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Does Kenwood Make a Dual Band Part 90 Mobile?

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sefrischling

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All the dual band Kenwood Mobiles I am finding, to try and find a solution for knocking two radios down to one in an ambulance are HAM and not Part 90 ... so ... does Kenwood Make a Dual Band Part 90 Mobile?
 

Remington12G

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All the dual band Kenwood Mobiles I am finding, to try and find a solution for knocking two radios down to one in an ambulance are HAM and not Part 90 ... so ... does Kenwood Make a Dual Band Part 90 Mobile?
You can make a dual-band Part 90 radio with decks from Kenwood. 1 Control Head with 2 Decks. Kenwood doesn't make dual-band out of the box like Motorola. What are you needing exactly? Analog? Digital?
 

sefrischling

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You can make a dual-band Part 90 radio with decks from Kenwood. 1 Control Head with 2 Decks. Kenwood doesn't make dual-band out of the box like Motorola. What are you needing exactly? Analog? Digital?

Analog only. We're on VHF for dispatch and TAC, we are surrounded by UHF departments. Our old bus, just retired this week had VHF and 33mhz low band, but it was installed 17 years ago. Those around us moved from 33mhz to UHF, we moved from 33mhz to VHF. So I need to find a solution, and the budget doesn't allow for APX or Harris. We'll look at used solutions, if viable, for the moment. New ambulance arrives shortly.
 

Remington12G

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Gotcha. Buying Multi RF can get expensive real quick. I'm not an expert so maybe @mmckenna could recommend a good solution. If your needing analog-only then there are plenty of options out there but everything that I buy and use going forward is digitally capable like NXDN and P25.
 

mmckenna

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Kenwood NX-5000 line of mobiles.
You can run up to 3 RF decks in any combination of Low band, VHF, UHF and 700/800MHz. 50 and 100 watt decks are available for VHF and UHF. 35 watt deck for 7/800 and 100 watt deck for low band.
Will do analog, P25, DMR and NXDN (only two digital modes per RF deck at a time. Low band deck only does analog and NXDN)
One or two control heads, including hand held control heads.

If you go to the EF-Johnson version, you can do 4 RF decks, but limited to analog and P25.
 

sefrischling

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Kenwood NX-5000 line of mobiles.
You can run up to 3 RF decks in any combination of Low band, VHF, UHF and 700/800MHz. 50 and 100 watt decks are available for VHF and UHF. 35 watt deck for 7/800 and 100 watt deck for low band.
Will do analog, P25, DMR and NXDN (only two digital modes per RF deck at a time. Low band deck only does analog and NXDN)
One or two control heads, including hand held control heads.


I can't seem to find any pricing on the NX-5000 ... happen to have an idea? Two decks, one head.
 

mmckenna

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I can't seem to find any pricing on the NX-5000 ... happen to have an idea? Two decks, one head.

I can pull LIST pricing for you, but you should be able to do 30% better than that under most state/NASPO contract pricing.

VHF 50 watt RF Deck Only $735
UHF 45 watt RF Deck Only $735
5ABMM-MR single head/dual RF deck kit (control head, cable, brackets, power cords, microphone) 2 external speaker $1006.50

That'll give you analog and NXDN. P25 can be added later if you need it.

So, you'd be looking in the $2400 range - 30% or so for each radio. You can save a bit of money by doing away with the external speakers, but that's not an ideal setup.

KPG-46XM is the USB programming cable $162
KPG-D1N is the programming software $155

Professional install will be extra, and unless you've set up/programmed these before, it would be a good idea.

Not cheap, but not as expensive as something like an APX. If all you need is VHF and UHF, it's a good solution. If you decide later on to add P25 or any other features, it's just a licensing thing.

I'm not a dealer, but I do have access to pricing. You really should talk to a local Kenwood dealer and get a price from them. State contracts should get you 30% off list pricing.
 

Remington12G

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I have a pricing sheet but as mmckenna said, talk with a local dealer and get a price from them.
 

mmckenna

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Two other good options:

Unless you —really— have to have a dual band radio, you can save a lot of money by having two separate radios with two separate remote heads. You could pull that off for the $1500 range.

Harris XL-200M is a cheaper alternative to the APX, you can order it with just the bands you want turned on. P25 and Analog, licensed features, etc. can save you a lot of money.
 

sefrischling

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I can pull LIST pricing for you, but you should be able to do 30% better than that under most state/NASPO contract pricing.

Thanks, now I have a ball park ... and this is far more cost effective than the Moto / Harris options. We just installed a Harris All Band into our tanker, which for UHF / VHF analog only was absolute overkill.

Don't get me wrong, I am happy to play with the stuff all day long, but I know our budget, and know what we could have used the extra funds for ... as I am the only doing the homework to replace 30-35 portables with a single common radio, instead of multiple radios from multiple companies, with most coming from a brand no longer in existence.

As a small fire company, that only has a portion of our operating budget covered by the town, the $225,000+ for the new bus doesn't really allow me to go all out on new mobiles.
 

mmckenna

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If you have the space, two separate mobiles would be cheaper. NX-3000 series are pretty nice. Won't do P25, but if that's not needed, its a perfectly good radio.
 

MTS2000des

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The Kenwood Viking VM7000 is also a great dual band/multi-deck mobile that can do P25 Phase 2 if needed, and has a ton of options. One control head can give you select/unselect audio like a dispatch console. It's much less than an comparably equipped APX8500. You can also order it with an HCCH if you want a small control head.
It also uses the Armada programming software which, unlike the technical abortion that is KPG-Dxx, is affordable, will keep track of all your programmed radios and won't let you duplicate trunking IDs across subscribers, and doesn't require an 8-core CPU and 64GB of RAM to run.
 

mrweather

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I know the TK-x90 series has been retired but weren't they also Part 90? They can be dual-banded with a single head.

Or maybe that's not an option since the model line isn't supported by Kenwood anymore?
 

mmckenna

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I know the TK-x90 series has been retired but weren't they also Part 90? They can be dual-banded with a single head.

Or maybe that's not an option since the model line isn't supported by Kenwood anymore?

Yes, the TK-x90 line would do a dual RF deck setup and they are absolutely Part 90. They are no longer sold by Kenwood, but still supported.

One drawback to them: They do not natively do MDC1200, it would require an aftermarket board.
 

W2PDX

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Another vote for the NX-series of radios. If you don't need the digital modes (other than NXDN which comes with the NX-series) they are a good option that would fit your needs. I agree that KPG is difficult to use, but if you're only programming a few analog channels it's actually not that bad. Not sure about CT rules, but you may be able to purchase off the current NYS contract pricing. If you click here you'll see the contractor summary. Under EF Johnson, click on Product Pricing for the current state contract pricing. That will get you in the correct ballpark based on negotiated contract pricing vs. MSRP.
 

sefrischling

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The Kenwood Viking VM7000 is also a great dual band/multi-deck mobile that can do P25 Phase 2 if needed, and has a ton of options. One control head can give you select/unselect audio like a dispatch console. It's much less than an comparably equipped APX8500. You can also order it with an HCCH if you want a small control head.

Thanks. We're strickly Analog UHF / VHF and most departments around us are UHF.
 

MTS2000des

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Thanks. We're strickly Analog UHF / VHF and most departments around us are UHF.
The VM7000 will do analog no problem, and you can order it with V/U analog only and save considerable money. If P25 is in your future, you can upgrade the radios via Vault, and one cool thing about EFJohnson radios is you can transfer purchased features via Vault from one product to another. So if you buy say, a VM6000 today with trunking/TDMA, you can transfer those to a new radio without having to buy them again. Think of it like moving your copy of MS Office from one machine to another (legally). Not having to pay twice..

NO ONE else does that. Not even the parent company (Kenwood).
 
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