Brandon_K
Member
Hello gents. Long time lurker, first time poster. I'm coming for help on choosing a new radio system. I run a large haunted attraction in Pittsburgh and every year we add more and more staff members that need to be on radio. A little background about myself; my position at the attraction is Operations Manager as well as Technical Director. I handle all of the PLC's, pneumatics, hydraulics, electrical, control, automation, IT, etc. I have been playing with scanners and other radio paraphernalia since I was a little kid, thanks to my Dad (he was a radar operator in the Air Force way back when). My knowledge of RF is a good bit above the average person, but clearly not even close to the same league as many of you. Throughout the summer I work for a company that provides PA and radio equipment to fairgrounds so I have some familiarity with CP185, CP200, GP300's (absolute tanks!) and a bunch of other Radius gear, both on repeater and simplex. I do not, however have any experience in programming them. Within our attraction I program and maintain animatronic PLC's and show control systems from a dozen different vendors, so I'm sure I can pickup using the CPS software pretty quick.
So, with all of that said, currently I have 24 CLS's (1000 and 1110's), many of which were purchased back in 2004. The CLS's have been fine for us, for the most part. They have all held up, not once have I had a failure on any of them. We have gone through a few headsets over the years, but that is to be expected in our line of work. The batteries aren't holding a charge like they used to, but it is to be expected for 9 year old radio's. 1W UHF has been sufficient range for us for the most part, on occasion we get some interference. I have been unable to tell if it was interference or if it was a range/building issue. Our property is right around 28 acres (~1.2mil sq ft, 1200'x1000') and is mostly flat, down in valley. The biggest issue I have with the CLS's is the attack time on Tx, it's very slow. I have to tell my staff to count 2 seconds before talking, after they key their mic. I would guess 10% of the staff does this, so all night long it is constantly "The first part of your transmission was cut off, please repeat". I also have a dozen wally world specials for the parking group that we hire. I believe they are MJ270's, operating on a FRS frequency so I didn't have to deal with another license. They work fine for their use.
Currently, 17 of the CLS's are programmed to one frequency and IEC, the other 7 are on another frequency and IEC code. This, while not ideal, has worked. The 17 is our security, maintenance and operations staff, the other 7 is our actor managers. We have a staff member sit in my tech office basically acting as a relay. She listens to both radio's and relays the info on a patron that punched and actor over to security, etc. It creates a lot of confusion and hassle as it is rather difficult to process two conversations at once. At the end of this season, I'm going to move us to a new system, but I have not yet decided on what I want to do. I will need to go to a minimum of 3 channels (security and maintenance need to be broken into separate groups) as there is to much chatter with them together. The actor side is non-stop talking, which is why I broke them into two groups to begin with.
2 years ago I bought a half dozen DTR 650's and 550's to test with. Overall, they work well, but I haven't put them into full service, so it's hard to tell how the DTR's are going to work with our day to day operations. The pro's that I can come up with for the DTR's are as follows; ideal range for us, completely secure (this has been an issue in the past). They are plenty rugged, can be programmed by myself with CPS, 6 bank chargers are offered and I can see who is keying their mic. This is handy as most of our staff does not use 2 way's on a daily basis and don't realize what they're doing (like the delay I spoke of above). Keying a mic open is common, now I can track them down and smack them upside the head, or disable their radio remotely. Another bonus is the CPS software is free. I really like that I can talk one-to-one if need be, this would come in very handy as most of us don't carry our cell's in the haunt and quite often myself and the other operations manager need to speak privately, which usually involves "meet "here" in 5 minutes". Also a bonus is that there is a confirmation tone for the staff to listen for, before they start talking. Price is right around the other radio's that I'm looking at, with the exception of the asian market GP338's, those are ~$100 cheaper "new". The biggest con that I can come up with is that an actor manager would likely have to take their radio off of the holster to select the security channel. Reaching down and counting 3 clicks to go to the security channel would likely be easier. Then again, I'm not sure most of our staff can actually count, so maybe not. The cell phone-like menu of the DTR might actually work better with the generation of kids we have working. Lastly, our staff members don't listen to the channel well and will proceed to try to talk over each other. The DTR's don't allow this to happen and instead give an error tone.
Otherwise I'm looking at CP185's or CP200's, RD4100's and 4160's as well as the bastard-child import GP338/GP380's.
If I were to go with one of the above radio's, can they be programmed to scan just 2 or 3 channels? IE, I would like to scan the security channel and maintenance channel, but still be able to switch to the actor channel if need be. Can any of the above radio's give a "begin transmission" tone like the DTR's do? I know this would help communication's. Can any of the above give an error tone of the user attempts to transmit over-top of someone else? Is the CPS software for any of the above free? It would appear the only minor drawback with the GP338/380 is the 16 pin connector. As I just spent $700 on replacement headsets this season, I would like to keep them, so I would get the M1 adapters for the GP's.
I would love to hear all of your opinions on which route I should go with this. I'm not opposed at all to buying used, all of my DTR's came from eBay, as well as a few of the CLS's. We are a 501c3 non-profit charity group, so budgets are always tight. Renting for our operating season isn't really an option as we do use the radio's throughout the year during build season as well as a few special events. Not to mention, getting the radio's in and setup before we open is another thing on the checklist to do before we open, that I really don't want to have to do.
Thanks for reading!
So, with all of that said, currently I have 24 CLS's (1000 and 1110's), many of which were purchased back in 2004. The CLS's have been fine for us, for the most part. They have all held up, not once have I had a failure on any of them. We have gone through a few headsets over the years, but that is to be expected in our line of work. The batteries aren't holding a charge like they used to, but it is to be expected for 9 year old radio's. 1W UHF has been sufficient range for us for the most part, on occasion we get some interference. I have been unable to tell if it was interference or if it was a range/building issue. Our property is right around 28 acres (~1.2mil sq ft, 1200'x1000') and is mostly flat, down in valley. The biggest issue I have with the CLS's is the attack time on Tx, it's very slow. I have to tell my staff to count 2 seconds before talking, after they key their mic. I would guess 10% of the staff does this, so all night long it is constantly "The first part of your transmission was cut off, please repeat". I also have a dozen wally world specials for the parking group that we hire. I believe they are MJ270's, operating on a FRS frequency so I didn't have to deal with another license. They work fine for their use.
Currently, 17 of the CLS's are programmed to one frequency and IEC, the other 7 are on another frequency and IEC code. This, while not ideal, has worked. The 17 is our security, maintenance and operations staff, the other 7 is our actor managers. We have a staff member sit in my tech office basically acting as a relay. She listens to both radio's and relays the info on a patron that punched and actor over to security, etc. It creates a lot of confusion and hassle as it is rather difficult to process two conversations at once. At the end of this season, I'm going to move us to a new system, but I have not yet decided on what I want to do. I will need to go to a minimum of 3 channels (security and maintenance need to be broken into separate groups) as there is to much chatter with them together. The actor side is non-stop talking, which is why I broke them into two groups to begin with.
2 years ago I bought a half dozen DTR 650's and 550's to test with. Overall, they work well, but I haven't put them into full service, so it's hard to tell how the DTR's are going to work with our day to day operations. The pro's that I can come up with for the DTR's are as follows; ideal range for us, completely secure (this has been an issue in the past). They are plenty rugged, can be programmed by myself with CPS, 6 bank chargers are offered and I can see who is keying their mic. This is handy as most of our staff does not use 2 way's on a daily basis and don't realize what they're doing (like the delay I spoke of above). Keying a mic open is common, now I can track them down and smack them upside the head, or disable their radio remotely. Another bonus is the CPS software is free. I really like that I can talk one-to-one if need be, this would come in very handy as most of us don't carry our cell's in the haunt and quite often myself and the other operations manager need to speak privately, which usually involves "meet "here" in 5 minutes". Also a bonus is that there is a confirmation tone for the staff to listen for, before they start talking. Price is right around the other radio's that I'm looking at, with the exception of the asian market GP338's, those are ~$100 cheaper "new". The biggest con that I can come up with is that an actor manager would likely have to take their radio off of the holster to select the security channel. Reaching down and counting 3 clicks to go to the security channel would likely be easier. Then again, I'm not sure most of our staff can actually count, so maybe not. The cell phone-like menu of the DTR might actually work better with the generation of kids we have working. Lastly, our staff members don't listen to the channel well and will proceed to try to talk over each other. The DTR's don't allow this to happen and instead give an error tone.
Otherwise I'm looking at CP185's or CP200's, RD4100's and 4160's as well as the bastard-child import GP338/GP380's.
If I were to go with one of the above radio's, can they be programmed to scan just 2 or 3 channels? IE, I would like to scan the security channel and maintenance channel, but still be able to switch to the actor channel if need be. Can any of the above radio's give a "begin transmission" tone like the DTR's do? I know this would help communication's. Can any of the above give an error tone of the user attempts to transmit over-top of someone else? Is the CPS software for any of the above free? It would appear the only minor drawback with the GP338/380 is the 16 pin connector. As I just spent $700 on replacement headsets this season, I would like to keep them, so I would get the M1 adapters for the GP's.
I would love to hear all of your opinions on which route I should go with this. I'm not opposed at all to buying used, all of my DTR's came from eBay, as well as a few of the CLS's. We are a 501c3 non-profit charity group, so budgets are always tight. Renting for our operating season isn't really an option as we do use the radio's throughout the year during build season as well as a few special events. Not to mention, getting the radio's in and setup before we open is another thing on the checklist to do before we open, that I really don't want to have to do.
Thanks for reading!
