Readers Airband Radios Continued...

Matt Has posted the following:

Hello again, when I started aircraft spotting around 1960, it was possible to use binoculars and telescopes(anyone remember the Hilkinson Pancratic ?)to read off registrations. Most civil and a lots of military aircraft had giant registrations and the civil ones all flew below about FL150.
A few years later I got my first airband radio - a Shorrock, cost £36 = a whole summer's work for me.Interestingly if you index the inflation since then this would be about £470 in today's money. This is almost the price of the Kinetic SBS-1 so not much has changed.In those early days only BOAC and a few American airlines used Flight Numbers and with Procedural air traffic control it was easy to get the registration and position just by listening.
Of course all that's changed and the modern tool has to be the SBS-1 from Kinetic Avionics. At the moment mine is displaying the radar positions of120 aircraft over southern England together with their registrations, callsigns and loads of other data.All of this is possible thanks to some very talented folks in the Kinetic Users Forum who have created lots of useful add-on programs that seriously enhance the SBS-1. As a general comment Mode S is now compulsory for IFR flights in UK controlled airspace and starting 2008-2010 other flights are expected to comply which should embrace most GA operations. Not all aircraft provide positional information, a big example are Military Flights. This is allowed but increasingly amongst Civil Aircraft positional data is being provided.For me, the SBS-1 has created a massive awareness of just how much traffic is around and that I was not noticing inspite of monitoring lots of the frequencies. In a way it takes me back to the 1960's type of spotting when you knew what was coming/and when by using the radio. Paired with an airband radio you really can get on top of the hobby.To any readers wondering about the SBS-1 I'd say visit a dealer and try it out. Make the investment and watch you own radar screen !Yes its not cheap, you also need to have a PC and depending where you live you may need to spend quite a bit extra to get a good aerial up outside and possibly even a preamp.Try these links to Kinetics and also their Forum where lots of newcomers find out details before parting with their cash:http://www.kinetic-avionics.co.uk/index.phphttp://www.kinetic-avionics.co.uk/forums/I'm happy to answer any queries about SBS-1 if this will help you decide.When I get a moment I'll sort out something on the Nova Tech...Have funMatt

And also a post left by Nick B:

Reading though Matt's list of receivers I realized I've been through a few myself, mainly during the early 1990's when I spent a lot of time listening to Mil Air.
I started with a Realistic PRO-2005. Bought this new from Tandy and set it up at home with a discone. Performance on both VHF and UHF airband was very good, apart from the odd problem with pager interference around 135MHz.I then sold this and bought the AOR-1000. Big mistake! Although this hand-held covered the frequency range, sensitivity was poor and it was very prone to overload on a discone. I also found the programming very unfriendly after the PRO-2005.
I was then fortunate enough to buy a second-hand PRO-2004. This was as good as, or probably better than the 2005. It has a metal case, as opposed to the plastic one on the 2005, and a sloping panel with a membrane keypad. It was easily modified for 400 channels and faster scan speed. I had this for over ten years before selling it.
One day, whilst on a visit to Lowe Electronics, I saw a Signal R-535, complete with battery pack which was quickly snapped up. Lowes were also kind enough to let me a have a copy of the service manual. Performance of this receiver is probably one of the best I have heard as is is a dedicated AM receiver. Compared to keypad-entry scanners is it a little slow to program at first, but once mastered there is no problem.Regrettably I sold the R-535, or rather exchanged it for an AOR AR-8000. Again, not something I was particularly impressed with so it got part exchanged against a MVT-9000. Another mistake. The MVT-9000 was another unwilling victim to local pager breakthrough on VHF so had to go, being exchanged for an Icom IC-R10E. I was never really happy with this either and it eventually got sold on.
Then I got Realistic PRO-60. Simple to program, just like the 2004 and 2005 base scanners, with excellent AM performance. This was regular visitor to the north of Scotland with me, spending many hours monitoring the range traffic at Tain, amongst other places.
At home I acquired a PRO-2042. Again, excellent performance for a Realistic scanner, with a few added features compared to the earlier 2004 and 2005.Recently, I was lucky enough to get a dead R-535 which I have repaired. Still a solid performer. They still hold their value, which is probably because they are unique as far as airband monitors go.

Thanks to both Matt & Nick for posting, I have had a couple of R535's myself, excellent radio but 60 memory channels is just not enough for me particularly if you monitor military. I can honestly say that my current Uniden UBC3500XLT matches the best radios I have had (Yupi 7100 & the R535) for sensitivity and the scanning ability is much faster than any other scanner I have owned myself at around 100 channels/second. I notice that Nick has had an Icom ICR-10. I found this to be absolutely 'deaf' compared to the Yupi 7100 I exchanged it for, I've also tried the ICR-2 & ICR-5 - both neat and portable but again, relatively deaf in my opinion!

Anyway, thanks guys and keep the comments coming, cheers. Mark Graham.