A Tip From Pete

Pete has sent a message with regard to my recent post about offset frequencies for Swanwick and London Air traffic control centres. Pete notes that scanners with a 'WAM' (or Wide AM mode) do not need to 'offset tune' to receive those frequencies correctly so thanks for that tip Pete.



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A Readers Question....

cmylan has posted the following:

'Just bought an maycom fr-100 with the rubber duck aerial.What mobile aerial can i replace it with to get the best possible reception.At the moment i get some ok reception from teesside airport and some bad.Newcastle approach 30 miles away vary from decent to awful.Can I buy something to improve this.'

Just about anything is better than a 'rubber duck' type aerial which is really only any good for 'on site' listening, even a telescopic whip type aerial will offer greatly improved performance. (In fact a piece of wire about 22 inches long for VHF airband attached to the antenna socket will offer great performance when out and about).You mention your after a mobile aerial, do you mean for fitting to your car? perhaps another reader could offer some recommendations on that.

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New Airband Frequency?

I was listening briefly yesterday to Swanwick on 127.1 (S28 - central UK FL195 - FL295) and I noticed aircraft were being handed off to a quoted frequency of '132.130MHz' could this be a new 8.33KHz frequency allocation? Time will tell.



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Airband Scanner Problems...

I have received an anonymous post from someone who has bought a radio scanner for their son but cannot receive anything. You have not stated what radio you have but in any case, please remember that the civil airband is found between 118.0MHz to 136.975MHz and the military airband is between 225.0MHz to 400.0MHz. All signals are AM NOT FM and tuning steps are 25Khz (just one UK frequency on the new 8.33KHz steps at the moment which is 'sector 1' on 132.840MHz).

Perhaps you could let us know whereabouts in the UK you are and I can give you a better idea of what to listen out for and on what frequencies. If you are having problems actually getting the radio set up on airband then let us know what radio you have and we can help you further, thanks. Mark.

Heard Anything Interesting Recently?

I switched on my scanner last week, it was tuned to Swanwick S5 sector (brecon) on 133.6MHz. Within seconds, I heard an aircraft put out a 'Pan Pan Pan' call. This aircraft was routing north/south through the Brecon sector but promptly requested a diversion east towards Birmingham declaring a medical emergency. I wonder if any readers have heard anything of interest lately?

Please keep any replies fairly general as for legal reasons we all have to be careful about divulging information heard. Thanks. Mark.

Airband Books

'dh' has sent the following message regarding airband book recommendations:

'My favourite airband books are: 1. Air Band Radio Handbook by David J Smith 2. Air Band Radio Guide by Graham Duke 3. Airwaves, VHF/UHF Aviation Frequency Directory by Photavia Press'.

thanks for those recommendations, airwaves is a great frequency guide. I have been making attempts to obtain supplies of this publication to offer to readers but after initially agreeing to supply me I cannot get them to reply to my requests to actually place an order at the moment, so I will keep you all posted on that one.

Airband Frequencies Over Caterham Surrey

Ok, with regard to frequencies over Caterham Surrey as requested. I imagine this is a very busy area for air traffic. You are directly underneath the London 'Biggin' sector (120.525MHz). This extends from surface to FL175 and handles traffic inbound to Heathrow from the South West, this traffic heads straight for Biggin where it is either passed to Heathrow director on 134.975MHz or is held in the Biggin 'stack' when its busy. The sector also handles Gatwick departures heading East & North and Luton, London City & Stansted departures which are routed to the East of Heathrow heading South/South West.

Above this, are Vaton up to FL215 (127.95MHz) then S26 upto FL305 (132.6MHz) and finally S2 upto FL660 (127.425MHz). As with other frequencies some of these may be bandboxed together during quiet periods.

IOW Air Traffic Control

A reader has posted the following:

"Hi, I have just a few months ago brought a uniden ubc30xlt as my first scanner. Also I live in Newport on the IOW and in the morning I can see flights coming in from the USA and in the late morning and the early afternoon I can see trans-atlantic flight climbing over the solent ( I think).Also I see some trans-atlantic flights that a at flight level still going east. Another flight path I can see is the one going to spain because I see easyjet ,ryanair ,monarch ,tap through the binoculars.So can you tell me what frequencys are being used in my area. thank you in advance."

As far as I am aware the only london frequency over the IOW is S19 (sector 19) which operates on a frequency of 135.05MHz. S19's area to the south of the IOW extends from surface level to FL660. There is then a 'chunk' of airspace running east to west from Bembridge to the mainland which covers surface to FL275 and then a small area to the north of the mainland extending from FL175 to FL275. I believe that solent radar (southampton) possibly overlaps this area handling lower traffic on 120.225MHz.

Just on the western side of the IOW is S20 following the same flight levels as S19 quoted earlier. The frequency for S20 is 129.425MHz however when traffic is low the two sectors can be 'bandboxed' together on one frequency. Hope this helps.

A reader has requested Swanwick centre frequencies, I'm sorry but I don't have time to publish a full list right now but if you want frequencies for a particular area I'll be glad to help out.

Also John from Caterham in Surrey has requested frequencies, again I'll get round to these in the next couple of days as time is limited right now. Thanks for your questions all and I will endeavor to answer them all as quickly as possible. Mark.