So this is a bit of a question, and will be a bit of a "here's what happened" post.
I'll be at the truck race this upcoming Saturday at Bristol with some family (couldn't get Cup tickets, but looking at the forecast we got the good weather day and we get more racing anyway with the heat races in the afternoon). I have a pair of headsets that connect to both a radio via Kenwood connector and a scanner via the usual headphone jack. This will be the first race I've had the new headsets for (which is why there are questions). Obviously, the goal is to use a two way radio to talk back and forth wirelessly between two of our group using the (supposedly) noise cancelling microphones on the headset so we don't have to take headsets off and yell. Unfortunately I am the only ham of the group so using a couple cheap dual band HTs is out of the question. This brings my options to FRS (Baofeng BF88A) and MURS (Retevis RT21V). FRS I feel like would be more likely to be crowded with people doing the exact same thing I am and would be more susceptible to intermod from everyone else using UHF. MURS would likely be much less crowded but could be in use by vendors, etc. at the track - I know everyone NASCAR-related uses UHF, as does Bristol itself, and PD/FD are all on 800. Either way I could program in tone squelch which wouldn't help us interfering with other people but would at least keep our headsets clear. I'm not concerned with range, 95% of the day the radios will be within 2 feet of each other. I should also note that for either service I cannot change tones on the fly because neither set of radios has a front panel, it requires a computer, so whatever is in the radio when I get there is it. My questions are:
1. Does anyone have experience using MURS at a race? Do vendors use it or do they tend to use track radios/cell phones/whatever else not MURS?
2. If you've used FRS, does the UHF intermod or amount of other users create a problem on FRS to the point that it is no longer usable?
And before you ask, I only use type accepted radios, meaning I'm not programming both services into a dual band Baofeng and picking one when I get there. I'd also rather not bring both sets of radios with me.
Right now I'm leaning towards MURS but have been flipping back and forth, mainly because the BF88A's are so cheap that if something happened to them I wouldn't necessarily care, I'd care a little more if I lost one of the RT21Vs. If anyone has any insight then I'd love to hear it, otherwise I'll post an update Sunday with my experience!
I'll be at the truck race this upcoming Saturday at Bristol with some family (couldn't get Cup tickets, but looking at the forecast we got the good weather day and we get more racing anyway with the heat races in the afternoon). I have a pair of headsets that connect to both a radio via Kenwood connector and a scanner via the usual headphone jack. This will be the first race I've had the new headsets for (which is why there are questions). Obviously, the goal is to use a two way radio to talk back and forth wirelessly between two of our group using the (supposedly) noise cancelling microphones on the headset so we don't have to take headsets off and yell. Unfortunately I am the only ham of the group so using a couple cheap dual band HTs is out of the question. This brings my options to FRS (Baofeng BF88A) and MURS (Retevis RT21V). FRS I feel like would be more likely to be crowded with people doing the exact same thing I am and would be more susceptible to intermod from everyone else using UHF. MURS would likely be much less crowded but could be in use by vendors, etc. at the track - I know everyone NASCAR-related uses UHF, as does Bristol itself, and PD/FD are all on 800. Either way I could program in tone squelch which wouldn't help us interfering with other people but would at least keep our headsets clear. I'm not concerned with range, 95% of the day the radios will be within 2 feet of each other. I should also note that for either service I cannot change tones on the fly because neither set of radios has a front panel, it requires a computer, so whatever is in the radio when I get there is it. My questions are:
1. Does anyone have experience using MURS at a race? Do vendors use it or do they tend to use track radios/cell phones/whatever else not MURS?
2. If you've used FRS, does the UHF intermod or amount of other users create a problem on FRS to the point that it is no longer usable?
And before you ask, I only use type accepted radios, meaning I'm not programming both services into a dual band Baofeng and picking one when I get there. I'd also rather not bring both sets of radios with me.
Right now I'm leaning towards MURS but have been flipping back and forth, mainly because the BF88A's are so cheap that if something happened to them I wouldn't necessarily care, I'd care a little more if I lost one of the RT21Vs. If anyone has any insight then I'd love to hear it, otherwise I'll post an update Sunday with my experience!
