Good Evening!
I put up a feed for Gloucester County (NJ) Fire & EMS (APCO 25 Phase II) last month and have been having some 'issues' with my setup. I have the Bearcat BCD536HP paired with a roof-mounted discone antenna which I rewired with 50ft of LMR400 cable when I purchased the scanner. Conceivably, you would think my reception should be exceptional. It isn't. I've thought perhaps the reception issue is due to not having a 'purposed' antenna for the Phase II system. While the freqs are within the range of the discone antenna, I'm wondering if it could be the issue. I switched back to the stock telescoping antenna and still experience the same problem with signal strength/reception. I live almost dead center in the county. Bottom line is that reception and signal strength shouldn't be an issue, but it is. I have a few questions that I'm looking to have answered before I go and spend $200 on a new directional antenna.
1. Are there internal settings within the scanner that I can 'tweak' to optimize the reception or 'tune' the scanner to receive?
2. Will the acquisition of a new directional antenna solve the issue? If so, which antenna will suit this system the best?
3. Is there something else I'm not looking at which could be the route cause?
Very appreciative of all constructive feedback to help me provide the best feed I can for listeners...
Bryce
I put up a feed for Gloucester County (NJ) Fire & EMS (APCO 25 Phase II) last month and have been having some 'issues' with my setup. I have the Bearcat BCD536HP paired with a roof-mounted discone antenna which I rewired with 50ft of LMR400 cable when I purchased the scanner. Conceivably, you would think my reception should be exceptional. It isn't. I've thought perhaps the reception issue is due to not having a 'purposed' antenna for the Phase II system. While the freqs are within the range of the discone antenna, I'm wondering if it could be the issue. I switched back to the stock telescoping antenna and still experience the same problem with signal strength/reception. I live almost dead center in the county. Bottom line is that reception and signal strength shouldn't be an issue, but it is. I have a few questions that I'm looking to have answered before I go and spend $200 on a new directional antenna.
1. Are there internal settings within the scanner that I can 'tweak' to optimize the reception or 'tune' the scanner to receive?
2. Will the acquisition of a new directional antenna solve the issue? If so, which antenna will suit this system the best?
3. Is there something else I'm not looking at which could be the route cause?
Very appreciative of all constructive feedback to help me provide the best feed I can for listeners...
Bryce