I probably like many of you over the years have thrown away piles of junk radios. A group of hunting buddies of mine are fixing to do an elk. We are in need of a new set of radios. What is the best brand now days?
All depends on how much money you want to spend and if you want to go through the trouble of obtaining licenses. Most OTC radios which claim from 2 - 18 miles range are talking about flat land line of site transmission/reception. If you are going elk hunting most terrain is going to involve lots of vertical and not much line of site. Radios which can give better coverage cost more and require licenses. Some states consider using radios for spotting and hunting game to be illegal. If you are talking about emergency calls then renting a satellite phone may be better option, but may still be vulnerable to line of site with satellite. I carry a Midland and the wife knows which frequency I'll be using in case of emergency that way I can probably contact an airplane or helo search that comes close.
Yeah seems like the cheap Midlands just don't cut it while elk hunting with partners.
Prwlr called it - if you want reliability, then brand names are in order. There are some VHF unlicensed frequencies (MURS) that you can use with 2 watt handhelds. VHF will serve you better in terrain than UHF, and certainly better than those cheap FRS radios (which are UHF and limited to .5 watts). It is unlikely you will find someone else on the MURS channels (there are five), but if you encounter a licensed service on one of the channels you have to yield to them.
As mentioned, you can use them for safety and coordination, you can't use them for spotting game and the like without running afoul of state regulations.
I use Baufeng UV5R. I have HAM license but mostly used other frequencies. They can be set to XMIT on 5 watts 2 meter and 4 watts 70 cm. You can buy better antennas than the rubber ducks that come on them. Probably down to $30 or so now. We all bought different colors so we know which radio belongs to whom.
My buddy has commercial radios and they are better but $300 each.