BAOFENG UV-5RA...Can the 5/2 tone mystery be decoded?

[Spankymedic7]

Hi to all,

I got the Baofeng UV-5RA HT for Christmas, programmed it with the software, and thought that all was well...until I discovered that it is capable of decoding 5/2 tone, now I'm on a mission. See, I'm on a local fire department, and would really like to find out how to program this radio to decode my department's pager tones. As anyone else can attest to, the manual that accompanies this radio is pretty much useful only for starting a good fire in the fireplace, and I haven't been able to find out any useful info elsewhere on the web regarding the 5/2 tone feature of this radio, other than it is capable of doing it.

So, I come to you, my fellow HAMs, GMRS'ers, and other assorted radio enthusiasts...can you help me solve this issue?

Thanks in advance!!!

[W8RMH]

deleted

[RBMTS]

Originally Posted by Spankymedic7

...until I discovered that it is capable of decoding 5/2 tone

Just out of curiosity where did you hear this? I have never seen anything about this topic nor have I seen this capability in the Baofeng or Chirp software.

[n8zcc]

Originally Posted by RBMTS

Just out of curiosity where did you hear this? I have never seen anything about this topic nor have I seen this capability in the Baofeng or Chirp software.

I Googled to see what a 5/2 tone is, didn't find out what it is but found an add for Wouxun indicating 5/2 tone.

Wouxun 699E 136-174MHz 5/2 Tone + 1750Hz KG-699E VHF 136-174Mhz [] - $99.50 : Buy Two way radios, Security 2 way radio accessories and commercial handhelds!

What is a 5/2 tone?

[Spankymedic7]

Originally Posted by RBMTS

Just out of curiosity where did you hear this? I have never seen anything about this topic nor have I seen this capability in the Baofeng or Chirp software.

I've seen this capability advertised in one or two advertisements/brochures for this radio. Also, you can see the display on the radio, in the lower left hand corner shows the "5T/2T" indicator, which can be found on the miklor uv-5r help page:

Baofeng UV5R FAQ UV-5R

I've heard that there are firefighters that do use this radio for the reception of paging purposes, just haven't been able to figure out how to program it to do so.

[RBMTS]

Now I know what you mean. The radio itself does not have any two-tone paging decoding capability. The firmware is not programmed for that feature. Yes it is on the display but it never appears. This is probably just a common LCD panel that is used in other radios. Now that isn't to say that at some point Baofeng would offer an upgraded model that offered two-tone paging capability. It just isn't in there now. And since the radio firmware can't be flash updated, current radios will not have that feature.