UHF Radios

Kath,

A good UHF in the area that you will be travelling will have at least 5km on flat road. The UHF works on line of sight. If there is nothing big between you and the other UHF you should be able to communicate.

The UHf's that are fixed into the vehicle should be 5watt. Hand held units can be 5watt but most are a lot less. They can be found wanting over any distance.

I have always used GME UHF radios, Australian made and work well, but you must have a good aerial to go with it.

Check out your local 4WD shop and they should be able to supply and fit.

Wayne

A 5 watt UHF Unit mounted in the vehicle with a quality outside aerial will give an approximate transmit/receive distance of 20 kilometres, or so, in the open.

If all you are needing is a "between vehicle" communication you may like to consider a hand held unit which is all you need providing one of the other parties has an in-car unit.

An in-car unit will cost you $300-$400 for a 5 watt transceiver.
A suitable (2 watt) handheld with full scanning capability costs about $170 and there is no installation cost or external aerial to worry about.

When looking at the safety issue, providing you can communicate with the other vehicles with the handheld unit, you could invest your money in an epirb device which will give you far greater safety backup than a UHF radio, even though the epirb would be a device of "last resort".

>but also for safety it will be our connections to
>the outside world should something go wrong.

In that case; forget UHF CB - full stop.

In good country simplex UHF CB may work out to ~50km (if you're lucky) in the High Country in Vic it is frequently limited to 1km.

If you want a "Get Me Out Of Here" radio then you should consider, sat phone, HF radio or EPIRB - consider UHF CB to be of use for vehicle to vehicle comms and no more.

Mike Harding

Kath, as others have said, UHF is short range only. Under freak conditions and with very good aerials you might get longer range, but basicly, a 5 watt UHF vehicle mounted one is limited to 5 or 10 km. The aerial is important - a cheap 4.5 dB (about 1/2 metre stiff wire with a coil wound into the centre) will probably not get reliably to 5 km. 6dB is a good all round aerial, 9 dB is better, but only in flat country. The aerial should be mounted as high up as possible, and some types rely on using the vehicle body as a ground plane (sort of a mirror, which acts to double the length of the aerial), so mounting options may be limited.

You actually have 2 requirements - between vehicles, and to the outside world. UHF is great between vehicles, and as others have suggested, handheld UHF is ok and a lot cheaper for limited range (<1km) use. For reaching the outside world, use either HF radio or a satellite phone; both can be hired. For a last resort, carry an EPIRB, but these are for serious emergencies only.

Have a great trip,

John

When it comes to range, the higher the better with an aerial. Roof mounted aerials always win in my experience. I've managed 70km line of sight (from the top of Mt Arden to the plain below, but up to 20kms is the usual on most roads.

Depending on the country you are in, UHF can be very useful for emergency comms, provided you are familiar with the repeater networks - have a map of their locations and the channels being used. It often puts you in touch with the nearest station, which is pretty darn good in an emergency. If there are no repeaters in the area, then its not much good.

Amen to much of the above from the regulars ('morning' team :-0)..... Re your UHF issues ....... I too reckon UHF is the pick for group travel comms or for something just a little further - I use the Icom 400 Pro - teamed with an elevated feed antenna on the roof, my retailer suggested this is as good as UHF gets in efficiency (it miht be true ! Other makes do this to of course, when setup properly). The Icom has a "repeater scan" function too - quick and easy to find repeater in range if you need one. Re safety - nobody should rely on UHF in remote areas IMO - why not HF or Satphone (hire or buy) - hiring costs shared across a group are very reasonable and it takes away most of the worry of remote area travel.