Released in June 2005 the new trunktracker fills a void, but the void its filling is about 3 years
too late, its really a step up from the handheld ubc245xlt and step below the ubc780xlt.
But since currently there is no trunktrackers available currently in Australia, its a stop gap model until
some new digital capable trunk tracking models arrive.
Well in the box, the scanner, telescopic antenna, mounting bracket for mobile mounting, a 12vdc accessory
socket adapter, a hardwire cable power cable. a 240v to 12vdc adapter, manual and a bonus on glass antenna.
As soon as you walk out of the retailer you can stick the onglass antenna (a piece of wire attached to 2
clear suction cups and about of 3 metres of black cable to the BNC fitting) on your car windscreen and plug the 12v accessory
power cable into the accessory socket(used to be a cigerette lighter socket) and into the scanner and power on! it works,
it beeps and say in the numeral writing UBCT8..... we have life.....
This scanner looks like a 780 kinda, bit smaller with a new C.C. button and red alert light, this is the
new feature on uniden models, its called "Close Call" technology, which undien means if a transmitter is nearby
it will in theory, search across the bands, lock onto a transmitting signal, beep flash and place the audio out
the speaker, but you have to press a button to see what frequency it has locked(more on this later). This scanner
also has preprogrammed by each state, police, ambulance and fire frequencies so the actual amount of programmable channels
is 250 in 5 banks.
So I quickly fingered thru the manual but instead just pressed buttons, pressing the state button scrolls
thru the states. and programmed it to NSW, to scan the police, fire and ambulance this really can be thought of as, extra
banks 7,8,9 (no 6 or 0) so pressing scan 7,8,9 the words police, fire ambulance appear on screen, by pressing C.C. the C.C
button lights up and the scanner scans the police etc and stops and says CC and goes thru its paces, pressing C.C again the
C.C button flashs and the scanner displays CC and 6 dashes. if something is picked up (like a UHF CB'er) Lights flash. the
scanner beeps and the FOUND is displayed while the audio is automaticly heard, But in the city of Newcastle the signals it
picks up include lots of DATA. The scanner has preprogrammed searchs of common bands, they are Police(OZ only not NZ),
rail roads, aircraft(118-136only), marine band, UHF cb, & AM cb.
Ok police in Newcastle are digital and the scanner picks up digital noise transmissions (you can lock them
out) and analog but since the Fire brigade are on GRN and the GRN is smack bang in the 410-420 slice of radio and the fire
brigade PMR(usual communciations) are also in the 410-420 the scanner locks onto the GRN control channels and ambulance also
use MDT data on their PMR channels so heaps of data noises ARRGHHH, this scanner needs to go home and get programmed with
GRN and some other freqs.
The scanner does not have alpha tagging or CTCSS decoding and at time of writing while computer programmable
no software from uniden was available (I rang and was told it would be available in the next 8 weeks from the uniden website
for about $60 PHUCK, do they Medicare, bit steep I think but we will see), So i searched the net, uniden USA site nope,
gotta buy it and Butel (scanner software specialist) www.butel.nl and found they have a overseas version but was not 100%compatible with our australian model, any since I only
had to program the GRN base configs, steps, offsets and freqs, no alphatags, it really is not too daunting..... as usual the
uniden manual is not that helpful and can be confusing, but i have expereince and found the programing not too difficult(ive
included a simple step by step guide for novocatrians below).
So the scanner like its big brother can search for ID's and scan programmed lists (5 lists of 10 IDS
per banks, or a total of 250IDs if all 5 banks of trunks are programmed in all the scanner).
So fuctionally the scanner state police fire ambulance feature is good IF there is no GRN or DIGITAL
services in your area. once programmed for the GRN it operates similarly to its big brother, locks onto an control channel
while searching and wont let go (annoying) can display incorrect ID's but cant do ICALLS but is capable of status
bits like the 780.
The Close Call feature, well its operates, but how well, depends on how you think, (I own a optoelectronics
xplorer) and ubct8'ss performance is about 1% of the xplorer For example as drive up croudace rd Lambton, the
scanner picks up a 151.850 (greek Radio) from near howe St, till past the blackbutt turn off, it doesnt or didnt pick up the
GRN or police TX, but the xplorer picks up the GRN from newcastle road & croudace st intersection, the GRN is detected
at Energy Australia Stadium, and the side by side comparison the xplorer on its internal antenna and the UBCT8 connected
to an external antenna show lower performances by the UBCT8 but comparing a $400 scanner to a $1200 hi-performance frequency
counter is unfair, for the average user it will detect the local truckie on his 50 watt radio at about 2-3blocks away.
So if you are looking in to getting a trunking scanner this is a good entry level model, its not perfect
but it works ok, has good accessories and its price of $429 RRP (we picked ours up from friends Newcastle PRO sound for a
discounted $395)
ARC8 SOFTWARE is about $60AUS available from www.butel.nl
read it to make a informed decision about purchasing
also call peter at Newcastle Pro Sound jesmond for a good deal and real smart sales people
<08/2005>
I timely trip to Melbourne provided some extra material to review, I know that heading from Wodonga to Melbourne
there is a VHF network, and the melbourne has metro UHF network, well sadly someone at uniden didnt include the vhf in the
programmed victoria state police program, so any traveller from Wondonga wont pick up any police after Albury till Melbourne
a boring 3hr trip, well at least you can scan thru the UHF CB and hear the truckies banter, which can be insightful about
about he police anyway.
ubct8im2.jpg
Programming
the GRN on a UBCT8 in bank 1
(replace
the bank number for your prefered bank)
Hold [trunk]until
{trunk bank 12345} are flashing
we now pick the
trunk type use the up/down arrows until {E2-UHF} is displayed then press [E]
the display should
now be displaying {1 Prog F}
we now program
the freqspress [E]
type 416.2500
[E] then arrow up for channel 2
type 416.1875
[E] then arrow up for channel 3
type 416.5000
[E] then arrow up for channel 4
type
417.0000 [E] then arrow up for channel 5
type 417.2500
[E] then arrow up for channel 6
type 417.5000
[E] then arrow up for channel 7
type 417.7500
[E] then arrow up for channel 8
type
413.2500 [E] then arrow up for channel 9
type 416.4750 [E]
then arrow up for channel 10
type 416.6875
[E] then arrow up for channel 11
type 416.9750
[E] then arrow up for channel 12
type
417.1875 [E] then arrow up for channel 13
type 417.4750
[E] then arrow up for channel 14
type 418.8500
[E] then [E] again and arrow up so that 2 bASE is displayed
press [E] again
and trunk M 123 are flash and the display says bas spc ofs(steady)
press 1
bas enter 413.100[E]
arrow up type 12.5 [E] arrow up enter 723 [E]now press [hold/resume]
press 2
bas
enter 415.000[E] arrow up type 12.5 [E] arrow up enter 748 [E]now press [hold/resume]
press 3
bas enter 415.575[E] arrow up type 12.5 [E] arrow up enter 380 [E]now press [hold/resume]
Press trunk and the scanner is ready to search the GRN, See the manual for programing the IDs and
list scanning etc
From The User Manual regarding Closecall Technology
Your scanner's Close Call feature lets you set the scanner so it detects then displays the frequency
of nearby strong radio transmission. Close Call RF capture works great for finding frequencies at venues such as malls
and sporting events. You can set the scanner so Close Call detection works "in the background" while you are scanning
other frequencies, turn off normal scanning while Close Call is working, or turn off the Close Call feature and use the scanner
normally. You can set the scanner so it alerts you when the Close Call feature detects a frequency. You can also set the
frequency band where you want the scanner to look for transmissions. Unlike searching, which requires the scanner to
tune to a frequency to check for a transmission, Close Call RF capture directly detects the presence of a strong, nearby
signal and instantly tunes to the source's frequency.
Notes: Close Call RF capture works well for locating the source of strong local transmissions
such as mobile and handheld two-way radios in areas with no other strong transmission sources. However, if you are in
an area with many transmission sources (such as pager radio transmitters, multi-use radio towers, traffic control devices,
etc.), Close Call RF capture might not find the transmission you are searching for, or it might find a transmission
other than the one you are searching for. Close Call RF capture cannot detect satellite dishes or any transmitter
with a frequency above or below the frequency ranges listed in Select Close Call Bands on Page 19. Close Call works
better with some types of transmissions than others. It might not correctly display frequency information for transmitters using
a highly directive antenna (such as an amateur radio beam antenna), if there are many transmitters operating at the same
time in the same area, or if the transmitter is a broadcast television station.
Every 2 seconds, the scanner checks for frequencies in the range you specified in "Set Close Call
Option" on page 19 and interrupts the audio when it checks for a Close call Transmission in that range.
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