I just bought a scondhand one in excelent condition. Does anyone know
if this is a high-end reciever? Also, does anyone know what it would
sell (or sold, seeing as it's analog) for? I got it for $15.

atomicthumbs wrote:

I just bought a scondhand one in excelent condition. Does anyone know
if this is a high-end reciever? Also, does anyone know what it would
sell (or sold, seeing as it's analog) for? I got it for $15.

The Patrolman line was a very good line of VHF receivers, sold by Radio
Shack in the 80s. I used to have a 60. Randomly tuning across the VHF
bands isn't likely to yield much, unless you know where to look-the band
was used by public services such as police and fire departments, but
most of those have gone to "trunk" frequencies and abandoned VHF, one of
the reasons I got rid of my Patrolman.


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"atomicthumbs" ) writes:
I just bought a scondhand one in excelent condition. Does anyone know
if this is a high-end reciever? Also, does anyone know what it would
sell (or sold, seeing as it's analog) for? I got it for $15.

I can't even picture it, but given that it's analog, it's not likely
to be very great.

Or rather, it's not so much that it's analog as that the analog tuning dates
it, to a time when such receivers weren't so great.

The average "police band" receiver from the analog era wasn't particularly
great. They'd have a relatively wide IF passband, and many designs were
just reworked from FM broadcast band designs. They likely had more than
ample sensitivity, especially given that VHF is line of sight only. Tuning
was usually full of backlash, and the tuning scale hardly accurate. They
were generally for non-serious listening "Oh look, I can hear an ambulance"
beause the nature of the "police bands" meant that often the frequencies
were not in constant use, at least away from the big cities, and if you wanted
to hear things you need to be constantly retuning. By the time you were
on to another frequency in use, you'd likely have missed much of the
transmission.

There were exceptions, receivers with an attempt at a better tuning
scale and a good IF filter, but I'm not sure any of the Patrolman's qualified.

For much of the analog era, if you wanted a serious receiver you went to a
crystal controlled receiver. Tended to be more expensive, but it would
also bring a better quality of receiver. You needed a crystal for every
frequency you wanted to tune, which meant you'd only be listening to a few
frequencies, but you could instantly switch between them.

The next step up was receivers with scanning capacity added. These
were still crystal controlled, but circuitry was in place to switch
between the crystals, faster than you could turn a knob. So you'd
miss very little of a transmission.

Those came around in the early seventies, and they did tend to have
good IF selectivity. You'd also pay more than the usual analog tuned
"police band" receiver.

Then in the late seventies, synthesized "police band" receivers came along.
No more crystals, but every desired frequency was there, and instantly
available, with no fussing over tuning. And they were all scanners,
so you could be constantly checking as few or as many frequencies
as you wanted.

Michael

(Michael Black) wrote in
:

http://n7olq.home.att.net/Radio/Galleryframe.htm
http://scanpix3.home.att.net/RS/patrolman50.jpg


"atomicthumbs" ) writes:

I can't even picture it,

Yeah, all I've gotten so far is some aeronautical stuff, someone
landing an Air Canda airplane, saome police action, and a weather
transmission. And some coast guard stuff, and a whole lot of slightly
musical-sounding digital noise.

For $15.00 you can't go too wrong if it works! Enjoy it for what it
is...a moderatly priced reasonably well made multiband radio that will
probably catch a fair number of broadcast stations and be fun to tune
around the public service bands too.

P.S. transmissions tend to be pretty quick, so catching them will be
kind of hit and miss. Does it cover 129mz? If so, tune up and down
and you will probably hear traffic from the local airport.

Yeah, I've heard thaton 128.906 (my guess.)

It isn't a bad receiver............maybe I will pull it out of the basement
and fix that UHF convertor.

Pete

"Michael Black" wrote in message
...

"Pete KE9OA" ) writes:
Probably, my favorite was the Pro 3A...........this unit had a crystal
filter for the NBFM mode, but unfortunately, the dial had a bit of
backlash
and the LO had pretty high phase noise, as evidenced by an increase in
the
noise floor when tuning close to a strong signal. It is still sitting in
my
basement...........I have to repair the UHF front end.

Pete

And that's one of the better ones that I was thinking of. I just
remembered I keep handy Popular Electronic's "Communications Handbook"
from 1973, which was an annual mostly a buyer's guide that the
magazine put out. It lists a price of $179.95 in 1973, and of course
had 30-50, 152-174 and 450-470MHz. Unfortunately, it doesn't list
any of the portables from Radio Shack, to give an idea of how much less
they sold for.

Michael

Do you mean the Patrolman-50 or something else for the price?

Michael Black wrote:

The average "police band" receiver from the analog era wasn't
particularly
great. They'd have a relatively wide IF passband, and many designs
were
just reworked from FM broadcast band designs. They likely had more
than
ample sensitivity, especially given that VHF is line of sight only.

Yea, if it's an analog portable type, they were pretty
marginal...Selectivity was the main problem. In a busy
city, you couldn't listen to the police, unless you wanted
to hear 2-3 channels at once. Those were usually 460 mhz,
with 25 kc channel separation. I couldn't hardly use one
here in Houston. Now, anything that is a "scanner" will
usually be ok. Either xtal, or synth, pll, etc...They all
had the selectivity needed to listen to tight channel spacing.
Also, the sensitivity was so-so...Usually FM images too...
I once had the top of the line patrolman radio...The big
puppy with two TV style whips, AM/FM/SW/AIR/VHF/UHF, etc...Was
a decent radio I suppose for a portable, but not anything a
serious police listener would want to use, unless they were in
a dinky small town, with few channels. I used to cuss the
things here in busy Houston. Really pitiful....My first actual
scanner was like night and day...Most of the scanners are
called "pro-whatever" instead of patrolman...Some of the first
xtal versions might have been called "patrolman" though, light
years ago...MK