Mayday, ship to shore... need to hear more.

[jennis9]

we have an old ship to shore radio installed on the boat... its a metal box model, digital with squelch and a 5' (or so) shakespere antennae. i know this is FIRST and foremost an essential piece of safety equipment, but we also monitor the fishing channel.

my question is do they wear out?

I think we should be hearing more... we can sometimes hear an outgoing call from some guy catching a fish and then we dont hear the response, just a little static. is the responding guy out of range? Or do we need a new radio, how do you know? I do ask for a radio check and get an ok.

Let me know how to troubleshoot this - or maybe suggest a newer model of vhs. handheld vs mounted like our box model. Thanks!

 

[mikeregas]

Re: Mayday, ship to shore... need to hear more.

I would try a longer antenae say a seven or eight foot one. The higher in the are the longer the range of the radio. Ship to shore radios work on line of sight and when the earth bends the signal keeps going in a strait line from where it is transmitting. Mess with the squelsh and see what happens with a longer anntenae and the squelsh. If that does not get it the I would look at a new radio.

 

[Bondo]

Re: Mayday, ship to shore... need to hear more.

how do you know? I do ask for a radio check and get an ok.

Ayuh,.... That's 1 way.......

 

[jennis9]

Re: Mayday, ship to shore... need to hear more.

Bond-0, logical... but do they wear out?

 

[NSBCraig]

Re: Mayday, ship to shore... need to hear more.

A radio shouldn't actually wear out.

Antennas go bad and wires go bad but the radio if it was a quality unit should last.

 

[Boatist]

Re: Mayday, ship to shore... need to hear more.

Everything wears out, but VHF radios are pretty good. How you care for your radio probably has more effect than the age of the radio.

A 5 foot antenna mounted 2 feet above the water has a range of 3.75 miles plus the range of the other radio.

Antennas usually have more trouble than than a cared for radio. The antenna that are very flexable fail more than the one that flex very little.

How do you tell? You can check your antenna and basic power out with a VHF SWR meter. If you have any HAM buddies they may have a SWR Bridge for 2 metters that will work fine. With 3 boats you can test your radio compared to another radio by calling another station and moving to a working channel like 68 or 69.
Another thing you can do is turn on one of the weather channel and compare to your buddy boat. This will allow you to compare how well the receiver works.

Handheld range usually about half of the range of a fixed mount unless connected to a good antenna.

A fixed VHF with A 6DB gain antenna with a solid brass radiator will have about 4 times the effective power out of the 25 watt transmiter or 100 watts ERP. However while this can help you get thru it increases the range very little since VHF is line of site.

A hand held with 5 watts out and a rubber duck antenna with a -3db loss will have about 2.5 watts ERP.

 

[jennis9]

Re: Mayday, ship to shore... need to hear more.

Boatist... thanks that's the troubleshooting info I was looking for. I'll give it a whirl.