What type of radio/with or without remote mic

[GPM123]

I am looking at replacing out aged MT1000's. I was wondering if there is a clear leader in radios being used and if you are using them with a remote mic or not? They have been giving us trouble.

I have been looking at the Motorola CP200.

what do you have and are they working well?

[Res343cue]

THE CP200 IS NOT A FIREFIGHTING RADIO

A mix of Kenwood portables and mobiles, and Motorola gear around here.

Motorola HT1250s and HT1550s, MT2000s, PR1500s, all sorts of them. Alot of departments like the HT series for their portables, or a comparable Kenwood like the TK-290, or TK-2180.

TK-780 and TK-790 mobiles, as well as Motorola MCS2000s, Spectras, and a CDM 1250s, and a bunch more.

Stay away from the CP200, and similar models. They aren't anything close to being "firefighter friendly", not that many radios are.

[mcaldwell]

Motorolas in the HT750-1250 range are the most common around here, with a few Kenwoods in the mix too. We use the Motorolas, and are very happy. The speaker mic's are OK, but prone to water damage during FF'ing.

A neighbouring department is on Kenwood and thier biggest problem is they spec'd the stubby antennae, so while they are nicer to carry for a volley, thier range is limited. The quick fix is speaker mics with antennae's, but I haven't tried it personally.

Avoid anything that is not intended for FF'ing and Rescue. Your attorney, and your conscience won't appreciate the $100 bucks you saved.

[DCFDCAR5]

The Motorola replacement for an MT1000 would have been the HT1000, but that has been cancelled as well. Next in line would be the PR1500 and MT1500, which are similarly optioned handhelds, designed for industrial & public safety applications.

[BirkenVogt]

We all for the most part use Bendix King around here. They are great tough radios. I have here a set from 1993 that still work great, have been on a front line engine all their life and show it too. Also their antennas seem to work better than Kenwood. Kenwood sells a whole range of antennas, some that work and some that don't. Kenwood makes some nice radios too though. Every bit as good as Motorola and a whole lot cheaper. And options out the wazoo

Birken

[Firetacoma1]

We use Bendix King around here too... decent radio. We've had some reliability issues with our newer ones. Evidently they are now made by a different company.

[SamsonFCDES]

We have had good luck with HT1250s. Not sure what the price on these is now days.

I have an XTS 5000 right now because thats what DHS/State grants made us get. Its a physically huge 5000$ radio...I am not all that impressed...and I am petrified of destoying it.

CP 200...our dispatch center offered to update our pagers. They are married to Motorola so it had to be that brand. Did we want pagers at 400$ a pop or did we want CP 200 radios at $440 a pop with charger, extra batery, and mic set up and not much more of a hassel to carry then a pager.

The guys jumped at the CP 200s.

We now have radios for nearly every member, which for us in a rural setting works great in coodinating people responding to distant incidents. We know who is on the way to the fire hall, who is going direct to the scene, who needs his gear bag grabed from the hall, etc...works out much smoother then the old pager system.

Is the CP 200 bulletproof? Not sure, but we have not borken one yet. Our guys are very carefull becuase they know radios dont grow on trees, not even $440 radios. So daily carry abuse has been mitgated to some extent, but they seem sturdy enough for the occasional drop or washing.

They talk as well as the other higher end radios we have been using, seem to have the same coverage and basically the same speaker/mic quality.

On the fireground both our structure and wildland PPE had a chest radio pocket which helps protect the radios to a great extent in the harsher conditions.

I would have to say I endorse the CP 200 for volly departments that are on a budget, not huge call volume, and would sooner issue a radio instead of a pager.

The CP 200 has worked well here even though its not a fire radio. Beats haveing no radio, the price is good so you can get more of them issued, if they break its not the end of the work, they have been reliable over the last 2 years for us.

I know nothing of Kenwood, Johnsen, etc...Bendix king is alright, but not something a volly wants to carry around on his belt all day.

[ldgary]

We received 10 Icom F50's on a grant. They are pretty tough radios and take a soaking well. The small size makes them easy to carry.

They work well for our small volunteer department. The only thing that has gone wrong is a broken antenna on one radio, easy relatively painless replacement part.

Be Safe.

[NYSmokey]

Do not buy anything EF Johnson. They will promise you the world and all you will end up with is a pile of s**t in your hand. Their portables are like bricks and they have a history of setting off the emergency signal when water gets on the mic. They are tough to use with a gloved hand and on our portables we get ZERO warning that the battery is going to die (they didn't design a battery meter into it). Great for firefighting, huh?

[SamsonFCDES]

One more thing I forgot to add about the CP 200s we use. All of them have an external mic set up. Its actually very easy to take on and off.

This keeps them in the radio pocket when on the fire sence (we often only have to run off a single channel, we swite to mutual aide once in a while, not a big deal). This in turn protects them from a lot of wear and tear and grime.

well worth the money, and can be easily taken off for belt carry for VFDs. Lots of the guys just keep the mic cord attachment in their gear bag or cliped to their PPE.

[BirkenVogt]

We have had good luck with HT1250s. Not sure what the price on these is now days.

I have an XTS 5000 right now because thats what DHS/State grants made us get. Its a physically huge 5000$ radio...I am not all that impressed...and I am petrified of destoying it.

We have a joke in the radio biz about Motorola...the model number is the price...you said it right there...XTS5000=$5000

Birken

[KEEPBACK200FEET]

ICOM F33 G's around here. 256 Channel, LCD display, and 5 watt power. Perfect .

[Res343cue]

The CP200 might be nice for a volly department on a budget, for BUDGET PURPOSES ONLY, but it's an easy way to get someone killed.

What are you going to do when a mayday is sent, but you don't hear it because "youre on a budget" ? Hmmm, food for thought. Using non-"industry standard" radios is just as bad as not having a radio.

[nmfire]

The CP200 might be nice for a volly department on a budget, for BUDGET PURPOSES ONLY, but it's an easy way to get someone killed.

What are you going to do when a mayday is sent, but you don't hear it because "youre on a budget" ? Hmmm, food for thought. Using non-"industry standard" radios is just as bad as not having a radio.

What he said.

For activities that are not, what is the word i'm looking for, "harsh", then a CP200 might work. But the bottom line is that a CP200 is a cheapie walkie-talkie that was never designed or intended to be used in life-safety firefighting work. Unfortunately, as is the case very often, the individuals making the decisions on buying radios don't know anything about them. All they know is it talks and the price is right. The dealer then sees that they can sell this poor sucker 30 $450 radios and make a but load of money. The dealer either doesn't care or doesn't comprehend the life-safety factor either.

So now you have 30 firefighters all with cheap walkie-talkies. They seem like the best thing since sliced bread and everyone can communicate enroute and on-scene. However, when one of them takes a good whack or a shot from a solid bore nozzle or a FF falling through a floor hits the concrete radio-first, your $450 toy radio isn't going to hold up.

Now ask yourself, is your fellow firefighter's life worth saving four or five hundred dollars?

If this is analog convention UHF/VHF/Low band, then I would suggest in the following order:

Kenwoof 90 Series Portables:
TK-190 (low band)
TK-290 (VHF)
TK-390 (UHF)
We use these exclusively and I would never buy anything else.

Motorola PR1500 or MT1500 are the current replacements for the HT1000 which was the replacement for the MT1000. Your paying a lot more per radio and not getting anything more or better than the kenwood really.

[RES81CUE]

We are all kenwwod Radio users here. We use the Motorola Minitor V pagers but, all Kenwood mobiles and portables. We use a combination of Kenwood TK 380 and TK 3180. All of my personel have a lapel mic with a quick remove screw. On fire ground ops they have the radio in the turnouts radio pocket and use the speaker mic. And, some use the speaker mic all of the time where as some do not. We have had other types of radios but, the Kenwood seems to work the best for us.

[REVANANT]

We use the Motorola HT-750's, Low Band, Just had to replace one that was fully emersed in water at a water rescue and it cost us <$600. We use the lapel mikes, only thing that we have noticed using them was on a Maxxon radio (we no longer use them) they reduced the transmitting power so a portable that would make dispatch without the lapel mike wouldn't with.

Larry

[nmfire]

Speaker-Mics don't actually reduce transmit power. What happens is this... When you hold the radio in your hand to transmit, the antenna is in open air 6ft above ground. This is optimal. When use a speaker mic, the radio is now 3ft lower and attached to the side of you body and possibly even under clothing. This adds a tremendous amount of attenuation to your transmitted signal.

My personal opinion is that a radio system's infrastructure should be designed with this in mind so it isn't a problem.

[Dave404]

We use the ht1250 - pretty good radio - have stood up to a lot of abuse. We use to use the Bendix King, but no one in Canada fixes them and it was getting cost prohibitive to send them out. Too bad because they are the best radios I have used.

[ksfireman82]

I work on an army base, and the entire post and surrounding communites all got sold a bill of goods on switching to the MaComm digital trunked radios. DON"T GET THEM...they are horrible...50% of the building we go into, we lose all radio comms as with the digital trunk system, if your radio can't reach the tower and have two way data, you cannot talk at all, even to the guy 2 feet away from you.

[Rescue101]

We've got a couple CP200's that we got to test.The two members with them have beat the snot out of them over the last 5 or so years we had them,so I'm not buying the "can"t take fireground activies"line.As far as getting out,FDNY has spots where their portables DON'T work and I'm reasonably certain they AREN'T buying the "el cheapo"version. We have a bunch of Vertex 180's we use in lieu of pagers.Yes,I know they ARE NOT "Fire"service radios.But they do the same job in the same conditions as our "Public"safety grade radios and even after being run over,slammed,pinched,dropped in water,steamed,broiled,still work and get out in all the areas we are that the portables work in.Put the members in jepordy? Well my take on that is that for OUR operations,in OUR area,I'd rather have EVERY member with a working communicator than three with an EXPENSIVE one.I know this doesn't sit well with some of you radio experts,but we beta test stuff before we buy it in lots and if it holds up and works well,we usually tend to stay with that product or product line.For our operations,we've had very good luck with Vertex,I've got a great dealer and we've experienced a very minor amount of problems.There are a number of decent Mfgs out there today and Motorola in my opinion is NOT the product it once was.So if I were looking,I think I'd try a few different brands that I could get local service on and field test 'em to see what worked for me. T.C.