thought I had no more questions...two way radios???

[nataliesdaddy]

ok so I bought two way motorola radios - the "up to two mile" maximum one watt power - I am not impressed - only got maybe a half mile - I realize they say "things in the way and foilage will interfere" but geez a half mile? SO i AM THINKING anyone have a 2 watt 5 mile radio? will that suffice to get me maybe a 2 mile range in reality? instead of line of site? I mean what good are the radios I have right now if you have to have line of site?

thx in advance for peoples answers

 

[DEH3rd]

tried them las year. there were sooooo many people on them, all channels, that they became more trouble then they were worth, and we left them in the room. we couldn't hear each other over all of the other people...."Who is this?" "Jimmie?" "Hello" "Hello".......

 

[nataliesdaddy]

THX DEH,

that answers another question I have - I am curious though - the radios you used - they had multiple channels for sure - did they have multiple codes? because these things I got have 22 channels and 36 codes per channel (motorola says that helps get rid of the clutter) - but if you had a multi channel - multi code set then maybe I don't want even the higher powered 5 mile range units either - which one were you using? It would be nice if I could find something that woulod do the trick - heck if ZI had the money I would just get us two cell phones.

 

[rwodonnell]

We had problems with the 2 mile range ones at a Six Flags park (in terms of too much traffic, as DEH3rd mentioned) so we anticipated it would be worse at Disney. So I bought the 5 mile range ones, and they actually worked reasonably well. Now that we've let the cat out of the bag here, though, and they have become more common to find in stores, they could go the same way as the 2 mile ones with hundreds of people on each channel.

For an example of their range, I was in line for Thunder Mtn and my wife was on Tom Sawyer Island and it was no problem. When we were as far apart as Frontierland and Tomorrowland, though, things were more dicey. Clearly way under the range of 5 miles, but also further than the 2 mile radios would have gotten us.

We probably should just refer to them by their FRS and GMRS acronyms, since the mileage ratings are so misleading. I think FRS stands for Family Radio Service, and these are rated for 2 miles, in ideal conditions I guess (like in space? ) GMRS stands for General Mobile Radio Service and are supposedly good up to 5 miles, again, in ideal conditions I guess. Don't quote me on this, but I believe they operate on different frequencies, so that also helps the GMRS versions. By the way, the GMRS ones come with a license thing to fill out - you are supposed to have some sort of license to use them. We of course filled ours out prompty and lessee, I must have that thing somewhere around here officer...

 

[DEH3rd]

I'm really not sure of all of the bells & whistles for 2 reasons:
1. only used them 1 day & never again
2. they were borrowd from a friend, so i do not have access to them now.

sorry

 

[MickeyisanNDfan]

We have used the Motorola radios on the past few tips and found no problems with them at all. Not even much chatter and we were there over Thanksgiving and Easter. If you are all in the same park they worked well for us. Make sure you do have the ones with the sub channels. One time there was chatter on our channels and my brother go on the radio and told the people that it was a secure disney security channel and they had to move. It was pretty funny listening to them try to change their channel.

 

[jdonat]

We've used the FRS radios for about 4
years now, and would'nt leave for WDW
without them. In fact, they're in the "stuff for
WDW" storage bin in our basement so's we
can find them easily.

We bought GMRS radios last year for New
year's mostly for the extra range. We only
had 2 at the time, so's we stayed on the FRS
channels for the most part. We had very little
problem finding a channel/subcode that
wasn't overloaded even in the MK over New
year's week.

The Motortola GMRS/FRS radios have
7 extra channels that are GMRS only. There
are some channels that are GMRS/FRS
and some that are FRS only.

We bought all Motorola's -the Cobra's fyi, use
the same channel/subcode scheme as the
Moto's so's theyre compatible. Look for
deals at Office Depot, etc -they've been
having sales with rebates that took the GMRS
radios down to about $30.00 each after the
sale and rebate.

3 out of 4 of us in the family have
cellphones, but we use the radios about
85% of the time at WDW.

 

[rwodonnell]

I'm amazed people have had such success with the FRS radios at Disney World. The experience that I mentioned at Six Flags, though, was using relatively inexpensive FRS radios that did not have sub-channels, so perhaps all that was needed was that feature.

By the way, the Six Flags thing was crazy, it was like a teen dating service.
Voice1: Hi, I'm Debbie, anyone out there?
Voice2: I'm John, how old are you Debbie? What do you look like?
and on and on...

Must be I'm getting old...

 

[Geoff_M]

By the way, the GMRS ones come with a license thing to fill out - you are supposed to have some sort of license to use them. We of course filled ours out prompty and lessee, I must have that thing somewhere around here officer...

More proof that GMRS is fast on its way to becoming another radio wasteland like CB. Its only saving grace is that FRS and GMRS radios use UHF and the chaos has a limited range due to the lack of signal "skip". A GMRS license is required by federal law. A 5 year license that covers all immediate members of a family costs $75. http://www.gmrsweb.com/gmrsfaqa.html It's a real shame that radio makers have blurred the lines between FRS and GMRS so that the average person thinks their use is interchangable. I bet long time GMRS users wished that stores required proof of licensing before selling people radios.

One of the rational behind FRS being a license free service was due to the low power output. At a maximum of 1/2 watt PEP, the downside of misuse is pretty limited in scope. But GMRS is legal up to 50 watts and can use repeaters so it doesn't have the same limited scope as FRS. But people have gotten used to the mind set that hand-held radios are "free" to use and that is now spilling over into GMRS. At the same time people aren't bothering to learn about the rules and proper operating procedures for GMRS radio. ( http://www.provide.net/~prsg/wi-gmrs.htm ) As a result, the FCC will pretty much have to abandon enforement of this piece of radio spectrum too as its become overwhelmed with misuse.

If you want better coverage, go out and buy a some 5 watt business band VHF/UHF handy-talkies and use them "bootleg".

Seriously though, if you want the best radio coverage at WDW then amateur radio is the way to go. There is a repeater on site that will give you wide coverage across WDW with a 2-meter handy-talkie. Licensing is required, but the tests are fairly each to pass and entry level licensing requires no Morse Code. The cost to take the exam is around $7 and licensing is free. See http://www.arrl.org for more info.