Tait Radio Systems

[NJFFDisp]

The township in which I am a fire officer in just awarded a multi-million dollar contract to Tait. The specs on the system are to maintain our existing 800 MHz freq. however, upgrade to phase II. The second portion of the spec is to provide dual band portables (700/800 and UHF T-Band) for interoperability. We were pushing Motorola, but with that said the town went with the bottom line and awarded to Tait.

I have extensive knowledge of Motorola products ,both infrastructure and equipment. With Tait coming in does anyone have any expectations I should be aware of such as dependability/durability of equipment (portables and mobiles).

Also what model P25 portable is Tait manufacturing that is dual-band capable.

Thanks

 

[PACNWDude]

The Tait 9400 series is looking promising. They claim P25 Phase 1 and upgradable to Phase 2.

I would find your local vendor and ask directly, what they are providing. (Or whichever vendor is getting the contract.)

Has been a while since touching a Tait radio, but the older ones were pretty tough.

 

[gesucks]

Couple questions, 1 Which township system? is it currently a Tait system? I have used the 9400 on in Phase II, there are out there now. Tait does not make a dual band radio so I am curious as to what dual band they will supply you.

 

[NJFFDisp]

This is replacing a 800 MHz type II smartnet trunking system from the late 90s. I dove deeper into the award bid package today. It seems that there was a bid exception, excluding the dual-band radios. That was one of my main questions was I was not aware of any dual-band products made by Tait.

Does anyone have any feedback on the overall durability and ruggedness as well as the operation of the 9400 series portable.

Thanks

 

[RodStrong]

There are about a hundred 9100 series portables & mobiles that are used by 4 different customers I serve, and I've had one TP9400 series demo bouncing around in the field for a year or two. They seem to work well on the phase I P25 system we use (800). The 9400 series is smaller than the 9100, and in my opinion, might be a bit more difficult to use with gloves and heavy gear on. If you are potentially going to be using these radios for firefighting, I would recommend you get your hands on some demos and have your guys test them with their gear on to make sure they are comfortable with them. That's about the only suggestion I can make based on my exposure to the 9400.

As far as them being rugged, I think they have done pretty well under medium to heavy service. One of the fire depts. that uses the 9100s is one of our larger and more harder charging depts. They have had hardly any problems with them. I can assume based on that, the 9400's would be similarly dependable.

The only thing I don't like about the Taits is there aren't very many non-OEM accessories out there for them. That is important to me, but not a deal killer.

I wouldn't hesitate to recommend either the 9100's or 9400's for the system we use. Probably doesn't help you much, but for whatever it's worth, I am fond of those radios, and the ones I have dealt with have largely served their owners well.

Good luck.

 

[7Air]

They have a youtube channel on the TP9400 with 19 clips

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zSWopt-aBU&list=PLEj-HwZj5SM-jthg1T4jwrcYpLEe5ISO8&index=1

 

[jmdtile]

I'm looking for a Tait TP9100 UHF LKP 450-520 4-7 Communities in Masssachusetts use tait and love them

 

[iamhere300]

Tait makes a wonderful product, and their service is great.

Dealing with their corporate offices is a nightmare, but they are a great radio.

They DO have a dual band mobile, basically two radios, 1 display. IMHO, a much better system than the APX dual band mobiles. Three big reasons, if one deck goes down, you still have the other capability, you have actual dual band capability, not one, then the other, as the APX does. You can listen to both bands at the same time, not do-able with the APX mobile.

Finally, you can get the dual band mobile set up as a cross band repeater.

IMHO, Tait is just as dependable and works just as well as Motorola - if not better in their DMR offerings.