I have a friend who is looking to purchase a dual band radio. He would like to install the radio close to his antenna location which is about 100 feet from where he is hoping to operate from. Rather than run the coax 100 feet through his house he would like to install the radio near where the coax enters the house and install CAT 5 or other control cable from the radio to the head in his office. I did some preliminary research and saw that most of the major manufacturers include 20-30 feet of cable with a separation kit. Has anyone had any experience with using the stock separation kits for longer distances? Or, has anyone used or built something aftermarket to remote a control head further than 50 feet? Thanks for any suggestions.
Remote Head Capabilities
- Thread starter Mattsenft
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Many dual band radios do remote head. Look for one that uses Cat 5/6 cable and you are good. I’d suggest if you do this use shielded cable. An example of a rig that can do this natively is the CS800D.
If you are good at rolling your own cables then any rig with a remote head can be accessible in the way you want. The trick is getting the right connections as not all use standard Base 10 connections.
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If you are good at rolling your own cables then any rig with a remote head can be accessible in the way you want. The trick is getting the right connections as not all use standard Base 10 connections.
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Icom ID-5100 uses standard cat 5 or 6 ethernet cable between the head and main unit. I'm using extensions on both of my radios. But it's only 6 feet.
73, K8HIT
Icom: IC-7300, IC-PW1, ID-5100A, ID-51A Plus 2, IC-R30, Hytera PD782G, Kenwood TH-D74, Uniden SDS100, DVMega, SDRplay RSPduo
73, K8HIT
Icom: IC-7300, IC-PW1, ID-5100A, ID-51A Plus 2, IC-R30, Hytera PD782G, Kenwood TH-D74, Uniden SDS100, DVMega, SDRplay RSPduo
Project25_MASTR
TX-COMU
Not exactly. It depends on the communications protocol being used to interface to the head. Just because it uses CAT5e as the medium doesn't mean it'll work at distance (CAT5e is the new 25 pair). A great example of this any Astro, Astro 25 or APX radio from Motorola. The serial interface the radio uses for communication between the control head/console and RF brick is actually based on RS-232 signalling...which limits it to 50 feet before you begin to have communications issues. To go further you'd have to convert that info to either IP or RS-485 for the transport side (the TX/RX audio is fine though).
While there are common solutions for this in the commercial industry, they are really aimed at channelized setups with one to 16 channels (sometimes more if there are serial buses for direct control).
mmckenna
I ♥ Ø
The other issues that occur with some radios (I think the Kenwood 710d did) was that over longer distances, the mic line would start to pick up clocking pulses that would come over TX audio. If you look at some of the cables, they may have an RJ-45 on each end, but the mic line is shielded separately from the rest of the conductors.
I thin, one of the new Harris mobiles actually uses Ethernet (and POE) as the link between the RF deck and the control head (which is an awesome idea). Probably just a shade out of most amateurs price range, though.
I thin, one of the new Harris mobiles actually uses Ethernet (and POE) as the link between the RF deck and the control head (which is an awesome idea). Probably just a shade out of most amateurs price range, though.
Project25_MASTR
TX-COMU
Sounds like we have something to ask them next year at IWCE.
mmckenna
I ♥ Ø
I looked back at my notes from IWCE. It wasn't Ethernet, it -was- Category 5 RJ-45 cables for connecting the control head to RF deck. Not Ethernet or POE, sadly. Still, I think it would be an interesting idea of someone did come up with that.
prcguy
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I also use remote rigs on a couple of radios and you can run either end into the wireless internet in your house making it easy to take the control head room to room without wires.
I have used a 35 foot CAT6 shielded on my ICOM IC-7100 with no issue. Remember the 7100 is nice as the mic can plug into the remote head. Other remote head radios require the mic to be plugged into the radio. My opinion would be to run the coax in to the radio location as a preferable solution. Good luck.
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