ScanDiego.com

I have this antenna set up now. I know the coax is not the best. But does anyone think a 2 meter antenna cut down to 3" length would work better for receiving SDPD here in San Marcos??? I can receive them now, but a real weak signal. I am on a small hill (800' above sea level) with a good view to the south. I would have the antenna on top of a motor home.

And anybody care to guess from the pic what make of motorhome I have. Its a conversion.

Schoolbus?

The bigest factor you'd have is coax if you're trying to pull a weak signal like SD from San Marc. If you can barely hear it now, putting on some LMR400 or better would make it better. How long is the run by the way?

As for your two meter ant, hey, if it works.... You can listen to 800 on a coat-hanger or just about anything else.

The motorhome... I am guessing a Crown.

Yes, its an old 1968 Crown. I cut down a 2 meter antenna to 3" and it seems to work better than the scanner antenna!!!
Another question. What is a "resident CHP" TG??? I listened to it for a few days and hear nothing. Its on the North system and it TG#38624.

'resident' CHP officers are ones who work out of their homes, being assigned to beats too far from a central office to 'commute' efficiently.

That is, they live way out in the boonies, and cover that area near their homes.

Those channels are pretty rarely used, as the 'resident' officers still operate on the normal dispatch channels. Most comms I ever heard on them tended to be 'chit chat' between resident officers, rather than 'working' traffic.

Concerning 800 antennas, as someone else said, if you're going to have one away from your radio, the coax you use is critical. Common coaxes you buy at Radio Shack are very, very lossy at that frequency range.

You're fighting a hard battle, because they tend to use minimum necessary power on 800, due to the multiple repeater sites on the same frequency and such. The systems are usually designed to cover 'this area, and no more', it seems.

Actually, the SDPD tends to be 'noisy' signals even IN San Diego, their own recievers seem to be picking up noisy audio and even if you have a 'clean' signal from the repeater, the audio crackles and pops a lot.

Yeah, what's the deal with the rice krispies? If they ever switch to digital at SDPD, will the krispies go away or mess up the digitized audio?