[Motorola] Motorola Reciever Strips

Gary Chatters [email protected]
Tue, 3 Sep 2002 09:52:14 -0400 (EDT)


>		I have an idea to set up some dedicated receivers for some 
>(actually 3 pairs) of VHF lo frequencies used by out highway patrol 
>here in California.  There are of course several ways to accomplish 
>this, but one (suggested by another ham) was to obtain some VHF lo 
>Motorola receiver strips and dedicate each to a particular channel.  
>He though they would be fairly cheap...especially if I didn't mind 
>the tube versions (which I don't at all).  
>

This is certainly doable.  I can't tell you anything about what's
available in California, but here are a couple of comments:

You do have to buy a crystal for each channel.  It's been a while
since I've bought one, but $15 would be my initial ballpark figure.

Tube radios are rather rare, at least on the east coast.  Try looking
for Micor receiver strips, or just buy the whole radio and take out
the receivers.  You might consider Motracs, too, but some of them
had rather poor front-ends.

Mitreks are also something to consider.  You can't take out
the receiver separately, so you have the transmitter taking up
space, but not being used.

If you get tube radios, you have to build a high-voltage plate power
supply. The solid state receiver strips require a 12VDC, plus
a lower regualted voltage, about 9.6v.

Be sure to get the right subrange.  Older radios divided the 30-50MHz
range into 2 or 3 subranges.

You can probably find a few radios at any reasonable sized hamfest, but
hamfests are getting smaller.  Of course, eBay is a source if
you don't mind paying the shipping.  Just ignore the ones with the
ridiculously high starting bids.

Another poster recommended old programmable scanners.  I'd avoid those.
I had an early programmable Regency several years ago.  The audio
quality was so horrid, I just gave up on it after about 3 hours of use.

gc