BigGameHoundsmen.com

thanks steve

Steve White you have shared some very interesting and helpful information about radios. This is some of the discussion I was hoping to hear.

Quick question about the idea of caring a 50ft coax cable and using it to gain better reception for lesser radios. Could you also adapt to the yagi to improved reception? Since it is something most of us carry anyway.

Anyway given all the great information you explained, could you domb it down a little for some of us less radio savvy houndsmen and suggest specifically what we should look for in a radio that is not a HAM or phone service based, ie. licensed required (may not be feasible for the weekend worrier)?

sorry b-n-trees, just now realized that I hijacked your thread

No worries dude, I enjoyed your comments.

BN- A yagi would not work well at all for transmitting. As it is designed to receive on different channels most of the time. This would cause reflected power and damage the radio. Besides loss of signal strength.

Really there are few legal options to get a bit more punch. Most of the laws though are not followed much. Most likely as they are not enforced much unless there is a problem. The frs/gmrs radios require a license, but rarely hear of anyone getting one. CB, well most have tried this and it works, but not well most of the time. With skip, and all the garbage. A lot of guys use marine channels. Most of the time there is no problem with this unless you live near a coastal area. At one time I thought I seen law that said you could use one on land if more than 26km from federal navigable water. Have not found it since then. Most guys end up going to the hma radios for use in this band because of the power. Standard mobile marine radio pushes 25watts. The icom that was mentioned I assume the 2200 pushes 65watts. The yaesu 2800 pushes 65 watts. Some guys use the icom 8000 wchich pushes 75 watts. This is a bad choice of radio. since these are designed to run at 144-148. The 8000 does not hold up well for out of band use. Which burns up the finals in the radio. Yaesu came out with the 2900 this year which does 75watts. have not heard anything yet about problems. The extra power these radios put out does help others hear you at the edge of your line of sight circle, but keep in mind the extra power is over the legal limit. having one of these radios does give you the ability to use the private channels some may own without having to buy a more costly business band radio. More and more guys are getting private channels to use. Really compared to maybe getting a fine it is very cheap. You can get a licensed channel for around $400. For about $600 you can get 1 channel for use at your main location and 2 other states. These others are shared channels, but most of the time nobody is on them locally depending on the area. to get these channels the fcc requires you to use a frequency coordinator. the one I have been talking too is www.landmobile.com there are others listed on the fcc website. Going ham opens up a whole lot of other channels for one to use.

The only radio services that I am aware of that are completely license free and open to the public on land is CB. With that though there is also a power restriction of 5watts am 2 watts fm and 12watts SSB. Not many follow those power rules including walmart! With all the garbage on CB including walmart it's no wonder why so many guys are using marine radio. Rarely do you hear of anyone getting fined for it, but it does happen. Just depends on how close you are to a coastal area, or great lake.

we use marine radios up here in idaho and they work great! We run a 3db gain antenna and just any old mobile 25 watt radio that you buy out of cabelas ao any radio shack.I also use a couple of icom ic-v82 radios that i run on marine frequencies and 150 mhz.The ic-v82 is a 7 watt unit versus the icom ic-v8 which is only 5 watt.We hunt in the mountains and we get outstanding range out of these radios.I have one hooked up in the house that i can talk to my girlfriend from where ever i hunt at.I run a yaesu radio in my truck that has marine frequencies on it too.I have talked well overe 100 miles on these radios on a good day and they are clear as day.Not like a cb radio.Legal,well i dont know,but they work awesome and in an emergency situation i wouldnt want anything else in my truck.

Legal, Not really. Yet they do work great. I will say this. In an EMERGENCY!! The converted ham radios have an advantage. FCC rules allow for you to transmit on EMERGENCY channels. IE, police, fire, etc.. Yes, the local sheriff may give you crap,, but the FCC allows for it. It had better be an true EMERGENCY!! Not, some thing like i got the truck stuck, etc.. LIFE OR DEATH!! Check it out. It's even a question in the ham exam!

Great tip on radios but have you tested the 2200 Icom after the mod? You will only get part of the wattage they say it is rated at. The radio is set up for talking in ham freq. when you go to marine you are out of the band that it was set up for. My first 2100 Icom only pushed 28 watts after the mod. Some of the newer 2200 Icom are at 30-40 from what I have seen. Still all in all they still send out and recieve I think better then the marine uniden.

It depends on who does the mod, and if they know what they are doing. There are a few more things that can be done to help it out. SWR is huge in this. Out of band operation without proper tunign though is what is burning up the icom 8000's . The finals are not strong enough to handle it without proper mods.

I also run a 200 watt amplifier that is attached to my 75 watt yaesu radio in my truck.It is a great addition to the radio I have been in some pretty deep and dark canyons,and not been able to talk to my girlfriend at the house,but with a simple flick of a switch,I can talk to her crystal clear.The amp I have does not have a pre amp built into it,but they do have amps that do have recieve amps on them.I bought mine off ebay for around $50 or so and there is quite a few on there from time to time.Just type in "vhf amplifier" in the search and it will pull up everything that is on there.Make sure it covers the frequency range that you wanna talk on.Marine frequencies are 156-157.Also make sure that it has a high input drive or else make sure you have a radio that you can adjust the power on.Allot of the ones you will see on there will be 2-10 watt input which is fine if you can turn down your power on your radio,but if you are running a straight marine radio,then you will need to find an amp that has a 5 or 25 watt input. If you wanna run just an all around powerful radio and good antenna that will get out just about as an amp,get an icom v8000 75 watt,or the yaesu 75 watt radio that run around 200 bucks,and then get the diamond m285 antenna or an antenna that handles that many watts.I run a Maxrad 3 db gain antenna with a magnet mount and it works great!The db gain only helps the recieve.The higher the db gain,the better you can hear who is talking.Now,to stay out of trouble from running a marine radio,I called the FCC a couple years back,and asked them if there were any channels that I could run on vhf that did not require a license.The lady gave me a list of channels but i dont remember exactly what they were,but they were somewhere between business band and marine frequencies.If I remember right,one of them was 151.800,and another was somethin like 151.895.Not exactly sure on the last one,but the fcc lady was really helpful and Im sure if you called them and asked they would give you a list of all of them.That enables you to run a big radio in your truck with lots of watts without a license or running the risk of getting caught with a straight marine radio in your rig.You can buy a super nice icom,yaesu,or kenwood radio for about the same price as a nice marine radio.And with that radio,you can listen to fish cops,pinecone cops,real cops,fire,and all the ham guys too.I have ran this setup for about ten years now and i wouldnt want anything else when it comes to hunting.There are very few places that I hunt that i cant talk to my home base or whoever I am hunting with.They are a little bit pricier than the regular old cb radio,but they are a night and day difference.Fm is soooo much more clear and you can talk a whole lot farther.If you are familiar with Idaho,then you know how many mountains we have here and This setup works great here,and it is not uncommon that i am able to talk over 100 miles on a good day.I have talked way farther than that when I hunt down in nevada but its way more open down there.I would recomend this setup to anyone who wants to be heard Hope this helps a bit and happy hunting!!!

Catslayer- You are talking about the MURS band. 3 channels that are 151, and 2 that are 154. You do not want to use those channels if you are using a Garmin, or Tinyloc. Those are the channels they use. In fact you could even damage someone elses units if you get close enough. Especially with an amp!! The Icom 8000 is a good radio, but they are known to burn up finals when operating out of band IE the marine band. Which is not covered by warranty. This came right from Icom!! If someone is going to use a amp. It is very critical that you tune your antenna!! If not you will also burn up your radio!!! Due to reflected power!!

Most guys around here run marine mobile and hand helds. My dad and I run opened up HAM radio's because he's been a licensed ham for longer than I've been alive. For hand helds we've been going with the cheap Puxing 777 (now 888) but have had some quality issues. The nice part is they are cheap and if you lose one you aren't out much money.

How much would a repeater cost to help improve the distance in the mountians for a ham radio.


How much does it cost to get your ham license.

A good icom or yaesu ham radio is around 200bucks right?

I am trying to figure out a total cost. I have been broke down and stuck 2 times in the last 2 week out lion hunting. I need a way to call out or something.

any advice would be good thanks

Gabe