7 replies to this topic

[Geordie Guy]

Any radio hams out there who can answer this question.

 

We have three pairs of radios (analogue from argos) 446Mhz each pair on a separate channel at our school.

 

We want someone in  office to have one radio that can receive and listen to any message from all three channels.

 

Will a scanner cycle through all three channels and pick up transmissions?

 

Looking at this http://www.ebay.co.u...C0AAOSwr81URps9

 

working with these http://www.argos.co....53498.htm#bv_qa

 

Cheers, Ivan

[Matt101]

I've had a few receivers Ivan. It' is definitely a case of buying a decent one to start with. Yaesu, Icom, Uniden, Realistic, AOR and Yupiteru are all names to look for. Cheaper ones tend to suffer from bleed over from nearby transmissions. You can programme 3 of the channels with the frequency of each channel the radios are on and scan just those 3 channels. It will cycle through until it receives a signal at which point it will stop on the channel until the transmission stops.

 

HTH

 

Matt

[Geordie Guy]

Cheers Matt !

 

[Rallyist]

Speak to these people Ivan started years ago with CB and Scanners. then into Amateur radio well respected. http://www.nevadaradio.co.uk/

[fixitsan]

 

 

Looking at this http://www.ebay.co.u...C0AAOSwr81URps9

 

working with these http://www.argos.co....53498.htm#bv_qa

 

Cheers, Ivan

 

 

That scanner won't pick up the transmissions from those PMR radios. PMR446 operates on 446MHz, Narrowband FM (sometimes encoded with CTCSS codes and i think newer ones run digital protocols)

 

The scanner tops out at the top of airband frequencies.

 

Most of these PMR446 radios have inbuilt scan functions, so all you need is a spare one of those radios. As with all radios the antenna is the key. Small inbuilt low profile antenna's are usually poor performers, longer high gain 'whip' types are better

 

It depends how far the distance is you're going to be working, and what objects lie in the path between the radios. Generally speaking the higher the frequency the more limited the radios become to 'line of sight' applications, but even that depends on output power

[Geordie Guy]

We have loads of spare sets,

 

How do you make one of those radios scan three channels?

[fixitsan]

You would need to read the manual, but according to this page it has 'dual channel scan', so it might only be able to scan two channels

http://www.tristar.e.../RC-6406/3/3821

 

I have a radio with dual channel scan but what it means is that i can set one channel to a single frequency and the other scan 'gg'channel' is all the channels within a range of channels set by myself. in some radios it would be called 'scanning with a priority channel'.

 

I bought a little 'Baofeng' for about £20. With a decent antenna it does the job . To get real reviews, once you see something you think you fancy, go to eHam and get the reviews from real hams http://www.eham.net/...ws/detail/10349

 

Yo can just google ' radio xyz eham review' and it will nearly always take you to a useful eham page

[Geordie Guy]

Thanks Fixitsan

 

look into that , great page and tones of information.

 

I think this answers it, 4mins 13secs

 

https://www.youtube....h?v=c5qTBRMEiy4

 

cheers everyone !!!