The old Mocoms were a great radio for the time. I had one and it worked with out any problems at all. I also have and old Micor 100w UHF that I installed a TS32 tone deck into and ran the switching knob to the control head and has the LED display in the control head,without external wiring.
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The 8000 dollar Motorola HT/s. Why?
- Thread starter prc117f
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The Mocom 70: The radio nobody really knows how to fix, because nobody has ever seen one that wasn't working! Arguably the most reliable mobile radio ever made.
I used to work with a man who was part of the Mocom 70 design team. He told me that there isn't a single part in the Mocom 70 that has to dissipate more than 10 percent of its power dissipation rating, which is the key to its reliabilty. A 1 watt resistor in it is carrying about 1/10th of a watt of power through it. So it doesn't even get warm. The whole radio is like that.
I can assure you, your current generation mobile and portable radios run their components at significantly higher than 10 percent rated power!
I used to work with a man who was part of the Mocom 70 design team. He told me that there isn't a single part in the Mocom 70 that has to dissipate more than 10 percent of its power dissipation rating, which is the key to its reliabilty. A 1 watt resistor in it is carrying about 1/10th of a watt of power through it. So it doesn't even get warm. The whole radio is like that.
I can assure you, your current generation mobile and portable radios run their components at significantly higher than 10 percent rated power!
prcguy
Member
Mocom 70s broke often enough, the UHF version had a diode tripler in the final that operated at fairly high power and these were a common failure. In the 1970s we had a few in our GMRS group that were troublesome.
At one point the Motorola Saber series was touted as having the lowest MTBF of any commercial handheld radio ever produced. This was after a lot of research on latent damage from static electricity discharge during manufacturing and Motorola revamping the production line to eliminate static damage.
prcguy
At one point the Motorola Saber series was touted as having the lowest MTBF of any commercial handheld radio ever produced. This was after a lot of research on latent damage from static electricity discharge during manufacturing and Motorola revamping the production line to eliminate static damage.
prcguy
I vaguely remember that diode tripler issue on the UHF Mocom 70s but I think the VHF ones were about as trouble free as any radio ever made.
Sabers have always been reliable, but I've had to fix a couple of them. Fortunately Motorola had a great module exchange program that made repairs affordable when your synth module kicked the bucket. It was either 70 or 90 bucks with exchange but something like 1700 bucks for that module if you didn't have an exchange for it. Done to keep people from just building new radios from parts.
Sabers have always been reliable, but I've had to fix a couple of them. Fortunately Motorola had a great module exchange program that made repairs affordable when your synth module kicked the bucket. It was either 70 or 90 bucks with exchange but something like 1700 bucks for that module if you didn't have an exchange for it. Done to keep people from just building new radios from parts.
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Motrac
Member
Possibly because that is what the market will bear?
Personally speaking, my agency has yet to pay anywhere close to that for any single radio. I don't know if you're a user or a technician, but I can guarantee you that us users appreciate them when they operate properly and report them when they don't, regardless of their original cost. Since they were bought for us to use (operate), that seems reasonable to me. The purchase price was apparently reasonable for my agency, or they would have bought some cheaper, less reliable, harder to maintain "type approved" alternative. Those of us who have worked in both the user/technician fields know what that's all about. You can't polish a turd.
Personally speaking, my agency has yet to pay anywhere close to that for any single radio. I don't know if you're a user or a technician, but I can guarantee you that us users appreciate them when they operate properly and report them when they don't, regardless of their original cost. Since they were bought for us to use (operate), that seems reasonable to me. The purchase price was apparently reasonable for my agency, or they would have bought some cheaper, less reliable, harder to maintain "type approved" alternative. Those of us who have worked in both the user/technician fields know what that's all about. You can't polish a turd.
I laugh at this. $3000 for a portable and $5000 for a mobile - like the very small volunteer fire departments (like mine was) could afford radios at that price! It's utterly ridiculous and goes back to GREED.
Mike
Mike
Apply for some grants. There is plenty of money to be had.
Then you need to find a grant writer. I am not aware of any legitimate departments being denied the radio money that was made available by DHS
In the last 10 years I've found zero to be had.
The EMPG grant is accessible if it is written correctly, hence the suggestion of a grant writer.
hitechRadio
Member
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It seems to be the norm that volunteer fire departments cannot afford $3000 for a portable and $5000 for a mobile, just the way it is in a lot of vol. dept. sadly. But, Just because it is not in your budget or there is not a grant available to purchase the radio's. To you for something you would want it is. "It's utterly ridiculous and goes back to GREED." This makes me laugh. Just because a dept. can't have what it wants, does not equal GREED.
Remember the price is based on the options you would need.
Local vol depts. around here have a couple XTS 2500s with P25 trunking to access nearby system for Mu/A. The rest of the radios are XTS1500 1.5, but are not optioned the same. Just basic analog, and that's it. It is not even close to a $3000.
They receive nearly all there equipment (not just radios) with the help of various grants. So grants are out there, and these depts don't have a grant writer. These depts. would have a hard time even surviving if not for grants.
D
Drake1731
Guest
Eh.. Well we all know what George Carlin would say about this..
You think those radios cost so much because of greed?
Wow, spoken like someone who has obviously never worked for a company or even in an industry where high tech electronics have to be designed, tested, redesigned, programming developed, redeveloped, debugged, upgraded, and then take the product to manufacturing all while understanding that you will not benefit much from the benefits of large scale production. A few tens of thousands of radios may SOUND like a lot, but it really isn't. Not when smartphones are scheduled for production runs of tens of millions.
You've got to pay for all those engineering and development costs, for the development of what are among the most complex portable electronic devices ever made.
Those 5000 dollar portable radios may not even make a profit for the company in terms of selling the hardware for what it costs to make it. The profit margin for Motorola and Harris is not in the hardware, it's in the service contracts.
Incidentally, that small fire department that says it can't afford 3000 dollar radios seems to be able to afford issuing smartphones to everybody working for it, at something between 100 and 200 dollars per phone per month in airtime fees.
Do the math.
Assume you get a super deal on your cell phone service. Just 50 bucks a month. That's 600 bucks a year.
The radios you say you can't afford cost 3000 dollars each on average. (Really it's probably less than that, WITH chargers, antennas, a second battery, and a speaker mic.) That radio has an expected 10 year service life.
Which works out to 300 bucks a year plus some budget for spare accessories.
Over ten years you'll spend 6000 dollars per cell phone PLUS equipment replacement costs as you're likely to replace the phone once every two years for an average 200 dollar equipment upgrade cost each time around. That's a thousand extra dollars over the ten years.
So you say you can't afford a 3000 dollar radio over 10 years but you can afford cell phones for 7000 dollars for 10 years?
Do you see how utterly ridiculous that argument is?
Wow, spoken like someone who has obviously never worked for a company or even in an industry where high tech electronics have to be designed, tested, redesigned, programming developed, redeveloped, debugged, upgraded, and then take the product to manufacturing all while understanding that you will not benefit much from the benefits of large scale production. A few tens of thousands of radios may SOUND like a lot, but it really isn't. Not when smartphones are scheduled for production runs of tens of millions.
You've got to pay for all those engineering and development costs, for the development of what are among the most complex portable electronic devices ever made.
Those 5000 dollar portable radios may not even make a profit for the company in terms of selling the hardware for what it costs to make it. The profit margin for Motorola and Harris is not in the hardware, it's in the service contracts.
Incidentally, that small fire department that says it can't afford 3000 dollar radios seems to be able to afford issuing smartphones to everybody working for it, at something between 100 and 200 dollars per phone per month in airtime fees.
Do the math.
Assume you get a super deal on your cell phone service. Just 50 bucks a month. That's 600 bucks a year.
The radios you say you can't afford cost 3000 dollars each on average. (Really it's probably less than that, WITH chargers, antennas, a second battery, and a speaker mic.) That radio has an expected 10 year service life.
Which works out to 300 bucks a year plus some budget for spare accessories.
Over ten years you'll spend 6000 dollars per cell phone PLUS equipment replacement costs as you're likely to replace the phone once every two years for an average 200 dollar equipment upgrade cost each time around. That's a thousand extra dollars over the ten years.
So you say you can't afford a 3000 dollar radio over 10 years but you can afford cell phones for 7000 dollars for 10 years?
Do you see how utterly ridiculous that argument is?
Elroy you forgot the most important part.
Talk to your fellow firefighter or the next town in the mutual aid pac on the cellphone.
Get that cellphone wet drop it in the water on the floor.
drop it on the street in a foot chase then pick it up and call for backup.
Talk to your fellow firefighter or the next town in the mutual aid pac on the cellphone.
Get that cellphone wet drop it in the water on the floor.
drop it on the street in a foot chase then pick it up and call for backup.
At $8000 and a ten year lifespan, at a minimum, that comes to $2 a day cost of ownership......I think an ASTRO25 all band TDMA radio is good for at least 20 years to an enthusiast, call it $1 a day!
Elroy NAILED it. "That radio has an expected 10 year service life." I have four smartphones on my contract at a replacement cost of $800+ each, every TWO years PLUS $6 thousand+ a YEAR in service. Coupled with the fact that the volume of smartphone sales outweigh high-end radios a hundredfold. It makes sense. i never thought about it that way.
If they are the crying the money blues the EMPG grant might not help because there is currently a 50% cost match in the program.
http://www.fema.gov/media-library-d...2df5b/FY_2015_EMPG_Fact_Sheet_Allocations.pdf
A cost match is required under this program. The federal share shall not exceed fifty percent (50%) of the total budget.
Also most of the federal grants now do not allow for supplanting for a single agency, so this creates a complex situation for a single agency trying to capture dollars.
I'm not saying it can't be done, but they should of looked to of done this 5 or more years ago.
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