Radios and You

[Cobrajr122]

The last 2 have a slightly different UHF range of 400-480MHz vs the regular 400-470MHz.

Not a big deal, makes no difference.

[FirestormX]

What's the advantage of having a quality PTT?
Is it mostly just reliability? I always see people smacking their PTTs; unplugging them and plugging them back in.

Or does it provide noticeable clarity, etc, too?

[leth1337]

No smacking required, rugged, durable, better signal transfer so in turn better or PROPER quality

[Cliffradical]

Mostly, the advantage lies in having the 'talk' button in an area on your body which is both quickly and easily accessible while keeping it out of the way of any other gear. It also creates a wiring hub which allows you to run cabling in such a way that keeps it out of the way as well (i.e: PTT goes on off-hand shoulder/ chest region, off-hand has little travel distance between the PTT and your weapon system, main hand stays in a ready-to-fire position on the weapon system without interruption, wiring is tight to your PC/ LBV and is less likely to snag on twigs, mags, your elbows etc).

With standardized PTTs of decent quality you can attach your radio, the PTT, and their shared wiring to your plate carrier or LBV more-or-less permanently, leaving the headset and radio as their own separate entities. This is good for your range of movement, as well as allowing you to hot-swap headsets and radios or affect adjustments/ repairs on the fly without forcing you to dismantle the entire system.

The advantages of clarity and reliability are a direct result of the quality of the PTT itself, the quality of the wiring, and the type of connector at the PTT-> radio endpoint (smacking a PTT may be a sign of poorly soldered/ worn out connections, Motorola Single Pin carries everything on one tiny prong and is therefore terrible by nature etc).

[Cobrajr122]

Pretty much just reliability.
There might be a hardly noticeable increase in audio quality because of thicker wires.

[FirestormX]

Thanks guys.

[Kiakaha_lp]

thanks! radio problem solved

[WPJ]

Originally Posted by Cobrajr122

Folding those blade antennas electrically shortens the length and will decrease the reception properties.

Think of it like a net, the larger the net, the more of the signal you are receiving. However, if your net is larger your net, the more potential there is to pickup the background noise and whatnot, especially when you move past 1 wavelength.

This can also un-match the antenna to the designed frequency and this will introduce a much higher SWR which can permanently damage the front end of the radio making it totally useless sometimes. But hey it looks cool cause the mil guys do it. Heber there radios are designed to tolerate much higher swr and when the blow the front end they just swap it out with antihero from stores ad have the original fixed. YMMV

[WPJ]

Originally Posted by Cobrajr122

Radios In Airsoft and You: Basics of Telecommunications

So before I start - I would like to state:
NOTICE : If you disagree with using 4 watt transmitters on the FRS or GMRS bands, or want to challenge the legalities, or are deathly afraid that the police will drop out of the ethosphere and bust you for using overpowered radios, please STOP READING HERE.

--------------------

Great info but also to add to that using illegal radios in Canada. They may work fine and dandy but IC not allows you to use a radio which it WA designed foe ie you can't use a commercial radio on CRS etc. But a lot of people do it still.

Again great info love it.

[Cobrajr122]

Originally Posted by WPJ

This can also un-match the antenna to the designed frequency and this will introduce a much higher SWR which can permanently damage the front end of the radio making it totally useless sometimes. But hey it looks cool cause the mil guys do it. Heber there radios are designed to tolerate much higher swr and when the blow the front end they just swap it out with antihero from stores ad have the original fixed. YMMV

Changing the length of the antenna will not change its designed impedance. As long as it presents 50 Ohms load on the opposite end of the transmission line as the generator its good.

Seeing as the majority of people on here will be running their antennas directly to the radios, SWR is nearly a nil factor as there is no transmission line for it to reside on.

Originally Posted by WPJ

Great info but also to add to that using illegal radios in Canada. They may work fine and dandy but IC not allows you to use a radio which it WA designed foe ie you can't use a commercial radio on CRS etc. But a lot of people do it still.

Again great info love it.

Yep, that was the whole point of my sentence, there is a guy who works for IC that plays with us and happily uses these radios alongside us at games.

[Drake]

Originally Posted by WPJ

This can also un-match the antenna to the designed frequency and this will introduce a much higher SWR which can permanently damage the front end of the radio making it totally useless sometimes. But hey it looks cool cause the mil guys do it. Heber there radios are designed to tolerate much higher swr and when the blow the front end they just swap it out with antihero from stores ad have the original fixed. YMMV

Note that most of the repro (AN/PRC variety) radios are basically the same as other Chinese programmable UHFs and those blade antennas are just a normal 4W/400Mhz antenna hidden inside a blade-style shell. Unless you're trying to mount a real PRC blade on a Chinese UHF it shouldn't be a problem.

[WPJ]

Originally Posted by Cobrajr122

Changing the length of the antenna will not change its designed impedance. As long as it presents 50 Ohms load on the opposite end of the transmission line as the generator its good.

Seeing as the majority of people on here will be running their antennas directly to the radios, SWR is nearly a nil factor as there is no transmission line for it to reside on.



Yep, that was the whole point of my sentence, there is a guy who works for IC that plays with us and happily uses these radios alongside us at games.

Actually it does and it can be a dramatic change hence the warning, if you don't believe me place an antenna analyzer on the antenna when t is as designed then bend touch it etch then watch it go from say 1.5 to over 10-20 ouch.

[barberouge]

SWR apply to both antenna line and antennas, that for sure.

Antenna that are telescopic tend to suffer from bad SWR, just stick to a simple antenna like a Nagoya.

By the way, MURS is still not legal in Canada:

http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/smt-gst...g/sf10822.html

[Kayn]

wow that is very comprehensive, good job.

[DrDoUm]

Does any of you guys use "private" channels for your team? If so, how do you achieve it?

I was thinking of using MURS frequencies then saw barberouge's post, so I figured it was a bad idea.

Then I thought of using "in between" frequencies in the GMRS range. But I'm afraid of "bleeding" on other frequencies.

Any other thoughts?

EDIT: the purpose would be to have a team dedicated channel when we attend 200+ players events.