Help with antenna

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nihilissa

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Mar 1, 2012
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Sorry if this belongs in antennas or Uniden...it felt kind of local. I'm living with my son right now. We just moved here. I cannot put up a pole or run things through the house. I have a Uniden BCD436HP. I have already replaced the duck with a Dimond RH77CA (this helped some, just in general). I *think* I'm trying to pick things up off tower location 4 in Casa Grande, which is 17 miles from the house. :( I'm from MO so the dry air, stucco housing and mountains are foreign obstacles (or helps as far as the air goes) to me. If I get a discone like a Tram 1410 will that be enough to get me Casa Grande fire/ems if it's on a picnic table outside (under supervision, I'd just unhook and put it in the garage it when I'm not using it). Or do I really need to rig up a painters pole that can drop down and a bucket of concrete or something for it to fit into? 😅
 

Ubbe

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Sep 8, 2006
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Stockholm, Sweden
Fire/ems are on 155MHz and the RH77CA probably works equal to a discone at that frequency band. Try the scanner at the position where you have planned to have the discone and check if you can receive anything. Having a coax connected to the discone will attenuate the signal somewhat. If the scanner can receive the transmissions with 2 or 3 bars then it's probably fine to use a discone.

Antenna location are important, to have it as high as possible. If that Casa Grande fire/ems are most important to you then you can probably look at a specific VHF antenna with some gain. Some HAM VHF 145MHz antennas can be cut shorter to be tuned to 155MHz and can be installed higher up, perhaps outside a window if the roof isn't an option.

/Ubbe
 

nihilissa

Newbie
Joined
Mar 1, 2012
Messages
2
Fire/ems are on 155MHz and the RH77CA probably works equal to a discone at that frequency band. Try the scanner at the position where you have planned to have the discone and check if you can receive anything. Having a coax connected to the discone will attenuate the signal somewhat. If the scanner can receive the transmissions with 2 or 3 bars then it's probably fine to use a discone.

Antenna location are important, to have it as high as possible. If that Casa Grande fire/ems are most important to you then you can probably look at a specific VHF antenna with some gain. Some HAM VHF 145MHz antennas can be cut shorter to be tuned to 155MHz and can be installed higher up, perhaps outside a window if the roof isn't an option.

/Ubbe
thanks!
 
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