Motorola MaxTrac 300

[aschenavar]

Just purchased one from a buddy who is a HAM junkie.. $75 programmed, with mounting bracket and speaker mic, 16ch 40watt

Just curious...I dont think I got taken on the price, but whats your opinions on the radio itself..and I understand its not Narrowband capable..

what kind of options or expandability do I have with this kind of radio (5pin btw)

 

[exkalibur]

It isn't a bad radio at all, my first radio was a Radius M216 which is pretty much identical to what you have.

Maxtrac and Radius Mobiles Have a look there, it is a pretty good resource with lots of information about the Maxtrac/Radius line.

One thing though, if you connect an external speaker do NOT short the wires or ground them or anything other than directly to a speaker. It'll blow up the audio section of your radio. I learned that the hard way.

 

[mmckenna]

I use a GM300 VHF in my Polaris Ranger UTV. Nice solid radio, no annoying bells and whistles, just a good solid radio. As they are not narrow band capable, you can pick them up cheap. $75 programmed isn't a bad deal. You can buy them used on e-Bay for $50 or less, but you'd have to pay someone to program them. Not a bad deal you got.

Lots of cheap accessories out there.
If you are not going to use it for a repeater, then there is nothing at all wrong with a 5 pin radio. External speaker will help with the audio for sure. You can buy speakers on line, and find the 5 pin connectors on e-bay and make your own.
Spare microphones are cheap and plentiful.

Not a bad radio for Ham use.

 

[w2smw]

It all depends what you are using it for, narrow banding is not going to cause a problem with amateur radio, if you are using it for other services you have a year to use it if you are going to transmit legally with it.

 

[WX9EMS]

They are excellent radios for what they are and nearly bulletproof to boot (besides having to program them if you want new channels). I own 1 VHF D34 and used to own a D44 UHF, did the upgrade to 32 channels on both. My D34 serves as my APRS/Winlink radio now. Would not hesitate to pick up another. As far as narrow banding, no worries in the 2 meter band.

 

[aschenavar]

Well I got it in with little to no problems, sounds pretty good for the price I paid, and seems to do well even on this little quarter wave I have..I even figured out how to set 2 priority channels in my scan list just from reading a little bit online..pretty happy I think