I am using a wide band indoor center loaded Radio Shack scanner antenna on my Home Patrol scanner. I am using this outside the window, attached to the scanner with simple wire (NOT coax). I'm getting 50 mile range out of it right now. This set up is far less then optimum for me. Being that I have to be careful of what antennas I use, because of the land lord, I am going to upgrade to a magnet mount scanner antenna. I think it's reasonable for me to expect 50 to 75 mile range from an actual scanner antenna set up. If your receiving 40 to 45 miles on a out door TV antenna I would actually be expecting more range then that. I don't know how high your antenna is mounted, or if it's facing away from what you are receiving on your scanner, but 40 to 45 miles is what I was expecting out of the duck antenna. Keep in mind my antenna is just a step up from a duck, but with the signal loss I'm getting from using low grade regular wire for a feed line, my signal reception is getting cut in half easily.
Is my thinking correct or have I simply found a match that is working? Am I expecting too much from a magnet mount antenna to pull in signals up to 80 miles away?