Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Two Way Radios For Hunting Question

For years my sons and I have used a set of 1990's vintage Motorola Talkabout Radios for hunting. These are FRS/GMRS band radios and I believe are 2 watt. We have tried some of the newer more compact radios in various brands including newer Motorola but have not found any that work any better for distance and clarity.

Does anybody out there use the higher priced commercial radios and get better coverage in hilly country (I know these require a FCC license)?

Would it make a big difference in radio-to-radio communication if using commercial radios and used a base station installed in the vehicle?

What are your experiences and what would be better than what I've got right now?

What commercial or what band radios would be better?

Thanks for any input you may have.

This is what I'm using now.

You have about the best option right now.

To get into the vhf 5 watt hand helds you need to either get permission from a person with a channel licensed to them or have one licensed yourself.

Radios are all about the antenna. The radios in your picture look to have pretty good (long) antennas.

I believe that all the FRS radios are mandated to have non-removable antennas, so you can’t upgrade a radio to a better antenna.

The best solution if you want to play by all the rules is to get a ham tech license (easy test with the question bank online) and use one of the VHF/UHF handhelds like the ubiquitous Baofeng. Get a better antenna and you will likely have range as good or better than your current setup. With repeaters (if available in your area) you can cover an entire city or mountainside.

The downside to ham is it isn’t channelized, so you have to program frequencies into your radio. In addition, the cheap Baofeng radios will transmit out of band, so you could conceivably transmit on illegal bands like the weather channel or FRS channels.

You could also look for current FRS/GMRS band radios with the longest antenna and longest advertised ‘range’. This is what I would do if I wanted an easy solution. All radios VHF/UHF are essentially line of sight, so keep that in mind as well.

Business band radios will not really be any better given the same antenna and power output, so you would be risking a fine for a trivial improvement in performance.

The early FRS radios were about 1/2 to 3/4 watt. Later models included GMRS "in between" channels, and were up to 5 watts on some channels. Later, the FCC changed the game with the MUR service. I'm not up to date on the current regs, but the FCC has those posted on the web.

If you are running the old FRS equipment, the 5 watt level is a worthwhile improvement, but maybe not so much as you would like.

Upgrading to ham equipment and license does open many possibilities, including better antennas, more powerful vehicle mounted equipment, and even your own temporary cross-band repeater. For relatively inexpensive handheld radios, I prefer Wouxun.

Note that some states prohibit the use of radios while hunting. That's mostly in the East.

Guy I hunt with have retired police radios. They are programed on a separate channel. I can get over 6 miles on a good day here in the hills.

I’ve bought several of the small 5-25 mile radios. None were worth a damn. On a good day, you might get one mile, line of sight, no hills, trees or other obstructions.
The yellow one in your pic is the best I’ve found, and they are not great at all.

Probably not a great idea.

all of these are line of sight radios. In mountains and hills, the coverage may be very limited.

Marine Band. They're not just for boats.

We use these bear hunting in VA and they work great. Better than a marine handheld VHF.

Did a little poking around, updating myself on the current regs for GMRS.

The license fee for a GMRS radio system is now $35 for 10 years. IIRC, at one time it was $75 for 5 years, then dropped to $50 for 5 years. Initially, people bought GMRS handhelds and ignored the license requirement. Now, the financial obstacle has practically been removed. There is no good reason to not get the license.

Getting the license allows you to use higher power. A good GMRS handheld will outperform the old combination FRS/GMRS radios, partly because the radios have an antenna that can be changed from the captive "rubber ducky", which is not an efficient antenna. You can also use a mobile transceiver in your vehicle, with an antenna on the roof. I don't know the specs on a 1990s TalkAbout, but I suspect that a useful improvement in performance is available. But that's a guess.

Certain channels are set aside for repeaters. You can't use the repeaters without permission of the repeater owner. Other than that, nobody owns a particluar channel.

If you get a GMRS setup, it may not come with pre-programmed channels. You do have to be careful that you only transmit on authorized channels. Many of the imported models have a very wide range of possible frequencies, some of which can lead to issues with licensed users in other services.

You do not need radios with the fancy functions such as repeater offset, dual VHF/UHF, etc. Something basic, UHF, transmit and receive, with CTCSS is all you need. If you get a unit with an LCD display, you can manually program channels. If no LCD display, then you'll need a USB programming cable and the CHIRP software (free).

Hope that helps. Enjoy your hunt!

tag

UHF is much more limited to line of sight commo than HF or VHF.

The Baofeng shown above is illegal unless the operator has a ham license and stays within the frequencies allocated to the licenses holder.

The marine band is always 100% illegal for land based operations, with limited exceptions for harbor masters and the like that have a special shore to ship license. Unless you are in a boat that is currently on the water they are 100% illegal to transmit with. I have read of cases of hunters (Arkansas bear hunters if I recall correctly) being caught and prosecuted. Fines can be very high.

Lots of folks chose to ignore the rules, but you do so at your own peril. If you want a radio that is more effective that an FRS, you can spring for a GMRS license or get the ham.

I agree. At VHF and UHF, trees soak up signal and hills block it. That's more true at UHF than VHF.

But as far as I can determine, the available practical alternatives are MURS, 2 watts, VHF, and GMRS, higher power, UHF. Well, there's ham too with many available solutions.

Uh yea it’s called a iPhone text and talk!

We use Standard Horizon radios.

100% illegal to use radios in AK.In fact, AK Trooper interpretation is that using any 2-way radio ends that day's hunting for both sides of the conversation. Even if being used for a simple request for a pick-up or a safety concern.

illegal in georgia

But yet the police use them.