Motorola Spectra VHF 50 watt????

[BUCKSHOT_106]

I recently required this radio in a trade. It powers up rx/tx perfect. But I was looking to sell on Ebay and you can barely give these things away. Lucky I don't have much in it. Are these radios fissing on completely?

 

[RodStrong]

The capacitor issue and the fact that they are wideband only and will be largely worthless in less than 4 years (except a few applications) may have something to do with it. Great radios though.

 

[jparks29]

pretty bulletproof.

Would make an excellent choice for aprs/packet.

 

[jim202]

With the coming of the narrow band limits in January of 2013, there will be a huge supply of these
kind of radios on the surplus market in the future. Those that are trying to sell them right now are
still under the impression that they are worth a bundle.

With the scarcity of spare parts, most of them no longer supported by Motorola and the leaky
capacitor issues with the Spectra and Astro Spectra, most radio smart people have figured
that the hey day of these radios has passed. If people are still stupid enough to pay good
amounts of cash for these radios, then let then spend their money. To those that still think
these radios are worth some real money, more power to them.

The true market will settle down on the Spectra and Astro Spectra radios, once it becomes
apparent to those trying to sell them at top dollar, that no one is willing to pay their gold
lined amount any more. Supply and demand will level the field. The hams will come around
see what little they are worth.

It makes me laugh when I see a sale for a Maxtrac and they are asking $100 for the radio.
I use them for book ends and supports under my shelves.

Jim

 

[radioman2001]

It's unfortunate that most people are misinformed about the Spectra. It will make the 12.5 kc transformation with little or no cost. The radio can have it's TX deviation lowered, and if you use the RX board from a 900mhz you just narrow banded the radio. You can make a Spectra a compliant 12.5 radio, at even less cost. Merely change the reference oscillator with a still very much available 00002 or 00001 standard, as I intend to do to over 150 VHF's I am responsible for. BTW the radios had an option for that very oscillator, so it makes the radio type accepted. As far as the cap issue, I believe there is enough information out there to fix that issue. The costs involved are minimal considering the radio you get when finished. Hands down a better radio that the CDM line.

 

[mancow]

It's my understanding that the Astro does not suffer from the leaky cap issue.

 

[radioman2001]

Possibly since it's too new, most of the Spectra's I have had issues with are 15-20 years old. I also understand that there was a different brand of cap used in some radios and they have not had the same failure's

 

[MTS2000des]

It's unfortunate that most people are misinformed about the Spectra. It will make the 12.5 kc transformation with little or no cost. The radio can have it's TX deviation lowered, and if you use the RX board from a 900mhz you just narrow banded the radio. You can make a Spectra a compliant 12.5 radio, at even less cost. Merely change the reference oscillator with a still very much available 00002 or 00001 standard, as I intend to do to over 150 VHF's I am responsible for. BTW the radios had an option for that very oscillator, so it makes the radio type accepted. As far as the cap issue, I believe there is enough information out there to fix that issue. The costs involved are minimal considering the radio you get when finished. Hands down a better radio that the CDM line.

but the reality is the analog Spectra is an almost 20 year old product, no longer supported by Motorola- the depot will RUR them, regardless of what one is wiling to pay to have them fixed. The real question is how long can one expect to have reliable service out of a 15-20 year old radio? The VFD tubes are becoming unobtanium, not to mention any existing parts are expensive. How long will one be able to program them as the older 486 and Pentium I class DOS computers die off? Does it really make long term (3-5+ years) economic sense to piecemeal together two decade old radios when the cost of modern, supported analog radios are so affordable? Keeping these in service to mission critical users seems foolish when the cost of replacement with up to date, manufacturer supported replacements isn't that much in the long run.

In the trunked world, the analog Spectra is a doorstop- no support for re-banding. Make nice bookends!

as much as many enthusiasts love the Spectra, it is past it's prime, as is the Saber, MT1000/HT600, Maxtrac, STX and other "golden age" Motorola products of yesteryear.

Motorola is accelerating the replacement cycle. It is almost impossible to get parts (such as the display modules) for more modern radios such as the XTS3000 and Astro Sabers, which are at least somewhat supported (re-banding and current CPS available).

Sometimes we have to let go of the past, no matter how much we like living in it.

 

[BUCKSHOT_106]

Would anyone happen to have the instructions for field programming this radio? It has the DTMF mic.

Thanks-

 

[FFPM571]

There is no way to field program a spectra..

 

[FFPM571]

There is no way to field program a spectra..

I got cut off.

I was saying There is no way to field program a spectra from the keypad. It has to be though a computer and with the RSS

 

[fineshot1]

pretty bulletproof.

Would make an excellent choice for aprs/packet.

They do not work very well down in the 144.XXX spectrum without a bit of vco tweaking,
at least on the tx side. Not sure about rx.

 

[jparks29]

They do not work very well down in the 144.XXX spectrum without a bit of vco tweaking,
at least on the tx side. Not sure about rx.

Never seen that to be an issue, with either bandsplit. IIRC the bandsplits were something like 136-162 and 146-174.. I never had a problem taking any of them (hi or low power,regardless of split) from ~143-170 without any tweaking.

 

[CCHLLM]

Never seen that to be an issue, with either bandsplit. IIRC the bandsplits were something like 136-162 and 146-174.. I never had a problem taking any of them (hi or low power,regardless of split) from ~143-170 without any tweaking.

I concur, never had a problem entering and using VHF FM amateur freqs in either bandsplit unless the radio had a problem to begin with. I've seen some that were deaf as a post on the low end, but a thorough and complete alignment by the book by someone who knows what they're doing always took care of it unless there were other problems.

 

[fineshot1]

I concur, never had a problem entering and using VHF FM amateur freqs in either bandsplit unless the radio had a problem to begin with. I've seen some that were deaf as a post on the low end, but a thorough and complete alignment by the book by someone who knows what they're doing always took care of it unless there were other problems.

Sorry - I should have been more specific. I was referring to the 146-174 split since it is the more popular one.

I never said anything about "entering frequencies". If you program a 146-174 split in the 144 spectrum try checking the power out while on the bench. They do not perform so well. I can not give specifics cause every radio has its own individual tx characteristics but with most of them the power starts dropping off in the lower 145 range and gets worse in the 144 range.

 

[CCHLLM]

Well then, let me be more specific. I do not half-ass radios, and I do check each and every radio that goes through my hands, and have done so for the 40 or so years I've been involved in the two-way radio business. Sometimes there are significant differences between radios, and sometimes the low split radios are worse at 144-148 than the high split radios are, but so far I have never encountered one that had any problem after a proper alignment. I stand by what I said, and since I should not have left the "and use" portion of my post open to question, I defer to your "correction."

 

[zz0468]

Spectras of all bands and bandsplits can be moved to give rated performance in the adjacent ham bands. Some splits are just more easily persuaded than others. But they'll ALL go just fine.

 

[fineshot1]

Well then, let me be more specific. I do not half-ass radios, and I do check each and every radio that goes through my hands, and have done so for the 40 or so years I've been involved in the two-way radio business. Sometimes there are significant differences between radios, and sometimes the low split radios are worse at 144-148 than the high split radios are, but so far I have never encountered one that had any problem after a proper alignment. I stand by what I said, and since I should not have left the "and use" portion of my post open to question, I defer to your "correction."

I certainly was not suggesting that you(or anyone else in this thread) was involved in "doing half-ass radios"
and was only trying to point out to the OP some possible limitations of the model he was inquiring about since he does not seem to have a technical background and you shure are living up to grumpy part of your signature...lol

 

[radioman2001]

For MTS2000des
Not all the Spectra's are 20 years old, our units are less that 6 years old. So doing the update is a no brainer. They have a better reliability factor than the CDM line hands down, and if you are doing the work yourself, your not having to deal with MOTO-MEXICO, who BTW are so brain dead that when I sent them 2 brand new radios, bad out of the box, I got back 2 used radios. We used to send 2 or 3 radios a month to them, no more, we invested in the tools to do the work ourselves. Even the staff at Motorola are embarassed by Depot repair, and has replaced our radios with brand new ones rather than lose us as a customer. We don't do trunking, while I have made some conventional Spectra's do it. As far as parts, we have or had a 7 year commitment from Motorola for parts for our radios as part of the bid. Be assured if they don't honor that, they will not be able to bid next time. The whole word is not going forward as fast as you think, there are plenty of users who are conventional analog and will stay that way for at least another 10 years. I'm not of the notion that the next narrow banding is going to take place anytime soon, the technology hasn't been made yet to compete with a good old analog signal.

 

[MTS2000des]

fact remains it's still a 20 year old radio design wise. It's no longer supported by Motorola officially. I am not denying that a properly working Spectra doesn't outperform a CDM/Pro Series, but comparing one to a Pro Series is like comparing an XTS5000 to a CP200- they are different tiers of product line. Compare it to a suitable replacement such as an XTL1500 and I think you'd agree the XTL is a superior product hands down, and it's current production and not going anywhere for a while.

The Spectra still requires DOS RSS and a slower PC to program, how many 486 SX25's are going to be running in 5 years? This is something you have to take into consideration. There is only so long you are going to keep this old stuff running before it becomes cost prohibitive to do so.

No doubt the Mexidepot is a joke, but then I've had just as many horrible experiences with both Kenwood and Vertex Standard (Yaesu) USA factory service centers. It took Vertex Standard USA 5 times to fix a portable that was NEW. They never reimbursed me the shipping costs which their service manager said they would.

Motorola at least supports their products, you said yourself they replaced your radios when the depot screwed up. Good luck getting that level of service from anyone else.