 Poster: A snowHead
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Hey guys! New member here, thanks for this site.
Does anyone know anything about these Walkie Talkie that you can get at Under ￡50 ? Use it for skiing, I want small, light, huge range, easy to use and long battery life. I want to carry it with me in my purse. Do any of you have a source for mobile type walkie talkies? Thanks in advance. 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Most long range radios operate in a band where you need to have a two-way radio license to operate. Using a radio which operates outside the 446Mhz range and over about 0.5W without a license is basically illegal anywhere in the UK/EU.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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@snowball88, Welcome to snowHeads! 
There was another thread discussing two way radios here: http://snowheads.com/ski-forum/viewtopic.php?p=2352370&highlight=emergency+services#2352370
As Richard_Sideways said, only the PMR446 type radios are legal for general public use in the UK/EU. As the other thread discusses, you can get other more powerful radios but a) they are illegal and b) you could be interfering with other licenced users and possibly emergency services.
It's your call.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Why not get 2 very cheap mobiles and a couple of three pay as-you-go SIMs? Depending on where you're going there's no roaming cost for much of Europe (France, Switzerland, Italy) and they would meet all your requirements. I can't see any other legal (or, given your budget, illegal!) solution.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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the license is a pure formality...fill in form, pay small fee...issued.
don't be put off by that part
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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I bought a set of 4 of these last January for just over £100 Motorola TLKR T80 Extreme Quad 2 Way Radio. We've used them on 3 skiing trips and various other excursions and can't fault them at all.
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remember that except in some exceptional conditions you're talking "line of sight" for VHF radios. Cheap local SIMs sound like a better idea.
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I can't see the point nowadays. I've never exactly held long conversations on 2-way radios when I used to use them and now everything I would have done with the radios I can do just as easily with texting on mobiles and they have no range limits. And it's been years since I've had coverage issues at any ski resorts.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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@MadMountainMan, how about the time where I managed to crack my phone screen without falling over (basically by being a fat knacker and it squeezing up against my inhaler)? Phone wouldn't work after that, we managed to lose the OH. Granted it would have been belt and braces to also have a two way radio!
PS. We did find the OH who had decided to wait at a bottleneck!
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@hammerite, Ah well that can be an issue and is why I use a fold over cover for my phone. Though I'm sure I could still manage to destroy it. My last non-smart phone was one of those Nokia indestructible ones which didn't prove quite so indestructible when I knelt on my rucksack and in so doing knelt on my phone screen which didn't come out of the experience very well 
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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I generally find I have good mobile reception.
Texting or occasional 'WHICH lift are you at" calls over the next few years before they abolish roaming charges are unlikely to get up to £50?
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| Quote: |
I want to carry it with me in my purse.
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? As far as I know noone takes their purse while out skiing. Most just stuff the money in a suitable pocket or expect someone else to buy the drinks. My wife's purse is also far too small to put a mobile phone in or a walkie talkie.
On the walkie talkie front I use a set of small (but still too big for a purse) motorolas for climbing on multi pitch routes in the Alps and Dolomites. It is suprising how many areas that appear close to ski resorts have no mobile coverage.
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I remember the mobile phone makers and service providers talking about PTT over phone networks in the late 90's early 00's. IIRC it was basically an sms/mms data packet of a recorded message which could then be replied to by recording the message back.
Might Google and see what happened to the concept.
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You know it makes sense.
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@ansta1, I remember that. It was big in NYC a few years back - worked just like a walkie-talkie. But I never saw it catch on here for some reason.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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@ALQ, thanks an confirmed i wasn't being senile (for now at least). Possibly never got taken up due to package cost variations for payg and contracts i would guess.
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Poster: A snowHead
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@ansta1, As far as I remember, it was free and constantly on. So meetings were interrupted with "WASSAAP" (which I think was the craze around that era). I was ALOT more grumpy in those days and thought it was the work of the devil himself! There might be an app for it now.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Bca backcountry BC link radios. Pack mounted with PTT mic. 4 day battery life. Yum
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Me and my brother recently got some motorbike intercoms from Sena. I'll definitely be using these on next holiday. They do snowsport specific ones too they're on their website.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| bananaman wrote: |
| Me and my brother recently got some motorbike intercoms from Sena. I'll definitely be using these on next holiday. They do snowsport specific ones too they're on their website. |
700 metre range doesn't sound all that useful on the ski slopes if you want to contact friends say on a different lift in a resort?
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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To be fair I think those are only designed to allow people to chat whilst skiing (or biking/motorbiking) and moving potentially a hundred metres or so apart. Totally different application to finding your long lost friends on the other side of the resort.
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Have thought about taking a couple of yacht handhelds in the past which are 5w and my radio licence. They would had a say 4-5 kms range but would be affected by mountains.
Strictly speaking they are meant to be used when linked to a yacht, which would be difficult to argue in the mountains, but if you kept to say channel 72, given their relatively limited range the chance of anyone minding or even knowing would be pretty much zero.
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I have a cheap Chinese programmable. I wouldn't carry it at a resort though - if I could not keep track of my friends there I'd call them up.
I was kind of waiting for the OP to come back and post a link to his site selling whatever it is. If that's not what's going to happen, then... radios are really not a lot of use for skiing, they're just difficult to use, without repeaters you're in and out of coverage, and the public frequencies are going to be full of twaddle. And if it's in your "purse" then it's no use to you when you probably need it most.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Great off-piste though for the sort of brief-but-important questions you need to ask:
Saw you go off that cliff - how's the landing / are you dead?
Looked like you got sluffed out of that couloir - are you dead?
Been waiting for you at the bottom of the trees for ages - are you dead?
Do I need to go right here or straight down? Looked like you went straight down. Are you dead?
Mobile coverage often much worse off-piste, especially in the backcountry.
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@stevomcd,
Don't forget: "I'm not dead but don't come this way, I'm walking back up"
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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The cheap Binatone handhelds go for about £23 an use AAA batteries. they run at the 446Mhz band ..
Which is really only line of site .. the antenna is small and not directional so the range is limited.
You used to see people using them quite a lot a few years ago ...
Standing in the piste shouting into them .. "WHERE ARE YOU?" & "I CANT HEAR YOU!"
You would be better off really putting flags on the end of your ski poles and using "semaphore"
Dah-dee-dah ... G4LID
Mobile Phone are pretty clever devices .. especially when using SMS
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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@DrLawn, I think the higher power ones are only line of sight as well. Not powerful enough to bounce of atmospheric layers, et.
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@under a new name, You're right, the power does not matter at all, the antenna is more important.
But how much antenna can you fly if you want to keep it in the pocket.
You need to have a frequency below 30Mhz and a sunspot cycle to reliably "bounce" ...but then you get every other radio transmitter around the world interfering with your signal.
Gosh I can be boring sometimes .....
Dah-dee-dah!
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You know it makes sense.
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That's what repeaters are for. But you'd be hard pushed to get one of them in a purse.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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There are a couple of PMR radios that are "upgradable" to higher than euro legal power. One of the Midland range and the Intek5050. They're not the smallest though. Both just require a link wire cutting and they go from 0.5w to 5w. There's guides on the web if you search. The Intek has 2 switchable power settings of 0.05-0.5w and when modified becomes 0.5(still legal)+5w(not). You'll get better range but also pick up many more other users... ie. not just your mates but every Bulgarian trucker passing through the alps.
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Poster: A snowHead
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I don't know how you're going to get on a repeater ... unless you have proper amateur kit, and you cant have that legally without a licence.
The repeaters for everybody else are provided by the telecom companies they are pretty good, we developed them especially for these sorts of situations. International roaming, high speed handover, Short Message Service, very portable devices and pretty private to all except GCHQ, it is a brilliant system.
We do know they have there limitation though, sparse access coverage in many places.
So now lets play "walkie talkie".
I must admit I took a pair of these Binatones to Bulgaria a few years ago .. they are just toys you cannot rely on them.
But you can have fun with toys ... You could stand on top of the mountain and call "CQ" ... "CQ" ... "CQ" ...
Then listen for a reply .. if you repeat this for a while you could get a reply.
You could end up with a friend for life.
But they are not very good for important and private messages between you and the person you want to talk to.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I must admit I have hardly any experience of playing radios in the 446 UHF frequencies. those Intek5050s look quite interesting but I don't think its worth trying to boost the power on them.
There's probably a mod that you do to tweak it to allow it to go on different and less used channels.
Which would be more useful.
(I'm just guessing that)
This is really a subject for a bunch of Radio Amateurs or CB freaks
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| Quote: |
But you can have fun with toys ... You could stand on top of the mountain and call "Broadsword calling Danny Boy, Broadsword calling Danny Boy, Come in Danny Boy" ...
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FIFY
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| johnE wrote: |
| Quote: |
I want to carry it with me in my purse.
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? As far as I know noone takes their purse while out skiing. . |
Purses were a very popular ski accesory in Cortina last few years (the kind with over the shoulder strap). I can't speak for this years fashion trends however so beware or you may end up looking 'so last year'.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| Quote: |
(the kind with over the shoulder strap)
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This sounds more like a bag than a purse which is, I quote, "a small pouch of leather or plastic used for carrying money, typically by a woman." I suppose in Cortina they must have a lot of money to need a shoulder stap to support it.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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The programmable Chinese stuff can be easily set at 5w, and you can upgrade the antennas also. Those things may not be legal where you live.
| DrLawn wrote: |
| I don't know how you're going to get on a repeater ... unless you have proper amateur kit, and you cant have that legally without a licence.... |
QED. Radios are fine in the mountains when used in conjunction with repeaters, otherwise GSM or a sat phone would probably serve you better, if you really need communications. Which you probably don't.
I've professionally built PMR and GSM systems, but never done any amateur stuff. I believe amateurs also use repeaters, but not quite for the same reasons: http://www.ukrepeater.net/ I'm sure those guys do need a license, but your average cab driver has a licence to drive but probably isn't great at morse. I know they don't force them to learn that any more, but it's still funny, well to me at least.
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Why not try a walkie-talkie or "push to talk" app for your smartphone? Like these
http://readwrite.com/2012/05/23/5-push-to-talk-apps-that-turn-your-smartphone-into-a-walkie-talkie
It turns your smartphone into a walkie-talkie — you just push to talk. And you can use your headset to receive, again, push the button to talk.
They use very little data, and operate over 3G, 4G & WiFi. With most smartphones you can set what apps are allowed to use data when abroad, so that will stop any other app using your data.
Most UK providers now charge very little for some data each day when abroad. Or you can get cheap SIM cards when abroad that allow data.
The upside of doing it this way, is you can also use resort apps that show you where you and all your friends are on the slopes via GPS.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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| philwig wrote: |
I was kind of waiting for the OP to come back and post a link to his site selling whatever it is |
or his mate/alter ego?
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Reviving this thread - has technology moved on at all?
Are there any radios that snowheads use regularly?
I was impressed at how well some semi pro reprogrammable radios worked recently on a trip with some friends so I’m now investigating. Wouldn’t be averse to getting the relevant licence to use higher powered ones.
Key feature I’d like to have is the ability to have a shoulder mounted speaker / talk button like the BCA BC Link, so communication is not a hassle and can be fast.
Thoughts welcome!
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FAQ
