I'm looking for peoples opinions/reccomendations or otherwise for some radios. It is prmarily for use on driven shoot days where I need to keep in touch with the beating line and others, as well as use while stalking to call guns down from highseats or report shots.

Because we are often on opposite sides of the hill to eachother I was looking at some of the unlicenced business ones rather than the cheaper leisure type compact units.

Any opinions/reccomendations would be greatly appreciated.

FB

Unfortunately I don't know the rules in the UK. Our little FRS radios are limited to .5 Watts. Idealy that gives 2.5 mile range but here in the moutains .75 miles is more common.Then there are the business radios with significantly higher power .The amateur radio handheld types like mine give 7 watts smaller ones have less power.I can also use a better antenna.It would be best to try out a radio before buying , in that area.Mountains tend to block radio signals !

It is not so easy to answer to your question, as mete said the first problem is related to the UK rules on radio devices.
Here in Italy there are two kind of radio that do not need licenes or the payment of a little, very little tax.
They work on UHF frequencies at 430 - 440 MHZ. there are the LPD and the PMR. the difference the frequency range, 433.075 - 434.775MHZ for LPD, 446.006225 446.09375MHZ
Built at 0.5 of power they always been transformed to work at 1 watt of power. Long life batteries, little, light weight but not too much delicate and a good range are their caractheristics, of course they work better on a flat ground. To work even more better you should go on VHF frequencies, where radio ham works, but, again, I do not know UK rules.

In Sweden we tend to use radions a lot during the season when we hunt with drivning dog,

as the driven animal moves, the hunters talk and shift position.

We use radios that work on 155 bandwith, they have pilot tone, ie only others with the same pilot tone will be able to hear your conversation, ranges in wooded areas are from 1000 meters to at a best 3 km, all depending on weather, yes rainy is better and the layout of the ground,

the same ones, radios that is are used in construction and so forth in sweden but on a slightly higher frequency.

I have a Motorola myself,

http://www.atoutdoor.se/Jakt_radio_ShopCategory-1298_DXNI-6279_.aspx this is a common version to.

Hunter and Lafayette are two other large brands.

As both Stewe and Mete mentioned above, the only way of knowing is through testing then,

I have been most pleased with my Motorola, however others have experienced short battery life and other issues.

Best regards Chris

We tried pretty much all of them, and none met our needs fully,we just us our mobiles now,both as text and voice much easier and less to lose!!

Kiri,
try these people: www.radioswop.co.uk

regards
griff

I am far from an expert on RF (Radio Frequencies) but often get to work with people who are. The best description I've ever heard of RF, and therefore of the gear that relies on such things, was given by someone in the know who was interviewed on TV. A radio transmitter was causing some interference problems which had become a news story and this chap was asked a long question by the keen reporter on what was going on, and why, and why the problem wasn't solved. His answer, to the amusement of many was a simple "Well, RF's funny stuff you know."

While this may sound like a put off it is the most accurate description of RF that I've ever heard and underlines what others are saying which is that you never know if it will work until it works and the fact that it works now tells you nothing about what might happen later.

The best I could say is that if you are thinking of buying something which depends on RF then get the person selling it to bring some demo units along and show you it working in your environment and in realistic conditions. You still can't be sure about anything but at least you know you've taken all reasonable steps to ensure that there is a better than evens chance that it might work on the day.

Not very helpful, I know, but hey RF's funny stuff you know :-)

Use them all the time hunting moose.
Would be close to helpless without radios.
Our team use the Swedish Lafayette with the 50 cm antenna.

For the stalking bit I don't see the need or the desirability for the UK myself. I hate stalking with the darn things - they always squark at the wrong time or some motormouth goes on and on just as you try and shoot something.

My suspicion is you'll lose more than you gain, I don't think you can go wrong with leaving any wounded until all are finished and having a set time to come down but that's just me.

Very important is that the hunters that are waiting to shoot have the audio d-ring accessory. for the beaten line is not so important, if they have to make noise the speaking radio will be helpfull.

Once I lost A big male of wildboar because I detached the Audio accessory, I prefer it without mic.

the right address suggested by Griff is: www.radioswap.co.uk

Hi FB

Try this guy I 've had radios from him and his new 12 km range ones are pretty smokey.

http://www.sasproducts.co.uk/

Gerry,

Have you actually tried those radios? When I looked at the link, I was intrigued at the claimed 12km range as to be legal here in the UK a PMR (which is what this is) needs to meet certain specifications.

The two that primarily affect the range of the unit are the power (restricted to 500mW or 1/2Watt) and the type of anntena used, which in laymans terms must be a basic built in unit with no gain.

I had trouble finding the power specifications as its not obvious on either SAS or Cobra own site...However after digging around I found the following link which rates them at 500mW, the same as most standard 3/5km PMR radios available over here.

Having read that, I'm would need to be convinced that the Cobra units offer any greater range in a practical sense and if they do, I'd love to know how Cobra has done this and stayed with in the fairly crippling legal requirements...To give put in perspective, in the States similar radios known as GMRS and which are advertised as giving 10km to 15km range are usually rated at between 2W and 5W in power, which is considerable more than these .5Watt units...

Regards,

Pete

Pete,

That is what I thought but when I looked at Griffs link, there seems to be some frequencies that are used for professional unlicenced use now. The ones I was looking at there were two watts of power output.

I have the Cobra ones in the cupboard but I don't think they have the range around the shoot to do what we want. I'll try them on Saturday and see how we go, then make a decision. I think they are the cleartone Puma

Rgds,
FB

You get what you pay for!
Even the 5 watt output of the profesional radios that we use on Arran have a limited range, even down to 1/2 mile in undulating forest.
The cheaper models are noisy and have far to much squawk,we have some midland 410 from the US which boast 5 watt output, again they have limited range..
Buy quality like the motorola gp 300/340 etc and you wont go wrong...

regards
griff

FB, Griff,

The basic problem with all these PMR hand-helds, is that the work on the UHF waveband. This is essentially "line-of-sight" so if something solid like a hill is between the two radios, it doesn't matter if the radios have 1/2 Watt or 3 Watts, you won't get through...Where the extra power or better receivers help is in marginal situations where the signal is being degraded by something less solid such as trees or the ground is not so hilly.

The plus side for using UHF is that the handsets and the antennas can be very small...As you move to VHF and finally HF radios, you potentially get much further range for the same power. The radio waves from these will follow the contours of the ground so to speak and in certain conditions, bounce off layers in the atmosphere...VHF and especially HF need much larger antennas, which is their downside as far as handheld use is concerned..

There are some clever ways around this, but VHF and HF just is not so practical to use in a small handset at this sort of price point...

FB: Given the terrain you are talking about on your shoot, handheld CB radios might actually work the best. They are not as small as PMR handsets, but are still reasonably portable given how you intend to use them. Some thing like this or even better, this

The main draw back with CB was it was full of idiots, but the frequencies are comparatively quiet these days...Around here, a lot of the guys who do green-laneing and off-roading are now using them again simply because they get more reliable coverage over longer distances than PMR...Plus you can get reasonably priced units to go in your vehicle which will have greater range again.

There are other solutions, but you'd be moving into hand held HAM radios and to get the best from those, all users would need to be wearing anoraks! (With apologies to Don ! )

What's an anorak ?? My 2m Icom V-85 ,7 watts, with after market antenna is still very reasonable size and weight and about the best you can do for hand held.
For longer range in the mountains we have other tricks but that's no longer a HT.We get lots of practice here in the Catskill Mtns of NY especially working for www.rallynewyork.com. We watch lots of Irishmen run into trees and ponds !! AC2RC

mete,

Over here once you start getting into HAM, is a hobby in its own right and one which is bound up with quite a bit of red tape...

Having seen the ground FB is talking about, he doesn't need "long range" so much as the ability to deal with undulating terrain which offers quite a bit of "shielding" to the low power PMR style radios. I doubt theres a 100m difference in height across the ground, but its enough to cause problems.

As the terrain is not too severe and the distance not too long, switching to the 2 or 5 watt business class UHF radios already mentioned might well do the trick, but as caorach said previously the only way to know for sure is to try it...

Regards,

Pete

if it is not a costs problem, and if it respects UK rules, you should consider a repeater also a little one, little enough to be installed on a car. The car can be parked in a high place and all the communication problems are finish.

FB

you could also go retro.