Travel Technology - Recommendations for a Radio Scanner?

Hey gang,

Looking for a cheap, but good radio scanner to listen to ATC conversations here in HNL while perhaps spotting planes from my apartment on those long cold lonely nights, meaning the scanner needs to have the right freqs (?)....

Any suggestions? Thank you very much for your help.

aloha

Hey gang,

Looking for a cheap, but good radio scanner to listen to ATC conversations here in HNL while perhaps spotting planes from my apartment on those long cold lonely nights, meaning the scanner needs to have the right freqs (?)....

Any suggestions? Thank you very much for your help.

aloha

Generally, most of the Radio Shack and Uniden scanners are fairly decent units. An excellent resource for scanner hobbyist is found at www.grove-ent.com and their current home page has a link for their magazine's "Annual Air Show Spectacular". You will find heaps of information relating to freqs. etc. There is also a link for their reference library, which is a compendium of data relating to the hobby aspects of communications monitoring and scanning, with special sections on aeronautical, maritime, satellite, etc.

Enjoy! :)

Anything that can get 108.000-137.000 (kilohertz?) frequencies is good, that is the air traffic band. I recommend anything by Uniden or Radioshack (made by uniden). TRY EBAY.COM I bought my scanner barely used and they have tonnes for sale. Just type in "handheld scanner"

I have an old scanner purchased from Radio Shack that does not cover the "airline" frequencies... Pardon my ill-knowledge on the subject, but can one somehow "enhance" the scanner to widen the freq. range on the scanner?

I realized only after asking that it sounds like a stupid question, but perhaps there's a way :D

aloha

Anything that can get 108.000-137.000 (kilohertz?) frequencies is good, that is the air traffic band.
Actually, that's megahertz. Some of the old "all band" radios cover these frequencies. Often, you can tune them in, but re-tuning for the various frequencies in use (tower, runway, etc.) can be a chore. For casual use, maybe not too bad. You might have an old portable like this laying around the house, but I wouldn't go out and buy one.

Pardon my ill-knowledge on the subject, but can one somehow "enhance" the scanner to widen the freq. range on the scanner?

Yeah, sometimes they can be modified - the typical scanner of yore required separate crystals for each frequency scanned, so it might not be practical to do so. Any programmable scanner (i.e., with a keypad for frequency entry) should cover this range no sweat. You'd have to find out what the frequencies in use are, though.

I'm not sure, but I think the more modern scanners will just scan up/down every few khz/mhz and you pick the ones you want to listen to. Your local Radio Shack guy can prabably tell you much more than you'd want to know about this. :)

I have a 14 year old Uniden Bearcat handheld that still works like a charm. You can buy a frequency book for Hawai`i - I got mine at the old Honolulu Electronics store on Keeamoku, across from the McDonalds...

I have an old scanner purchased from Radio Shack that does not cover the "airline" frequencies... Pardon my ill-knowledge on the subject, but can one somehow "enhance" the scanner to widen the freq. range on the scanner?

I realized only after asking that it sounds like a stupid question, but perhaps there's a way :D

aloha

Never a stupid question. Many scanners used the same basic electronics, but limited the bands scanned for marketing purposes.

What is the name and model #? I'll do some research.

I got mine at the old Honolulu Electronics store on Keeamoku, across from the McDonalds...

Haven't they turned it into a Men's Entertainment bar (at last glance)? :rolleyes:

What is the name and model #? I'll do some research.

Thank you for the help, birdstrike :)

It's RadioShack and here's what's listed on the back: "Cat. No: 20-508 | Scanning Receiver Pro-28 | FCC ID: AAO20-508".

aloha

It's RadioShack and here's what's listed on the back: "Cat. No: 20-508 | Scanning Receiver Pro-28 | FCC ID: AAO20-508".

aloha

Alas, I was unable to find any mods that would help that model receive the air bands. I also looked into downconverters, but unless you want to build your own, the cost would likely be more than a replacement scanner.

Your best bet might be to sell the Pro-28 and use the proceeds towards a more capable device.

Alas, I was unable to find any mods that would help that model receive the air bands. I also looked into downconverters, but unless you want to build your own, the cost would likely be more than a replacement scanner.

aircraft band is am; police/fire/railroad/etc. is fm. if the scanner doesn't have aircraft band, chances are there is no circuitry to handle am at all. therefore, any mods to add it will be far from trivial.

Mahalo Nui Loa (Thank you very much) for all your help again.

Alas, eBay here I come.

aloha

Can anyone recommend a scanner (make and model)? I like to occasionally plane spot at LAX and lots of folks there have scanners. When you seach on ebay, there are thousands of scanners offerred (trunked, untrunked, manual, automatic, 200 channels, 500 channels, memory, etc.), it is so overwhelming. I just want to go to LAX and know when the heavies are coming in or ready to leave, I don't care to listen in to police or fire or Nascar conversations.

Thanks,

Onedog

Hey gang,

Looking for a cheap, but good radio scanner to listen to ATC conversations here in HNL while perhaps spotting planes from my apartment on those long cold lonely nights, meaning the scanner needs to have the right freqs (?)....

Any suggestions? Thank you very much for your help.

aloha

If you want a good scanner Try ICOM ICR 5.
Perfect for ATC !
Some time ago I find on Yahoo ATC LIVE transmissions in straming.

Can anyone recommend a scanner (make and model)? I like to occasionally plane spot at LAX and lots of folks there have scanners.

Local voice traffic should be in AM mode between 118 and 137 MHz. I'd look for a cheap Radio Shack Pro-51 off the top of my head. It won't pick up inbound/outbound Pacific shortwave communications, but reasonably priced handheld scanners tend to do a poor job with the HF range regardless.