Portables for events

[n9upc]

Greetings fellow batlabers,

I am posting the question out here to all to get some feed back and opinions about a somewhat interesting situation I am involved with for an upcoming event.

I am seeking input an opinion about radios to use for a fishing event coming up that I am working medical with and need to oversee communications also. The event is a 3 days event (All day Friday & Staurday, with things wrapping up around Sunday at noon or so.) The EMS services use a VHF radio system (analog) with the county, and ground events take place on a business VHF freq also.

Now in the past the boats invovled always carried an orange flag and had to stay with 1 of 4 zones on the lake. I would have to say from the farthest point of one zone all the way over to the farthest point of farthest zone would be about maybe 2 miles across somewhat open water (it is on a flowage type river/lake chain.) Now with in each of the 4 sectors is 1 sector boat and 1 medical boat. In turn these boats keep a look out for the boats involved in the event to make sure that they are not waving an emergency flag.

So we wanted to get all the boats involved in the event on radios and have some sort of ability to call the boats on a one to one basis. So at first we thought maybe using soem 900Mhz ISM FHSS type radios (like the DTR's or TriSquare types.) But soon I thought then that we would have to build a cross patch between a DTR and VHF radio so that ideal kind of went bye-bye.

The next thing we looked at was maybe getting some CP100's to use as they seem to be everyway and able to purchased in a qty of about 6 or so for about $100 or so. But then we looked at the fact that they can only be programmed to preset business freqs and figured maybe that was not a good ideal either so we kind of scraped that ideal.

So now we looked at just getting some used VHF portables that are programmable and have over 8 freqs, more like 16 channels would be the best. So off to Ebay we went a lookin to see what the market was holding out there for us. Well we found out that there seems to be a huge surplus of SP50's (10 channels), really no GP300's/GP350's, and some P1225's. In addition there are a fair amount of Sabers popping up (but due to size we did not really find that to be an option because of that.) The reason for the over 8 channels is largely due to the fact that we can also throw in the weather channels so they can listen for upcoming or approaching severe weather.

So what do the members at batlab here suggest? We do have a few guidelines we are trying to focus on due to financial reasons and usage reasons:
1.) Looking for something in the VHF band 150-163Mhz
2.) Need to have min of 10 channels but no max # of channels
3.) Size is somewhat of an issue (nothing Saber size, more like an SP50 or P1225/Gp300/350 size.)
4.) Software or field programmable (no crystals or set freq like DIP switch programming)
5.) Somewhat of a current or recently discontinued model (I know a GP300/350 are a strecth but they were easy to fix or repair if needed.)
6.) Brand is not of an importance right now (Motorola, Kenwood, Vertex, Icom, etc...)
7.) Price is also a factor (need to maybe get 20 - 25 of them throughout the year, at least 12 by the begining of June or so.)

So what do people suggest based on the guidleines listed above. What ever people suggest and seems to be a good fit will be the radios that I shall try to seek out via the forsale section on the board here or on Ebay. (Kind of a # 8 or add on to # 7 I will try to be trading off equipment for equipment.)


I thank everyone in advance that will make a suggestion and for your help.

[Terry_Glover]

That's an awfull lot of detail to digest... There is really no one-stop solution to cover the whole thing.

Start off looking at the legal aspects of what you want to do (read: LICENSES..). Assuming that no one in this tournament has applied for any "business" licenses, those frequencies are legally out of the question.

You should plan your event by first determining what freqs the whole group is legally qualified to use. You're best bet would be to keep boat to boat comms on marine channels, as they are intended for. Use license free MURS or FRS radios for boat to shore and general comms.

Illegal operation of radios at events such as these can really fart in a lot of other peoples airspace.

[n9upc]

Sorry should have mentioned that earlier. The event is licensed for 2 VHF frequencies with a max power of 50 watts simplex only on one VHF business band frequency and one non-business band frequency. In the past the boats have also used some of there own marine radios that they have brought but not everyone has a marine radio.

EMS would usually use there own county tactical channel and if need be hop on the grounds channel to talk to cordination staff of the event. So licensing is not an issue hence why I looked away from the 900MHz FHSS, and the business preprogrammed radios and are looking at VHF.

[mike m]

Since it is maritime use I would look at some of the marine VHF radios with DSC, (digital selective calling), which all marine radios have this day.

Some even have built in GPS which gives you an actual position indication on the radios LCD, and most that don't have internal GPS have some type of external GPS connections.

You could then send various text messages etc and also have FM voice on VHF 156.8 calling along with the other FM VHF maritime frequencies.

The unidens, both HT's and mobile's, are very inexpensive and they work great.

Here are some examples of what the unidens cost, I'm not endorsing this company so if you choose a DSC radio I'd bet you could find them cheaper than this by searching around.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi ... ame=Uniden

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... _-72123014

[akardam]

Since it is maritime use I would look at some of the marine VHF radios with DSC, (digital selective calling), which all marine radios have this day.

+1

[Grog]

Standard Horizon 370 comes with all marine and is also programmable from 137-174, one of a few part 80/90 HTs around. In addition to the preprogrammed marine and weather freqs, it can also hold an additional 40ch.

$110-130 each brand new and very rugged. If you need to save a few bucks, the 270 omits alphatags and ctcss/dcs tones.

[k2hz]

Marine radios are probably a good solution with a few points to keep in mind:

Use of marine handhelds on shore is strictly prohibited by FCC regulations unless you have a Marine Utility license. This type of event probably would not be eligible for such a license nor would this type of use involving stations on shore be permissible communications in the marine service.
Marine Utility licenses are primarily for commercial port operations.

The use of marine radios on board the boats would be OK if conducted on an authorized working channel. The suggestion to use the 156.800 (CH16) distress frequency is very irresponsible. The Coast Guard strongly recommends non-commercial boaters use 156.450 (CH9) for routine calling and then move to a working channel.

Non-commercial boats operating in US waters do not a need a license for a marine radio or handheld approved for marine service used on board the boat.

[mike m]

I didn't specifically tell him to use 156.8 for chit chat, maybe it was my wording that made you think this irresponsible.

What I meant was that if there was a situation where someone needed to send an emergency DSC message then all replys would automatically revert over to 156.8 but only if the radios were set up correctly for DSC auto reply.


With every radio you purchase should also receive a pamphlet listing the available marine channels for general comm use.


M

[JustinMoon205]

Rent the radios from a two way radio rental company. BearComm is a national company that I am familiar with; and I am sure there are local companies in your area as well. I handle the communications for three different events each year in my community and we use BearComm and have never had an issue with them. They can supply you with radios programmed to your licensed frequency for event communication and EMS as well as provide licensed frequencies for your boat to boat or tactical communications. If this is a once-a-year event or one-time event this is the most economical way to go.....otherwise you have to deal with upkeep of the radios, battery maintenance, licensing, etc. Renting the equipment solves your problems...that is why radio rental companies are out there.

Just my 2 cent.

-Justin

[n9upc]

Thank you to every one that has posted a reply. We have taken your suggestions and thoughts into account on everything.

We looked at a few things and came up with the following:

1.) We are not going to use FRS as they are not compatable with the needs and we do not want to have the chance to run into communication problems as eveyrone seems to have an FRS radio with them.

2.) We have checked into the aspect of renting portables per event. In the past though when we have rented, from different companies, we have run into them either wanting a high/outstanding deposit since we are not a business; or the other common one is they want us to rent all UHF and will not rent us VHF as their "rental cord." or "rental specialist" states our needs show us that UHF is what we need and VHF will not work.

3.) We will look at the Standard Horizon option and see what costs are per radio.

We have also been in contact with some people who have a cache of used SP50's and P1225's all in VHF either 10 ch (SP50) or 16 ch (P1225) for sale which I think is the way we will go. We looked at how much we will use the radios and see that on an average we would use them for 2 events per year now with about a total of 15 days between the two events when we include set-up for the events, palnning, etc..

Once again thank you to all for your input.