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Up to date military radio

ONTOS66

Member
433
3
18
Location
Franklin, NJ
Radio monitoring, be it military, or regular SWL (short wave listening) is kind of like selling real estate: Location, Location, Location.

When dealing with tactical FM transmissions (or the local emergency services, or what ever floats your boat) the radios are "low power" for local use. The military does not want their signal going any further than needed for several reasons - interception by the "other side" and interference with other units being two of them.

Of course there are strange things that can occur, such as "skip" which occurs from time to time and can permit longer distances than normal. As an example: years ago I was at Fort Drum, NY operating a night tank range. Using the range control frequency for Ft. Drum one of my RTOs was conducting a periodic check and found himself talking to 2 other range controls, one in Virginia and the other in Pennsylvania. That surprised all 4 units (me and the 3 range controls). Fortunately it was of short duration and things went back to normal within an hour or so. S**t happens in the field.

Antennas - yours and theirs also play a part. Mobile antennas are not as effective as fixed stations for a bunch of reasons.

tennmogger mentioned HF. A whole nother ball game. HF (high frequency) radios are used by the military (and others) to communicate overr longer distances. Military HF gear will generally be more expensive than the more common tactical FM gear.

When I was the Operations Sergeant Major for a tank battalion I used a portable civilian scanner to monitor multiple frequencies when we were in the field. With the scanner I could listen to the Brigade Operations Net as well as my Battalion Operations Net plus the Bn Admin Log net and each of the tank company nets, plus the scout and mortar platoons as needed. Or when we had tank ranges in operation I could monitor the frequencies of several ranges as well as range control, etc. It all depends on what you need to accomplish.

Having said all that we won't even go in to radio wave propagation and other technical stuff. Again, check ARRL and other sites dealing with radio listening for more details.

So, it really depends on what YOU want to do. There is no single correct answer nor perfect solution. Sort of like life.

Good luck with your project.
 

Billy Bobbed

Active member
1,346
13
38
Location
Terre Haute,Indiana
I finally got around to putting in my new CB radio.I used a CB removable base so I can take it in and out easy.And bolted it to my hard top that is made from 1/8 inch steel (they were custom made for the DNR forestry trucks).I drilled and tapped the top for studs.The removable plate is lockable sometimes when it wants to lock.Its been to cold to get it all done.I got a 24 to 12 volt box to put in and hook up and run the antenna cables.
 

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3cavtanker

New member
47
0
0
Location
Colorado Springs, CO
As far as I know right now, and as we did it when i was active duty (98-06), military units will use single channel/plain text (SC/PT) on their SINCGARS radios whenever they are able to. Freq Hop is a pain, and not generally needed when CONUS. You should be able to pick up local range control channels from any nearby bases with just a radio shack scanner if it will receive 30-88mhz. Range control is almost always on single channel because of the safety factor (if the freq hop data gets lost, you don't want to be stuch not able to talk to the guys firing live ammo). With the new SINCGARS radios, it takes much more than just the right julian date and time. You would need the encryption keys and hopsets, loaded into your own SINCGARS by computer or have the net control station transmit it to your radio (OTAR). Good luck with that. The radios are controlled and the data is classified I think.
 

digitaldust

Member
529
2
18
Location
Twp Flint ,Mi ,
try hf 11.175mhz its air traffic USAF comes in with ok deuce radio setup . or look for spy numbers there strange freqz that have a person come on once a hr or so and read 3 . 54. 34. 3. 14 etc
there is always time on e 5k 10k 15k mhz and then dont forget the crazy pirate radio use all over HF like Never pay tax talk show or end of time stuff 5.070 Mhz 5.255 strange but official sounding

oh use USB on the radio Air traffic Mil 11.xxx - 11.700 just click around

and i almost forgot NASA there picked up via a old Mil radio just look around you cant go bad adding a cool radio to your truck , look at PRC-2000 HF good grear

btw singars is gone its last years tech HI.HI
 
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