How to Figure out your transmit range

Short undetailed answer
Longe distance radio communications are acomplished by the signals being refracted back to the earth's surface off the layers of the ionsphere.Many factors come in to play here like:Sunlight/darkness at site of transmission and reception,Season,Sunspot cycle,Solar activity,Solar activity,Polar aurora.By choosing the right frequency under the right conditions long distance communications are possible.

Take an AM broadcast band radio and during the daytime, tune from one end of the dial to the other and note how many stations you can hear.Do the samething after dark and you will hear many more stations after dark.

During daylight hours you will hear local and semi-local station via groundwave propagation.The Ground or Surface Wave, which travels directly from the transmitting antenna to the receiving antenna following the contours of the land or surface of the sea.

At night you will hear many stations at long distances as their signals are being refract off the ionsphere, this is skywave propagation.The Sky Wave, which travels upward and at an angle from the antenna , until it reaches the ionosphere and is refracted back down to earth at a distance from the transmitting antenna dependant on the angle it is refracted by the ionosphere.






The long detailed answer would take on book form.:smt120:smt024

 

No I JUNK that stuff back in 1976 ....... The problems included a copper plated chassies a sprayed front pannel switches that failed and so-so receiver for mega bucks.

DRAKE just never worked out for me and i never bought another DRAKE station again. I still have thw W4 watt meter the guy who bought the station din't want the meter and SOLD the station a few years later at a loss ......

The Drake R4 receiver had no filters like the later R4c and used back to back IF cans for bandpass and on moonbounce even in 500 hz bandpass had a poor skirt almost 2:1 which didn't help with noise and the 2 meter conveter had a 2DB NF not real bad for 1970 but today would be a joke.

My Yaesu right out of the box was a better radio and I STILL have it and USE it 35 years later.

 

NO.

Trees, buildings, dirt, power lines, railroad tracks, clouds, anything that is in the way... CB radio signals (AM radio waves) are "line-of-sight" you can have 10,000 watts and not talk a mile through a city, or you can have 100 watts and talk across the country. There might be an object in the way and not even see it. It's all about what's in the way and what in the weather.

 

You got it ~line of sight and how good the other station is.

 

Mad dog,WA4GCH and Alby....you do realize this is a TRUCKDRIVER forum dontcha??!!
Good Lord fellas you got us truckers looking at the screen the way people in Alabama look at jeopardy.Tone down the smart talk.All we wanna know is how do we key up over the knucklehead sittin next to us.....AWWWWDIO!!!!

Hopefully no one took offense.Just poking some fun at myself and my truck driving brethren.

Ok brainiacs....have at it.

 

Get ya a linear and get your SWR's down....and hope your linear is bigger than his and hope his SWR's are high....

How often does someone say "aaauuudddiiio" over the air?

Hey it could be worse...it could be some male talking about "not having any panties on".

 

Hey that was great info Turbo-T Thank you so much for that post..
I run a galaxy 99 that pushes 45 watts barefoot ,a single Wilson with a 6ft coax that has about 1.2 SWR reading after extensive tuning by my CB guy. I wanted to see how good we could get it with that setup. I have been able in good weather and usually across water with no obstructions go to 15 to 20 miles easily as tested but another trucker I run with who also has a galaxy 33 with the same wilson setup.
We have bridges here in Tampa and have heard Japanese shipping crews coming in on side bands my radio has so yeah many factors are involved.I also pick up skips from out of state at times too. Im not able to talk to them only hear them. Like turbo said once all those factors are taken care of then you can boost the watts and get out further. I do know receiving requires less power than transmitting. I'm no expert by any means so again thanks Turbo. I appreciate it

 

15 - 20 sounds about right i'm in SEMINIOLE and on a VERY good night from Largo you might hear me .....

 

Yeah ya never know..Thanks buddy