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please help with hand-held radio advice

7K views 45 replies 27 participants last post by  kl0an 
#1 ·
Ok, I know there have been hundreds of threads on radios and they almost always get overly technical and devolve into a discussion of ham radio setups. Please keep it simple for me.

I'm looking for something that has a reliable communication for a distance of say 8 to 10 miles in an urban setting. I'd like to pay around 100 dollars or less. It should be hand-held (as that is easily portable). Oh and Ideally wouldn't require any special license.

If you know any radios that meet this please let me know.

Thank you very much in advance,
Holly
 
#6 ·
There are no handhelds that will reliably give you a 10 mile range in an urban setting without repeaters. Forget the marine radios, they will find you and as someone else stated you will get a big fine and have your equipment confiscated.

With a 5 watt radio you may expect between 1/4 to 2 miles at most. Those frs/gmrs radios that advertise a 10 or 12 mile range are never going to give you that range unless it's from one mountain top to another....... line of sight.

You can get a base/mobile GMRS radio with more power and be able to set up a repeater to have a much greater range but there is a license and good equipment will cost much more than 100 dollars.

Go get your tech license. Buy a study guide, take a couple of weeks to learn the basics and take your test. It's not a hard test at all if you study a little. I wouldn't even call it studying, just read the book a couple of times and you should be able to pass it. It's inexpensive also.

You really start to learn the technical stuff after you get your license when you can experiment.
 
#25 ·
From the standpoint of a prepper who wants to "get it done" without a lot of fuss and paperwork, you're right: it's a PITA.

However, from the standpoint of an RF engineer (and the FCC), it's necessary. There just aren't enough "usable" blocks of the spectrum that can be assigned to folks like us who will only use them occasionally, because there are a zillion competing commercial users who want to use them all the time. Even if we ignore the police, fire, ambulance, civil defense, and military users, there are still thousands of companies screaming for more bandwidth to use for the new information age: cellular data, direct-to-home broadcast services, satellite services, satellite-based-internet, portable broadcast pickup, etc., etc.

Long story short: the FCC doesn't assign these ever-so-precious airwaves anymore - it auctions them off to the highest bidder! That means that users like us, who don't have any money to spend at auctions or for lobbyists, have to take the leavings that either can't be auctioned (many frequency bands are allocated by international treaty, including the the ones for the Maritime Service and ham radio), or are set aside for users that don't want to share: the government, the military, and defense contractors all get their assignments from special allocations managed by DoD, not the FCC.

The only way to provide any level of service to casual users is to do what the FCC has already done: keep power levels so low that MURS, FRS, GMRS, and other "local" users get about the same range that kids used to get from the walkie-talkies they got for their birthday.

Amateur Radio is much less of a PITA to get into than it used to be: there is no need to learn Morse Code, for one thing, and the tests have been simplified to the point where anyone with a weekend to spare or the chance to attend an "Exam Cram" session can get a Technician license and enjoy the (much) wider selection of channels and the help of other hams to get things going.

There is an oft-forgotten fly in the Amateur Ointment, however: a strict prohibition against "pecuniary interest", which means that anything involving money has to be strictly about ham radio: Amateurs, for example, can join "swap" nets to offer ham equipment for sale, but that's all.

Long story short: getting a ham license is the easiest, most expedient, and least-cost way to setup your family or community network so that it works both now and after a disaster. And, sorry to bring bad news, but you're much more likely to need $1,000 than $100.

YMMV. HTH. HAND.

William Warren
 
#10 ·
In for a penny in for a pound, if your able to build or setup an antenna for a GMRS then you are able to get a tech ham.

There is already a network of people currently managing and building an ever better system of emergency communications. They Go to great extremes to test this system, to hone there skills, and to insure it functions. They come from all walks of life, they are all generally good people with the same desire as you, they all have a plan, they all currently use this system. Its HAM radio.

Its not hard, and reliably being able to use radios of any kind for distances you want to achieve require the same knowlage that the HAM radio test covers. Its a win win, and totop it all off there are many people just waiting to help and teach you, its your local HAM club.
 
#13 ·
yes yes ham is the bomb. It just feels like such an over kill. First study, then take a test, then buy a radio and build some kind of setup (most of which seem to be stationary) and then you can talk for miles and miles and miles (to complete strangers). All I really want is to be able to contact other members of my group (friends and family) when the phone and Internet die. It seems like such an ordeal, and if I want to talk to (MY) friends and family... then they too will have to deal with all of the red tape involved with the pig oops I mean ham.
 
#12 ·
No one is listening for maring radio use in the Tennessee moutnains so I call BS. As for the hunters, they were busted for being stupid, smoking dope and poaching. Add to that the were (confessed to) using marine radios. Yep...they deserved it.

Not to mention how hard it is to track down an intermittant transmission, and find it transmitting in your possesion...and....and...and... nothing like confessing to a fed...

Use your head. Marine radios are fine for STHF como and the super duper secret obama marine radio monitioring corp does not exist....yet....

BTW, don't get caught, and above all, admit nothing, deny everything, and make counter accusations.

My personal preference is for the Yaesu VX-3R. Amazing radio and it WILL transmit on marine bands if needed.
 
#14 ·
While in your area you may not of had any problems yet, I assure you the 4 old fox hunters in my Ham club could find you in 4 short radio contacts. They live , eat, and breath foxhunting. They build super antenna arrays to track that very thing, they have a van set up to track and practice once a month as well as stationary positions. But hey believe what you want. In Any Case its still a VHF system and subject to the same limitations as 2 meter ham, sorry but 10 mile radio to radio ain't going to happen reliably.





Holly, the test is actually easy and we were able to get 9 of our local guys HAM ready in less then 10 days. we just took the Ham practice test at QRZ until we passed then took the test, real easy.

I bought a few older radios for less then 100 bucks.

At minimum you should just go to your local HAM club meeting and see just what it is about.
 
#15 ·
holly,

I have some info that might help you when it comes to the HAM licence. All you have to do is take some practice tests to be able to pass the real one. qrzed.com has these tests online. Take a test over a few times and only look at the correct answer. Take the next test and do the same. Repeat.

I did this for a total of about 4 hours and took the test and passed. Do I know what I should, no. Did I pass the test, yes. Go buy a FT60R radio and an adapter and a cheap mag mount antenna and you are set. You can get less of a radio, but get the external antenna.

You can get into HAM like any other hobby. Skim the surface, or dive headlong. It is always your choice.

BTW... you can pick up an old Realistic(Radio Shack) 2 meter radio for next to nothing if you keep your eyes open.
 
#21 ·
Business can use GMRS. However, they are in the UHF band. You will not get what you want without repeaters.


Businesses use The Business Band portion of the Land Mobile spectrum. You do need a license. But they are very expensive and complicated to get.

Just my opinion.
 
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#22 ·
Holly, there is a product called GoTenna. Check it out. Maybe it would work for you. http://www.gotenna.com/

If that doesn't work, then CB is your best bet and you should use antennas that are longer than the factory 6 inch "rubber duck". The longer and higher an antenna, the better the range. Make sure you get a handheld CB that has a removable antenna with a BNC connector, like this one... Amazon.com: Midland 75-822 40 Channel CB-Way Radio: Electronics

Then get this antenna http://www.walcottradio.com/27-in-flexible-handheld-cb-radio-antenna-p-2537.html if you want to use it handheld.

If you are in your car, get a magnetic mount antenna such as the Wilson "Little Wil" Amazon.com: WILSON 305-38 300-Watt Little Wil Magnet Mount Antenna: Electronics

If you want to use your CB indoors, you really need an outdoor antenna because being indoors cuts your reception/transmission substantially. We can discuss this more if you decide to go in this direction.
 
#24 ·
That 8-10 mile range and cost of less than $100 are both deal breakers.

As for people not direction finding and hunting violators, a local school in my area was using FRS/GMRS radios. They had an expired UHF license for commercial frequencies and just bought blister pack radios when the license expired. They were given the option of a $16,000 fine or finding a legal alternative. An automated logging system in use in the area showed that they had been using the radios for about 2 years before the FCC decided to "enforce" the issue.

This logging system was a Raytheon ACU-1000 connected to radios and an Eventide logging recorder. Had they payed attention before, they would have known the instant the school began using it. What changed, a new employee decided to actually do their job.

A Hydra V3 system has since replaced this receiving gear. I myself us a Bird Dog 360 and logger. All of these systems can listen and direction find anything within range in rear time. The government has better gear, if you get someone who chooses to enforce the law, it only takes one transmission.

In my previous life, I often logged things, and kept that information for later use. Go ahead and use Marine VHF in the hills somewhere, but do it at your own risk. Use FRS/GMRS for business use without a license. Use used Motorola gear from a cab company for your kids playing in the back yard. But know that it is probably being monitored and logged by some government entity. RF traffic is often recorded and archived for further review.

My personal comms when camping, or just out and about, Motorola ISR band DTR-410's. No license needed, about 1 mile range, but at $250 per radio, out of the OP's price range, and not far enough to meet their range (8-10 miles). However, harder for anyone to listen to.
 
#26 ·
#29 ·
I'm one of the rebels who uses Baofeng radios and don't have a ham licence. So it's not like I'm preaching here.

But I stick to FRS/GMRS/MURS and stay away from Marine or any other restricted frequency. It's a no-brainer. People DO get busted on VHF Marine sometimes, fines start at $10,000. Put this in a google search box to see:

vhf marine site:transition.fcc.gov/eb/Orders/


,
 
#30 ·
You will be fine as long as you stay off the ham bands, we don't like that one bit. Like I said in a different post I have a group of hacker friends who set up a digital network on MURS . It's been up for quite some time and nothing has been said about it. Other than their net I have never heard any traffic on that band and I live in a medium size city.
 
#36 ·
Holly,
If you are set on getting handheld radios, then consider the following:
1) The GMRS license is only good for your household members and costs several times what testing for the ham licesnse costs. There are 8 year old children with ham licenses and if they can pass the test, then you can too.
2) As has been pointed out above, your two biggest players in range are going to be antenna and curvature of the earth. 5Watts is all you need to communicate with satellites if you have the right antenna on your handheld. At the height of a handheld's antenna, the horizon is a little less than six miles away, so there is your theoretical limit. More power can get you through more trees or buildings, but not dirt (as in earth).
3) because the antenna plays such a huge role in effective range, I would avoid any radio that contains the letters "FRS", even if they also include the letters "GMRS" By law, all FRS radios have a permanently attached and by design, very inefficient antenna. With any FRS radio in a residential neighborhood, if I am in my house and my neighbors are inside theirs, I will be able to communicate with the guy next door, but not "reliably" with the one on the other side of him.
4) I know you don't want to hear this, but licensed ham radio opens up so many possibilities, even without technical knowledge, that it just makes sense. Here is a bit of information on how inexpensive ham radio handheld units can be used to set up a one-to-one wireless intercom system for an entire neighborhood with the ability to contact people by name as well as calling the entire neighborhood. http://firewallsrus.blogspot.com/2014/07/Intercom.html
 
#38 ·
At one time I owned a sailboat, and I installed a marine vhf radio on it. I spent a small fee and had the license to use the marine radio. There were no limitations placed on where I could use that or any other marine radios that I might have purchased. The only limitations were the specific channels that are assigned for designated purposes. For example certain channels are reserved for commercial shipping, radio telephone, emergency and standby channel for hailing (ch. 16). There are other channels set aside for boat to boat or boat to shore use. If you are in the woods and are using the proper channels and not being abusive, obscene, or hogging that channel, then it is not very likely that anyone will take an interest in your use of a handheld marine radio. By the way, the hand helds usually transmit with a 1 watt or a 5 watt output via a selector, and the base station will transmit with a 25 watt output.
 
#40 ·
At one time I owned a sailboat, and I installed a marine vhf radio on it. I spent a small fee and had the license to use the marine radio.
Except for a few specific situations there is no longer a fee or paperwork required for VHF Marine operation, this requirement was dropped a few years back. Today the average recreational boater does not have to fill anything out or pay any fee.

There were no limitations placed on where I could use that or any other marine radios that I might have purchased.
Just because you were unaware of limitations did not mean they did not exist. You cannot, and since the 1950’s have not been authorized to, use VHF Marine frequencies for other than boating applications. You cannot use a VHF Marine radio on shore except under specifically defined conditions, and you cannot use VHF Marine for shore to shore contact unless specifically authorized, i.e. bridge keeper to bridge keeper.

If you are in the woods and are using the proper channels and not being abusive, obscene, or hogging that channel, then it is not very likely that anyone will take an interest in your use of a handheld marine radio.
Except that such use is not legal, and people are occasionally prosecuted for it. Now because of FCC manpower and budgetary issues the enforcement division may be reduced and less active than in the past, but it is still potentially an issue. Your chances of winning the FCC enforcement lottery are pretty small, but they do exist, and it does happen.

T!
 
#41 ·
Whatever you use, if you take the time to make a simple resonant dipole hoisted as high as possible, and v'd about 120-150 degrees, you'll see a great improvement.

A 5 watt hand held CB (GE, remember those?) with a quick deploy dipole will be more than adequate for 10 miles outside a city.

Don't use rg58, get some GOOD rg8 or 8x.

I've had the best results for RESONANT dipoles with direct coax fed, a dozen or so ferrite beads at the feed point, and about 18' wrapped around a 6-10" plastic bucket at ground level. Search ugly balun.

This is what my 80m dipole is, I run up to 800 watts with 18ga. insulated legs, rg8 fed.
No problems.
 
#43 ·
Even if everything was above the 3rd or 5-6th floor the reality is with the shear amount of amount of emergency calls to dispatch will see this service non existent for use because this service dies..

Reality in an emergency repeater based services are going be a poor option because they were never designed to be a high volume traffic..

Outside of repeater use you are better of with 20-100 watts, 5watts in peak use on typical 6-6.5 foot gets 2.4km or just shy of a mile as this is the practical range in a radial and radius diameter.

Ideal across open you may push 5km or shy of 2.5 miles as long as your radius range over laps for signal..

Only time you might see anything in distance output at 5watts if you have a 40-100 foot mast to make any contact at all..

Generally if you want long distance contacts you usually use ssb/lsb/USB..
Am/fm/vhf/UHF/sw/lw/mw

My opinion of the you can not overlap 2 different services across the same frequency space without causing cross talk between the two regardless of the output used of the wattage..



Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
#45 ·
First token I more or less covered what you just said just said because unless you got on a barge on the river full of repeaters you be plum out of luck for services.

The cell network will be shot to **** when emergency services become a speed dial in an large scale emergency.

And to be honest radio repeater based options were never designed to handle a traffic jam of people trying to talk to one another..


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
#46 ·
You might want to talk to the good folks in the Arctic Amateur Radio Club up in Fairbanks.. They use every kind of power they can thing of from cell to many banks of batteries, to wind.. A lot of their towers can only be reached by helicopter and they have an excellent working relationship with other rescue services for that purpose.

Granted, I'm now in the PDX area of the Pacific North Wet and there's not much for repeater networks in this neck of the woods. I've never tried one of the networks that drop down onto the internet, only to be dubplesed on another computer and sent out on a tower there. It has it's purpose but, my reactions will focus on local areas, taking care of our own so to speak..

My bug out vehicle is a 92 Wrangler with an ICom 706 and 7 different HyGain whips that can be changed in less than a minute depending on what band I need to get on. I also have a scanner and a CB radio in there as well. The 706 also has 2m capabilities, the newer models had 440 I believe. I've got two 706's, one will be in my RV soon when I decide to go full time in that so I can talk to my wife in the vehicle she'll be driving.

Why not just make it a family affair and everyone go for their Tech licenses, pick up some handhelds and they'll be covered. They can dial 911 off most repeaters thru autopatches and that's usually to a wired system, not a cellular one.

As for the locaton of the cellular hardwarae, I guess each city has their own ideas on best places for it. There was a flood pretty deep a few years back in Great Falls and cell phone service was the first to drop. And that was before everyone was obcessed with having to record everything and put it on Facebook, Twitter, snap chat etc..

You can also put your own family repeater up. Just get permission from the allocation committee as to what freq's to use. Put a p.l. tone on it so not everyone can jam it up and you're in business.

Radio Shack used to make the cheapest of cheap repeater accessories that would copy what you said, then turn around and "repeat" it, I believe on a different frequency.. Could be wrong..

If I'm in my Jeep and those hyGains aren't making the trip, I've got a few backup optipons that take up next to no space.. Dipole Antennas.. A G5RV would be a good one but, the best bang I've found its a well tuned dipole. Then there's also long wire but, you'll need a tuner for that. Connect it to your radio and the other end to a barbed wire fence, steel bridge, you name it..
 
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