- Joined
- Feb 21, 2013
- Messages
- 5
I am pretty new to the game. I live in a populated area (Columbus, Ohio) and want to monitor the police departments P25 system. Since it's such a populated area and the airwaves are congested I figured a directional antenna would be a good idea. The system I want to monitor simulcasts from 6 towers around the area. One is listed as a broadcast strength of 75 (I'm assuming watts) and the other 5 are listed as 150 watts.
My question is about how far will those towers broadcast? The stations are in the 850MHz range and it's pretty flat here so for the most part terrain shouldn't matter. I'm confident that at least one of them will be within range, the closest one is just under 6 miles as the crow flys. My main concern is with it being such a populated area that interference may factor into which tower to aim it towards. Basically, the closest tower may not be the best tower. I was wondering with towers broadcasting at that strength at what distance should I consider a tower not eligible as a canidate? The antenna I have is the TerraWave 806-960 MHz 10dBi Enclosed Yagi Antenna.
Thanks,
Nathan
My question is about how far will those towers broadcast? The stations are in the 850MHz range and it's pretty flat here so for the most part terrain shouldn't matter. I'm confident that at least one of them will be within range, the closest one is just under 6 miles as the crow flys. My main concern is with it being such a populated area that interference may factor into which tower to aim it towards. Basically, the closest tower may not be the best tower. I was wondering with towers broadcasting at that strength at what distance should I consider a tower not eligible as a canidate? The antenna I have is the TerraWave 806-960 MHz 10dBi Enclosed Yagi Antenna.
Thanks,
Nathan