Aye, the Family Radio Service radios (.5w, UHF frequency band) are woefully
inadequate for car2car communication unless you are sitting next to each
other at a stop light. After much testing, we (ClubZ) have standardized on
the Tekk T-20 commercial band radios. Even though they are more like $100 a
piece, they put out 2W of power and run in the more flexible VHF frequency
range (roughly 150Mhz, which means we can also use the 2-Meter Ham antennas
and such with them; makes life easy). Range and battery life are excellent,
far better than the 5W CB systems we tested or the Motorola Talkabout (which
is probably the best FRS radio out there). The only problem we have had so
far is some times conflicting with frequencies in use at tracks,
specifically Thunderhill. OTOH it's kinda cool to hear what's going on...
=)
-Carl
KE6WDU
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Michael R. Clements [mailto:mrc01@flash.net]
> Sent: Wednesday, February 02, 2000 3:04 PM
> To: Darren Madams
> Cc: Russ Bowlus; ba-autox@autox.team.net
> Subject: Re: Phoenix Divisional
>
>
> Darren Madams wrote:
> > I would seriously consider buying a Motorola TalkAbout... they seem
> > to have become the standard and work pretty well for car2car and at
> > the events. Everyone who's anyone has them :)
>
> I tried my talkabout in the car a few times and it didn't seem to
> work too well. . . range was only 1/2 mile or so. It works better
> in open spaces. My CB works a lot better in the car. Not
> surprising, considering it has 4 watts output (compared to 0.5
> watts for the talkabout) and a big long SWR tuned antenna. It has
> a range of 5-10 miles easily. And CBs are cheaper too. You can
> get a decent Midland 40 channel radio for about 30 bucks and a
> decent tunable antenna at Radio shack for another 20 bucks.
>
> So, that's a 10-10 on the Talkabout due to 10-1, so I had to 10-3
> on the Talkabout and give a 10-4 to the CB radio for 10-2, and
> now I get 10-15.
>
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