Thread: UHF VHF Radio 50Watt

Originally Posted by alexturner

<snip>
$200 gets you a highly illegal 50Watt VHF - UHF Yaesu unit from China. Seems like a kinda cool thing to have, selectable output powers.

Alex

Alex

And if I saw you with it I'd be reporting you to ACMA imediately!

Amateur radio ops spend a lot of time studying and sitting exams to be able to use these sets.

Diana vk2fvrc

Naivety showing here, but why is the unit illegal?

Are you only allowed up to a certain power?

Originally Posted by Lotz-A-Landies

Alex

And if I saw you with it I'd be reporting you to ACMA imediately!

Amateur radio ops spend a lot of time studying and sitting exams to be able to use these sets.

Diana vk2fvrc

+1 to that VK3HKH

Originally Posted by alexturner

Hey Everyone,

Found a cool little unit whilst browsing Alibaba.

Cheap Vehicle radio Yaesu FT-7800R products, buy Cheap Vehicle radio Yaesu FT-7800R products from alibaba.com

$200 gets you a highly illegal 50Watt VHF - UHF Yaesu unit from China. Seems like a kinda cool thing to have, selectable output powers.

Alex

PS UHF CB is on 477Mhz so these sets no good for CB users.

Originally Posted by nice1guv

Naivety showing here, but why is the unit illegal?

Are you only allowed up to a certain power?

The citizen band only allows up to 5 Watts of power on certain frequencies.

Outside those parameters you require a licence of some sort. It may be a commercial licence on a fixed frequency, usually 25 watts for VHF, marine licences go to hundreds of watts, or it may be broadcast licence allowing power up to (and sometimes beyond) a Kilowatt.

The set advertised here is actually amateur radio equipment and is legal in the hands of a licenced amateur radio operator.

Yep, what Diana said.

Thanks for that btw.

I will however also put a slight rider on that.

The unit is still illegal even in the hands of an amateur radio operator if it is operated out of license. That is, operated on frequencies not allocated for purpose, at a higher output than allowed, or even transmission type.

As another aside. Some of those programmable chinese built units which have been set up to operate on the UHF CB frequencies are also illegal if they can be altered to transmit out of band by a non-licensed user (which the non-amateur radio licensed G.Public is).

Caveat Emptor. You have been warned. ACMA have no sense humour when it comes to operation of equipment like that. Come to think of it neither do the ARO's who have worked hard for their licenses.

OK, I'm calm now, soapbox packed up.

Cheers,
Iain (VK3YJH earlier in life)

Hi alexturner,
Why not sit for the new amateur license , it’s pretty easy and you can use it legally (although still only 5W on CB Bands.)

The reason why we hams get a little defensive is that with a unit like you mention you can very easily cause interference which we get blamed for.
"It must be that guy down the road with all those antennas".

And offcourse power is not linear, so 50 watts does not mean you get 10 times further. And if you did you can’t hear the other guy because he's only got 5 watts.

My advice is get the biggest gain antenna you can afford/fit and a 5watt radio will operate beautifully.

Also check out The Wireless Institute of Australia

Ham radio is fun but we get a little defensive of those abusing our hard fought privilege.




Paul

VK3GPS

I pay homage to those full call and standard ops out there.

The electronic theory of the higher licences scares me and my fading brain a lot.

Must get to the books!

Diana