military air in long island ny?

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tommyscan

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Ive been trying to conquer my first military air frequency catch since being in the hobby for the last 15 years!! Cant seem to catch one? I am either very unlucky or my receivers are deaf!! I have no immediate bases in my area but you would think 1 should pop up sometime!! I try monitoring all different times of day/night with nada!!!!
 

ka3jjz

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A couple of comments here-

- You didn't say anything about what gear (scanner, antenna) you are using. Not every scanner is milair capable (The PRO-96 doesn't always work well in the UHF air - 225-380 mhz - band when opened up with Win96, but should be fine for the 138-144 mhz area, for example).

- This is one game when the antenna is the rule. A discone or scantenna mounted well away from obstructions is going to be a big help. Get the right coax to minimize losses. A duckie is not going to be much help unless you're real close...

- Frequencies? I'd start with the ZNY ARTCC UHF frequencies, as well as the South Jersey page (the URL I can't recall off the top of my head, but I'm sure someone here will jump in - and it is in our wiki...). Those freqs are in our database and are pretty accurate. We've got a few in the Maryland forums that catch flights coming in/going out of that area headed down here.

[edit] Here are the URLs for those 2 pages...

http://www.radioreference.com/modules.php?name=RR&aid=2246

http://hometown.aol.com/jerseymilair/

Nor would I ignore the UHF Coast Guard freqs - I don't know if they're in use in the LI area, but it's worth checking...

http://wiki.radioreference.com/index.php/United_States_Coast_Guard

Everything should be in AM mode, of course

73 Mike
 
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tommyscan

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sorry,I use the psr500,pro96 and the pro97 for my main monitoring. I do not have an outside antenna but use the mobile mag mount spectra. I have air band commercial/military handheld antennas. They are the maldol500ah and the watson 991.
 

ka3jjz

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The Austin Spectra isn't tuned to work in the milair band. You will definitely need to invest in something better for an antenna. You may find that being in such an urban area, an outdoor antenna may also bring in a lot of pagers and other unwanted junk (not so hard to understand - the PSR500 is prone to overloading, and the 97 isn't much better in that regard...). Some filters, such as those from PAR electronics, are almost certainly in your future.

See the links I edited in my last message for freqs. 73 Mike
 

N8IAA

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The Austin Spectra isn't tuned to work in the milair band. You will definitely need to invest in something better for an antenna. You may find that being in such an urban area, an outdoor antenna may also bring in a lot of pagers and other unwanted junk (not so hard to understand - the PSR500 is prone to overloading, and the 97 isn't much better in that regard...). Some filters, such as those from PAR electronics, are almost certainly in your future.

See the links I edited in my last message for freqs. 73 Mike

I disagree on the 97, Mike. One of the best scanners I've had for milair since my Pro-43. Been using a dualband antenna on the 97, 163, and my BC895. Don't really know much about the 500, other than holding one in my hand at the local HRO three months ago. The worst for intermod is my Alinco DJ-X10 for milair, also, probably the best milair rcvr I've ever owned. No external antenna for that one:))
Larry
 

ka3jjz

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Wouldn't surprise me if there was some unit-unit variances...still, a little caution on putting a big antenna in an urban area on something that's really not designed for it is warranted...73 Mike
 

cipher66

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