HighClouds
Senior Member
- Joined
- Mar 13, 2023
- Messages
- 135
Is there a good substitute for a HAM radio? Particularly curious about the Baofeng line or anything similar. Basically looking for a good radio for emergency situations. Thanks
Access to what? Most bands that are monitored are limited to authorized users or are restricted to specific use cases. For example, marine VHF channels don’t require a license, but their use is restricted to boaters, ships and shore stations serving them. Business band doesn’t require a license, but is limited to 2W and business operations only. FRS doesn’t require a license and is open to all but limited to 2W. There just isn’t much range in a 2W radio. Most anything other than CB with more than 2W output requires a licenseis there one radio that provides the most access? Seems there are several areas of communization ham/gmrs, some FAA and others are RX only) but no single radio seems to include them all.
Any chance you can define "emergency situation".Is there a good substitute for a HAM radio? Particularly curious about the Baofeng line or anything similar. Basically looking for a good radio for emergency situations. Thanks
The problem for most cases is going to be figuring out how to contact someone. What frequency do you use? You need to know that there is at least one attended radio within range set to your frequency at the instant you transmit.Emergency is defined as to preventing harm to life and property. Everybody is allowed to use the HAM radio to call for help if no other means are available.
You can get and monitor a ham radio all day long without a license. The 25$ Baofeng radios on amazon are cheap and work well for what they are. They are a little tricky to hand load the frequencies into them but there are programs like "chirp" that takes the pain out of it. Get one, get familiar with it. Then study and take the general exam (not hard to pass) then you will be legal and won't have to worry about using it in any situation.
There are two common calling frequencies at ~146 and 446MHz where someone will be listening all of the time, but transmitting directly from a handheld may not reach anyone monitoring.