Baofeng Radios for Sledding/Backcountry Sports

RXN

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I've read back in other posts that guys are using one channel for emergencies.
Is that still the same?
 

Caper11

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I really like my Baofeng I got from Ray.

Was pretty handy communicating with trucks in a bad snowstorm last winter.
 
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norona

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Whoa, I thought BCA Link was the best.

Is that RGM in the video?


BCA 2.0 work well but just dont have the distance, when we drop into big zones through some avy chutes there can be debris and of course one at a time, my bca was not reaching the distance to see if someone had issues or not, these work flawlessly and when Ray and I were Guiding we used these. It is all I use now.
 

arff

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I bought one from Ray

Great video explaining how to use it

Thanks
 

Teth-Air

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In Canada you are supposed to have an Amateur radio license to transmit on these radios but even then you are not to use them on non-license frequencies. But we carry 2 radios, one on the sled and one on the rider. The other radio should be a legal, non-license required radio e.g. Garmin Rino, BCA etc. Officially, you will be only listening on the Baofeng and transmitting on the legal radio. It is perfectly acceptable though to transmit at any power on any frequency and any radio in an emergency situation. And this is the how you can justify having one with you sledding.
 

Caper11

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Its fine, CRTC has a hard time finding guys on the highways, let alone in the mtns.
Program the radio to transmit on the RCMP frequency, and a person has a high chance in getting caught, but I dunno if these Baofeng radios are digital.
 

bayman

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Got the same radio from Ray. Distance is great, had the BCA previous. Was on Keystone talking with a buddy on Frisby Ridge and it was clear as day.
 

Caper11

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Got the same radio from Ray. Distance is great, had the BCA previous. Was on Keystone talking with a buddy on Frisby Ridge and it was clear as day.

Lol, yep they are impressive. We split our group one day and some went to eagles pass and my brother and I rode frisby. The other group had BCA radios, they could hear me calling out to my brother but they could not get out and contact me.
I have no clue how far that is as the crow flies.
 

skegpro

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So heard an interesting story from a source that used to sell these radios.

I understand last year at the Edmonton sled show BCA was was cruising around taking notes of who all was selling Boefeng radios.

Shorty after businesses started getting phone calls from the FCC that they had to cease selling all Boefeng radios. Got off with a warning but the fines for noncompliance was steep.
Wonder how long till boarder services starts intercepting our supply of reliable radios.......

I understand that BCA links suck and that they suck because they are bound to rules set out for them by the FCC, but they are trying to ruin a good thing for the sport.

Till that day, make sure you jump on the opportunity to get these radios. As they are truly a safety must.
 

Teth-Air

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Doing some radio tests and found my Nagoya antennas I bought are fakes. They work at some frequencies well and not well at others. This can over-heat the radio and the range can suck. They are pretty easy to spot once you look at some of the youtube videos on the subject. If they are under $20 they are probably fake.

I don't know of any one on here selling fakes, I ordered mine online.
 

RGM

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Doing some radio tests and found my Nagoya antennas I bought are fakes. They work at some frequencies well and not well at others. This can over-heat the radio and the range can suck. They are pretty easy to spot once you look at some of the youtube videos on the subject. If they are under $20 they are probably fake.

I don't know of any one on here selling fakes, I ordered mine online.

I buy direct from the factory in Taiwan. Most antennas are tuned to a certain bandwidth. The main ones I sell are tuned to 145MHZ which is in the ham band. I also stock ones tuned to 155MHZ which is in the commercial band and which I normally sell to loggers.
sweepNA771a.jpg
 

kimrick

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Just ordered up 2 new ones from Ray.
Same day shipping, programmed, etc.

Great price for a good wattage programed radio in my opinion.

Thanks Ray and Dave
 
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Bury Me With My Toys

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Been using a Garmin Rino 755, the dual aspect is what I like, it is a GPS, with radio capability built in. Girlfriend has the same unit, and we never have problems with them.
 
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norona

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Been using a Garmin Rino 755, the dual aspect is what I like, it is a GPS, with radio capability built in. Girlfriend has the same unit, and we never have problems with them.

Great set up with those, you wont have an issue with them, however they are low powered radios, just like bca, there is no comparison to the baofeng, which are just as simple but way more powerful and reach way further away and can go VHF 8 watts. Cheers dave
 
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