RNAV Polish Spotters

Hello everyone, i know this topic has been quiet for quite the while. I am looking to buy some equipment for christmas that would allow me to listen to Upper Atc. I dont really know anything about this and im asking anybody for tips, what is the Best way to listen to Atc, what equipment should i buy ? Do i need to be really near a station or will it work from my home too ? Thanks in advance if anybody could tell me more about this.

Hi,

imo the best solution for you will be radio scanner receiver. I use for example Uniden UBC125XLT, which covers military freq., has fast scanning, also freqs can be separated as banks. Also, you can connect it to pc and set up freqs/options etc. This scanner has the best price/capability ratio from my point of view. I do not know how much do you want to spend, but I bought used one, still under warranty for very good price.

From Wieliczka, I listen to planes up to ~150km using aerial from the kit. You can easily build your own dipole antenna, which has a much more range.

Thanks very much Vader for the quick reply.
This is exactly the information i was looking for, and i think this is in my price range and its also avalible in a shop near me :).
I also have acess to all the Freq. in Slovakia so im probably set for that.
One more question, is there anything to the legality of listening to atc ? can i get in trouble in any way ?

Seimou pisze: ↑22 listopada 2022, 15:18 Thanks very much Vader for the quick reply.
This is exactly the information i was looking for, and i think this is in my price range and its also avalible in a shop near me :).
I also have acess to all the Freq. in Slovakia so im probably set for that.
One more question, is there anything to the legality of listening to atc ? can i get in trouble in any way ?

I am not sure how it works in Slovakia, but on this forum (message from 2017) you can find that

In Slovakia, no license needed for scanners.
Listening to unencoded analog networks is allowed, but the law states that you can't handle recieved information form transmissions to anyone else unless you're registered user of the network you are listening to.
Decoding and decrypting is officialy prohibited.

https://forums.radioreference.com/threa ... st-2835582

You can also ask the radio authorities in your country -> http://en.rvr.sk/

Thanks for helping me Vader, i appreciate it very much :) i am looking forward to listening to atc.

Seimou pisze: ↑23 listopada 2022, 10:46 Thanks for helping me Vader, i appreciate it very much :) i am looking forward to listening to atc.

You can start now, for example Shannon ATC https://www.liveatc.net/hlisten.php?mou ... &icao=einn

On this page you can find and listen to many airports https://www.liveatc.net/

With uniden ubc125xlt I use Sirio GP3e antenna, it's good with planes and with e.g. fire fighters frequency.

geo pisze: ↑24 listopada 2022, 12:55 With uniden ubc125xlt I use Sirio GP3e antenna, it's good with planes and with e.g. fire fighters frequency.

I use two antennas, a homemade dipole and a Diamond X-50, both work great with the UBC125XLT.

Thanks for all the tips :), i got my scanner on christmas and already had a blast spotting yesterday with atc.

Ive got one problem now tho, since yesterday like 19:00 i didnt get any transmissions. And today im getting just a few aircraft in really low signal and bad quality and i dont hear any of the atc transmissions. Could this be because of Weather ? it is much worse than yesterday ( im on the other side of the Tatras right now near KELEL ) Or maybe because of low battery ?

thanks in advance.

Also note that the Atc tower is located in Bratislava which is pretty far away and controls the whole country as of right now .

Just an Update so nobody has to reply to my previous post, everything works fine now and was probably just caused by weather and electric devices interfering.

Thanks for the tips everyone ;)