The best old time radio scanner???

[SCPD]

Bct800xlt.................

 

[RogerH11]

My all-time classic base is a Pro2006 base and Yupiteru MVT7100 handheld.

 

[russellmaher]

This is the receiver that started it for me:

Lafayette HA-520 VHF Receiver (10 tubes and tunable) 30-50 and 152-174 MHz. I used primarily to listen to Holyoke MA Police on 159.210 (this freq. is still used today) and MA State Police on low band. If my memory serves me, the item sold for $89.95 in 1965 and it took me months to pay back the money that Mom & Dad spent for it.

The next unit was given to me by an uncle that was going to throw it away, and what an upgrade this was for me since it was a 10 channel, three band, programmable FM receiver:

Regency Scanner Model R1050 covered these bands: 30-50, 144-148, 148-174, 440-450, 450,470, 470-512 MHz and watching those 10 red LEDs as it scanned 13 channels per second was dizzying for me. Good times for sure!

And that's how it all began....




Russell

 

[ratboy]

I started out with the "Little Tiger", then went to a stack of Regency, Midland, and Lafayette tunables. My first scanner was the "Thin Scan" which was a bad choice, it didn't last long, then I got a Bearcat III when UHF came in. I bought a new, like a week old Bearcat 210 from someone who needed money to get home in 1979, and had that and the tunables until 1983, when I started buying a lot, and I mean a lot, of scanners. My peak was in 1999, when I had 7 base radios, and 33 handhelds! I've sold all the old timers and now I have 4 base radios, with only two in use, and 3 handhelds.

 

[N9NRA]

My first scanner was a Uniden 10-channel crystal-controlled scanner (sorry, can`t recall what the model was now, darn), had that one all through highschool at a school for blind kids, loved to listen to the police on that thing . My favorite old-time scanner? That would have to be my Realistic Pro-2003 that i got after i graduated, it was nice to have something that i didn`t have to buy crystals for anymore, by today`s standards it wasn`t the best or newest, but at that time it was a really good one, and sometimes i still miss it. Finally sold it to a friend here in town so he could have a scanner that wouldn`t cost him a year`s wages . N9NRA

 

[tampabaynews]

My first scanner was the Bearcat 210. I still use it to this day. Oh the childhood memories of hearing the fire tones and watching the volunteers race down the street...

 

[Thunderbolt]

Does anyone besides me remember the Petersen Dual Band Scanner, this was the first scanner that scanned the 30-50 and the 150-174 range, Petersen was a small company I think it was located in IOWA but not sure, I worked at a electronic dist. in NC and we were the Regency dist. for the southeast, when the Petersen came out we ordered 50 of them, it took about a month to get them and, Mr. Petersen and the engineer that made them delivered them, as it was there first order for the scanners

<Bump>

My aunt had a Petersen dual band scanner. She bought it from a local electronics dealer in Milan, Michigan around 1970-71. The store owner offered the unit with red or optional blue lights, and she had them order the blue version. I can remember it had eight channels, but back then in a small town in the Midwest, that was all you needed to catch the local action.

73's

Ron

 

[scannercollector]

Take a look at this site : Kristalscanner.nl

Greetings from The Netherlands
Gerrit

 

[popnokick]

Electra Bearcat III

The radio newsroom I worked at in NY in the 70's had two of these and they were very sensitive on VHF Low and High using our rooftop Antenna Specialists Monitenna.

 

[flythunderbird]

My first one was a Regency ACT-10-L/H/U. A retired neighbor gave it to me; he said it never worked right from day one and wanted to get rid of it. I found out that whoever he bought it from had installed the wrong crystals. It performed flawlessly once the correct crystals were installed. Sold it years later to buy a programmable ...

 

[gmclam]

PRO-10 &amp; PRO-77

To answer the original question, I guess it depends on how far back you want to go. I like the original scanners before they were programmable (therefore crystal controlled). Radio Shack sold several similar models depending on the specific bands you wanted to receive.

I bought the PRO-10 (VHF hi & 450 UHF) and PRO-77 (VHF hi & VHF low). They were originally 8 channels each using incadescent lights for active channel indicators. I replaced all that logic with a CPU (8748) and extended them to 20 channels with an LED display. Still in use today (as per tag line) http://forums.radioreference.com/ra...55-realistic-scanner-crystals.html#post776734

 

[Thunderbolt]

The radio newsroom I worked at in NY in the 70's had two of these and they were very sensitive on VHF Low and High using our rooftop Antenna Specialists Monitenna.

I so remember these Bearcat III scanners from my childhood. My parents almost bought me one, but I ended up with a 10-channel Regency instead. Good thing they decided to go in that direction, as the local PD decided to install a new 453 MHz repeater, and I wouldn't have been able to receive it with the Bearcat III.

 

[ZGX]

Favorite was the BC560 XLT.

 

[tonyclark]

Made for stock car racing, I have one works great.

I would say this is the weirdest scanner ever, notice the very discreet color .

RadioPics Database - Other Radio Scanners - Memorex TracTec MSB1003



To put a face to some of these old time radio scanners look here.


RadioPics Database - Main

RigPix Database - Main

 

[Thunderbolt]

Take a look at this site : Kristalscanner.nl

Greetings from The Netherlands
Gerrit

That's it! Except the channel lamps were blue, and the power light was red on the one my aunt owned. Sadly, it was struck by lightning and never worked again.

 

[ki6asp]

I enjoyed my Regency HX1000, Pro2005 and a Sony All band scanner. But my favorite to this day, despite owning the x36 family, is the BC3000. Except for the Sony, I still have them and use them.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[PACNWDude]

My favorite is my Pro-2006.

I have a bc 300 and a Radioshack pro 2006 with the optoscan 456 .

I had many before and many after it, but still have my PRO-2006. The OptoScan 456 and Bill Cheeks book made you the king for a long time in the '90's.

This was used to listen into cordless phones all the time. Made for some great entertainment as I lived in an apartment on a military base in those years.

 

[N9JIG]

I had an old Regency 8 channel VHF-High crystal scanner back in the day as my first ever scanner, it was particularly sensitive but not very selective.

The most sensitive scanner I ever had was a Regency MX7000. Bizarre as it was it would hear things even the best professional radios would not. As a scanner however it was worse than bad. A scan rate that could be measured with a calendar, odd programming and an impossible mounting system made for one odd radio.

The best overall scanner I ever had was a Bearcat 20/20. Fantastic on Low band, even better on High band. Great sensitivity for the day and decent selectivity except for occasional aircraft intrusion on high band.

The best handheld for sensitivity I had was was a BC-200. This thing was a low band magnet!

 

[riccom]

this and

 

[jaspence]

Best Scanner

Regency HTX 1000. Excellent sensitivity, good volume, good battery life, easy to enter frequencies.