Whistler to Uniden and Back Again

[emsflyer84]

Hey guys, just a quick observation and maybe a question or two. I've now had two TRX-1 scanners that I've used as base scanners at my house. They have been wired to a rooftop antenna. At some point over the last few months, I noticed a decrease in reception and an increase in noise/interference on weaker signals. This only happens at my house. If I take the scanner with me in the car with a rubber duck, reception improves. Randomly, a weak signal will instantly come in crystal clear, as if someone turned off the switch to whatever is causing the interference. Then it will instantly sound weak and distant again. It's very strange. It could be something in my house causing the issue, but I've cut all the power to the house with the main breaker and the problem continues.

Anyway, I recently bought a Uniden BCD325P2, thinking a scanner that had a less sensitive front end might do better in my house. So far it seems to have the same issues the Whistler did. Additionally, I'm noticing that the very beginning of many transmissions seem to be cut off more often with the Uniden. As if the squelch isn't opening as fast as the Whistler. Overall, the Whistler seems to catch more complete transmissions. And the audio quality seems better too. Digital P25 transmissions on the Uniden can sound muffled.

I've still got to play around with the settings some more on the Uniden, but I might end up just going back to the Whistler for home use. It seems to perform better overall.

Back to square one on tracking down my interference/reception issue....

Anyone else have observations on Whistler vs. Uniden handhelds? Thanks.

 

[KB4MSZ]

Sounds to me like a transmission line problem, possibly a connector issue at either the antenna or the radio.

 

[emsflyer84]

Sounds to me like a transmission line problem, possibly a connector issue at either the antenna or the radio.

Hey, thanks. But I've tried several antenna's different lengths of coax, etc... Actually I have the same issue when I stand on my roof and plug directly into the antenna with a 3' run of coax. It's definitely something about my house, my property, etc. A couple hundred feet up the road and reception improves, even at lower elevations. Just today I heard a recording someone took of interference thy were getting from an issue with a transformer on the main power line in front of their house. It sounds similar to some of what I'm getting. That's the direction I'm going now. It would explain why I get the same issues in my house using any combination of antennas or scanners, even with the master power turned off in my house. I also have weird issues sometimes with my cable tv signal. The tv signal pixilates pretty bad on some channels sometimes. Cable company hasn't been able to fix it. I wonder if it's related...

 

[WB9YBM]

It could be something in my house causing the issue, but I've cut all the power to the house with the main breaker and the problem continues.

Could it be from a neighbor's house?

 

[Engine104]

Being that these are handhelds, have you tried to attach the rubber duck and see if you can null out the noise by pointing it in different directions?

 

[emsflyer84]

Yea I’m fairly confident my issue is power line noise out in front of my house. I might take a scanner out in AM mode and see what I can find.