Transceivers, Audio Communications|Avionics, Transceivers, Satcom, Antennas, Annunciators, Displays

Out of curiosity, how much does one of those radios cost?

you must be really bored to be reading this far down

HAHA You know me too well.

 

[petnrdx]

I don't think you will get much on "public use" category aircraft.
And I think the complete Wulfsburg system was something like $50K in mid 90's.
I would expect the newer radios that include trunking and such would be pretty expensive.

 

[TampaTyron]

The handful of Technisonics I have programmed over the years used Motorola XTS and later APX portable radios in them. So the Technisonics capabilities was determined by which radios it had inside it. It programmed/keyloaded through a special adapter/plug that might have required a completely new programming cable. It has been 3-4 years since the last time I touched one, so my details are a bit cloudy. TT

 

[TampaTyron]

The handful of Technisonics I have programmed over the years used Motorola XTS and later APX portable radios in them. So the Technisonics capabilities was determined by which radios it had inside it. It programmed/keyloaded through a special adapter/plug that might have required a completely new programming cable. It has been 3-4 years since the last time I touched one, so my details are a bit cloudy. TT

And they were $35k-40k ea. TT

 

[poltergeisty]

Wow, that much, huh? That's crazy! I mean the helicopter its self is a massive bill, let alone that constant mandatory maintenance and fuel.

I can envision law enforcement using some kind of drone that can loiter for hours and be a lot cheaper one day.

 

[mm]

I forget which RT's we had, but I know there were three. LB, HB and UHF. With separate "guard receivers" on HB and UHF.

You probably had the RT30 VHF-LO (29.7-49.99 MHZ), The RT138 VHF HI 138-174MHZ or the RT9600 VHF HI 150-174MHZ and either the RT406 406-470MHZ or the RT450 450-512 MHZ 10 watt radios with crystal guards.

There are some customs drones flying between Yuma and Douglas AZ. that use 2 of either the the RT5000P (P25) MODEL or the RT5000CS (P25 with multi Aviation, marine vhf EMG receivers).

The dual RT5K'S in the big drones can be configured to use the internal Motorola xts P25 MTM MODULES and/or main xcvr as airborne repeaters.

As to the cost, they are cheap considering what they do in a small package:

These radios are expensive because of their coverage and the accompanied govt. paperwork required to get them in the air.

All of the The RT5000 RADIO derivatives cover from 29.7 TO 960 MHZ, total receive and about 95% of this range in transmit.

Also a tid-bit of info, It's common for some pilot/observers to listen to FM BROADCAST band between 88-108MHZ during slow times.

The main analog AM/FM TRANSCEIVER supports ALL MODES, AM, FM NB, FM SLIVER band, FM 35KHZ AND FM WB, THE POWER OUTPUT is 10 watts FM and 15 watts carrier AM (60WATTS PEP AM), there are 2 optional fully synthesized guard receivers with the same coverage or the option in the RT5000P models to have dual 5 to 10 watt P25 transceivers.

The dual P25 transceivers use any combination of 2, trunking phase 1 MOTOROLA XTS5000'S, with a 10 watt internal power amp for the VHF XTS5K and standard 5 watt UHF, 3 WATT 700/800MHZ.

Another model, the RT5000CS,(NTL GUARD/COAST GUARD MODEL) HAS a single added VHF P25 transceiver along with the above base 29.7-960 analog transceiver along with 4 COMBINED down converted SDR EMERGENCY RECEIVERS covering 121.5MHZ AM ELT, 243MHZ AM ELT, Marine band VHF 156.525MHZ FM DSC RX AND 156.8MHZ FM receiver.

All 4 of these above SDR emergency receivers operate simultaneously along with the vhf p25 transceiver and the main 29.7-960 analog transceiver, can you say sensory overload monitoring all these receivers simultaneously?

The FAA TSO and FCC PAPERWORK alone to cover about 60 sub-models of the RT5000 P/CS lines accounts for ~35-40 % of the radios cost and then there are the various low profile automatic Pin diode tuned blade antennas that cost several grand.

Just the fact that I remember all these spec's after being away for 9 years is scary.

 

[poltergeisty]

Wow! That's pretty interesting information. It's absolutely amazing what drones can do now a days. I know a guy in the real estate business using drones to film property to present to prospective buyers. I also know that drones are used by farmers to survey their land. SAR even uses them with FLIR onboard.

I would absolutely love a drone with FLIR capability myself. I was so interested in IR that I bought one of those Seek thermal imagers for my phone. To see the world as a heat source is really amazing. You can even see rafters and studs in the wall.


That's pretty cool that they monitor ELT transmissions.

 

[mm]

This drone referenced is a very large military model.

Supposedly there are also some RT5000 airborne repeaters in some tethered Aerostat ballons along the same border.

 

[nd5y]

Once over 15 years ago when I was living in the DFW area the DEA and Texas DPS were doing a joint operation and had an aircraft crossband repeating DEA UHF and DPS VHF channels. I have no idea who the aircraft belonged to.

Another time I ran across some SINCGARS FM on the VHF air band and UHF milair band:
https://forums.radioreference.com/t...ity-and-frequencies.84183/page-3#post-1715857

Probably some of mm's radios in both cases.

I also used to work for a company that Cobham bought and ran into the ground.