CB quick-start (sdroxide — 11 m)
A short, task-oriented walkthrough for getting sdroxide going on the
11 m (27 MHz) citizens band: setting up your SDR or CAT rig, using the
per-country channel plans, and following the WSJT-CB digital traffic. For the
reference detail behind each control, see USER_MANUAL.md;
for the why of this fork, see the README.
This is the CB/SWL fork of sdroxide. The 11 m band and the broadcast bands
are added on top; the amateur bands and everything else are upstream and
unchanged.
Nederlands: cb-quickstart.nl.md. Français:
cb-quickstart.fr.md. Italiano:
cb-quickstart.it.md. PDF:
cb-quickstart.en.pdf.
Bold names such as SETTINGS and Callsign are buttons and fields exactly
as they appear on screen. Settings > Radio is a menu path.
What you need
- An SDR or a radio sdroxide supports. For 11 m the usual choices are:
- RTL-SDR (dongle) — native, no SoapySDR needed.
- RX-888 / RX-888 Mk2 — native; the firmware is uploaded to the receiver
automatically.
- Airspy HF+ (Dual / Discovery / Ranger) — native, 0.5 kHz–31 MHz.
- Also possible: HackRF, Airspy R2/Mini, SDRplay RSP, ELAD, PlutoSDR, or a
CAT rig (Icom/Yaesu/Xiegu) over a serial port + sound card, TCI,
OpenHPSDR, or SoapySDR.
- A 27 MHz antenna suited to your receiver.
- sdroxide installed (below).
Installing
- Windows — the installer (
.msi) or the portable .zip (which contains
sdroxide.exe): see the Releases page.
- Linux — the AppImage (one file,
chmod +x and run), the .deb, or
the portable tarball.
- macOS — the
.dmg.
You can also run sdroxide as a server and open it in a browser:
sdroxide --server, then http://localhost:4950. Handy when the antenna is
somewhere else.
Part A — One-time setup
Everything here is saved under ~/.config/sdroxide-brown/, so you do it once.
1. Start sdroxide
The main window has the control bar across the top and the panadapter and
waterfall below it.
2. Pick your radio
Open SETTINGS and go to the Radio tab. Pick your interface (for example
RTL-SDR, RX-888 or Airspy HF+), then the sample rate and the
gain. Changes apply right after Apply / reconnect.
- Linux — USB receivers: install the bundled udev rules, or sdroxide will
see the device but fail to open it:
sudo cp 60-sdroxide-*.rules /usr/lib/udev/rules.d/ && sudo udevadm control --reload, then replug.
- Windows — RX-888: bind the device to WinUSB once with
Zadig — for both USB ids (
04B4:00F3 and
04B4:00F1).
3. Fill in your details
Go to the General tab:
- Callsign — for CB/WSJT-CB, enter your CB identifier here.
- Locator / grid — your Maidenhead grid; the map and the decoding use it.
- IARU region — the region that sets the band plan.
- CB plan — pick your country’s channel plan: World / freeband,
CEPT/EU (the Netherlands), Germany 80 channels, UK 27/81,
USA, Australia. This is what decides the channels and the channel
number shown on the waterfall.
Part B — Listening on 11 m
- Pick the 11 m band on the band bar. It runs from 26.965 to
27.860 MHz.
- With the CEPT/EU plan, channel 1 = 26.965 MHz and channel 40 =
27.405 MHz (10 kHz spacing). The channel number appears on the
panadapter.
- Pick the mode: AM or FM for voice, USB/LSB for SSB on the
freeband.
- Listening only? Turn on SWL mode: every transmit control (PTT,
TUNE, CALL CQ, …) disappears and you are left with a clean receiver. With
Simple UI you see only the controls you need, with AM · FM · USB ·
LSB up front.
Part C — Digital on 27 MHz (WSJT-CB / FT8 family)
This fork speaks the same hashed WSJT exchange that
WSJT-CB uses on 27 MHz.
- Pick FT8 (or FT4/FT2).
- Pick the digital channel from the channel plan / channel list of your CB
plan.
- In the decode list: click a row to move your audio onto that signal and
press REPLY or Call CQ.
- Every decoded station shows its country flag — sdroxide follows
WSJT-CB’s callsign conventions and country numbering.
- In SWL mode you can read it all without transmitting.
Part D — Saving your setup (profiles)
Under Settings > Profiles you save a whole working setup under a name and
put it back later with one click: dials and VFOs, mode and filters, gain, drive
and antennas, the digital identity and the band stacks. Handy for switching
between “11 m at home” and “listening to shortwave”.
- CW on your keyboard: hold the Space bar — your keyboard works as a
straight key.
- Export the decode list to CSV or a received-report ADIF, for
keeping track of what was on the air.
- The browser client can import ADIF and CHIRP files.
- Audible alerts for calls and new DXCC/grids.
- Themes: ten extra colour themes.
Sending on CB
- CB is meant for sending and receiving, and in most countries it needs no
licence — the licence-free CEPT channels, at limited power. This fork treats
11 m as a full band, not a receive-only extra.
- To transmit, switch on Allow transmit on 11 m (CB) on the General tab and
confirm the note once. It is a switch only because the program’s amateur-band
lockout is generic and refuses every band that is not an amateur allocation;
CB is a separate radio service, so it is opted into rather than assumed. After
that, transmitting on 11 m works like any other band.
- To send the digital modes (FT8, SSTV) you need a transceiver, keyed
either by VOX (a sound-card rig — the program plays the audio to its mic
input and the radio keys itself) or over CAT. A receive-only dongle (most
RTL-SDR, RX-888 and Airspy HF+ setups) hears them but cannot send them.
- The switch opens 11 m and nothing else — the broadcast bands stay
receive-only. (
--oob-tx / tx_ham_only = false remains for licensed
out-of-band use.)
- Keep to your country’s channels, power and modes — ordinary CB courtesy.
Check the current rules where you are.
- This fork is for the whole of CB — voice and the digital modes — alongside
SWL and decoding. CB and amateur radio are neighbours on the same spectrum;
this program is glad to serve both.
Help and links
- README — the full overview of the fork.
- USER_MANUAL.md — the manual, control by control.
- WSJT-CB — the digital 11 m project
this builds on.
- Releases — the
latest build for every platform.
See you on 11 metres! 73