Hi All,
I'm not particular savvy with radio tech., and I'm in a confusing situation. For a few years I've had a Yaesu FT-270, using a car mounted antenna and a Diamond RH77CA as a handheld, mostly monitoring rail frequencies. I've noticed some friends of mine were getting better results with a Laird Technologies EXS-160 series antenna that was cut for the AAR railroad radio bands so I got one last week. I inadvertently purchased the SMI version, but cut it down to pick the SMA connection on the FT-270. I tested it yesterday, scanning all the AAR channels in a very busy area, and I am barely picking up anything. Essentially, I can only hear transmission when they are from very short (several hundred feet max) range, whereas I was picking up several miles away with ease with the Diamond (I swapped back and forth to verify this).
Today, I borrowed another EXS-160 (the regular SMA version) from a friend who also has an FT-270, and interestingly enough I also could not pick up anything on my radio using his antenna. Yet, he could pick up things with the same antenna. For today's testing I used my car antenna, Diamond, and my friend's FT-270 with the EXS-160, I picked up numerous transmissions loud and clear from a wide geographic range over the few minutes I was playing around with this. With my own radio and both Laird antennas, there was complete silence. I'm really baffled what's happening, and am looking for some input on what, if anything I can try to rectify this.
Thanks, Happy New Year!
I'm not particular savvy with radio tech., and I'm in a confusing situation. For a few years I've had a Yaesu FT-270, using a car mounted antenna and a Diamond RH77CA as a handheld, mostly monitoring rail frequencies. I've noticed some friends of mine were getting better results with a Laird Technologies EXS-160 series antenna that was cut for the AAR railroad radio bands so I got one last week. I inadvertently purchased the SMI version, but cut it down to pick the SMA connection on the FT-270. I tested it yesterday, scanning all the AAR channels in a very busy area, and I am barely picking up anything. Essentially, I can only hear transmission when they are from very short (several hundred feet max) range, whereas I was picking up several miles away with ease with the Diamond (I swapped back and forth to verify this).
Today, I borrowed another EXS-160 (the regular SMA version) from a friend who also has an FT-270, and interestingly enough I also could not pick up anything on my radio using his antenna. Yet, he could pick up things with the same antenna. For today's testing I used my car antenna, Diamond, and my friend's FT-270 with the EXS-160, I picked up numerous transmissions loud and clear from a wide geographic range over the few minutes I was playing around with this. With my own radio and both Laird antennas, there was complete silence. I'm really baffled what's happening, and am looking for some input on what, if anything I can try to rectify this.
Thanks, Happy New Year!
