Putting this here in advance of our 1st annual BCADV Moab Trip (yes, this will be an annual thing!)
We’re big on using radios for our group rides. They are much, much better and more reliable than Bluetooth options. Great to have a Cardo and Sena to listen to tunes, make a phone call, or talk to 1-2 riding partners on a road rides. But they 100% always fail with the distances and terrain involved in off-road / ADV riding.
They are especially useful in desert areas like what we’ll be riding in Moab:
Groups become quickly separated (wide gaps between riders), as we avoid each other’s dust.
Speeds are often high so the length of the group, from front to back, can be very long.
However, the terrain is often more wide open (no trees to obstruct transmissions), to it’s relatively easy to maintain comms across these long distances above.
The group may become split up, as one half of the group makes it over an obstacle, the other half decides on a go around, and both groups are able to quickly communicate with each other and determine a plan to link up again on the other side.
I’ve been a Baofeng user for years and it’s a great place to start, due to the affordability. However, in my opinion, the radio is overly complicated for what we use them for. Invariably someone shows up to a ride not having done all of their homework to set it up properly and therefore can’t use it, or we waste time programming Timmy’s radio for him at the trailhead.
The Rocky Talky is much simpler, durable, and does everything we need of it. And we have a 20% discount with them. Just ping me, @mulebarn , @ChrisMunro or @RC_John for a code.
I will be ordering an RT before Moab and the BF will be relegated to a spare or or trail loaner. I’m getting the 5w radio + shoulder mic + extended antenna.
I think I’m going to take your advice and run a trucker mic instead of the ear piece. Last group ride was a “hot mic” bonanza and that squelch sound gets annoying inside of your ear constantly.
Totally agree can’t go wrong with RT. Tough and simple. I’m not so sure the Baofeng is as complicated as you’re making it out to be though. Child soldiers the world over use them. They’re like the AK-47 of radios.
I’m a licensed amateur radio guy (KQ4NXZ) though so take my opinion with a grain of salt. It takes a person with a special kind of autism to enjoy radios, but if there’s interest, I could look into putting on a technician class exam to get dudes that are interested in RF licensed. Gives you a bit more freedom out there when you don’t have to deal with a bunch of 12 year olds usurping your GMRS / FRS channel.
Thanks for volunteering to be the club Comm O, sorting out people in the parking lot when they show up on the correct frequency, but not the correct privacy code
We identified a privacy code associated with each frequency that we used because yes, we would get stepped on by other people on the trail
Shoulder mic is always better because if someone has a dirty connection, or a hot mic for some reason, you’re not getting that static directly in your ear
I can help people with their radios. Since I can’t figure out how to change my profile picture and for all the new folks that need to identify me in the parking lot, I ride a KTM 790, have a salt and pepper beard, and love unsolicited advice about which oil to use.
If you need help with your ‘feng, just ping me. Or you can check out this cheat sheet:
Or here is a good video:
I would 100% agree that RT is easier to use, and more rugged. That 20% discount is super enticing. I just have a bunch of baofengs laying around in case the Chinese paratroopers drop in and I need to hit the hills.
How’s the volume on the Rocky Talkies? I ask because I almost never wear a backpack so won’t be using a shoulder mic or keeping the radio near my ear. I have a Baofeng but with it in my tankbag or a jacket pocket I can’t hear it at all. This has sort of worked, as in if I realize I haven’t seen a rider or my group in a long time I pull over, dig the radio out and start communicating. Of course, that means I’m missing any info anyone sends until I’ve decided to pull over.
I’d replace the Baofeng with a RT if it’s loud enough to be heard when sitting on top of my tankbag or in a breast pocket over the sound of the mighty 1090 and whatever thrash metal is coming through my AirPods. If it has similar volume to the Baofeng I’ll keep my monies.
Whelp, I’d say that if you’re not carrying the radio somewhere where you can easily hear it and transmit, either while riding, or stopped, then you’re kinda missing the point of carrying it in the first place.
I get not wanting to wear a backpack. My jacket has a pocket for a water bladder to be worn under the jacket. But even if I went that route, I’d still want to figure out some way to put the shoulder mic close enough to hear it and transmit on the fly.
The scenario is this: Kenny hucks his bike of a cliff and is trapped under the bike. His radio is on his shoulder so he’s able to transmit asking for help. But his riding partners all have their radios in tank bags, jacket pockets, etc, don’t hear his call.
At the end of the day, having unreliable or not easily usable comms is worse than having no comms. With no comms, everyone acts accordingly, because everyone knows there’s no way to communicate with either other. But with unreliable comms, someone is always left out, misses a transmission, etc, and gets lost, because everyone acts as if everyone can hear everyone else.
I do hear you but to clarify a bit, it works fine when stopped. It’s the while riding part I’d like to improve.
I’ll also say that part of how I’ve ended up here is that I tried running the Baofeng in a pack with a shoulder mic and couldn’t hear it at all. Since I don’t like wearing a pack and the shoulder mic was yet another thing to deal with I ditched it because it doesn’t work.
Since the RT’s are physically smaller and more weather resistant I thought I might be able to find a way to keep it closer to my head and if they’re loud enough, it might even be useful…
Agreed. Any shoulder mic isn’t super useful above about 20-30mph, between engine and wind noise. But at least you can quickly stop or slow down, listen in, quickly broadcast, rather than stop, dig out the radio, etc.
The 100%, best solution is helmet speakers, mic, and PTT on the bars, but that’s a whole nother set of costs. That’s what I ran for years in SoCal.
The bad news is there is no such thing as a mic that will work at speed with wind and engine noise. The good news is that the RT shoulder mic is very loud, and the audio quality is head and shoulders above the cheap options. It’s like going from a.m. radio to HD lossless music with Baofeng vs RT. Also, the ergonomics on the RT shoulder mic are very good for gloved hands.
Even if I were running the radio on a tank bag or inside the tank bag, I would have a shoulder mic clipped on the outside top of the tank bag because it’s so much easier to use. And it’s loud enough that if you can’t hear what people are saying, you can generally hear that something is going on. Unless you have an obnoxiously loud exhaust or something.
It only gives you more freedom if there are other nerds in the woods on ham radios. The club will never go down this path because the overhead is absurd, and it’s hard enough to get people to use a dead simple radio with three buttons.
The bottomline is that unless everyone is running helmet speakers with a mic, radios with shoulder mics or just clipped to a pack strap are really only used in emergencies or to communicate an issue, etc. “Hey, Kenny launch his bike off a cliff and I’ve stopped to help him.” With everyone on radios, everyone eventually get that info. They may have to stop and ask you to say again, but everyone eventually gets it. They’re not used for passing casual conversations.
By contrast, when everyone has helmet speakers and PTT on the bars, you can have complete conversations while separated miles apart, can pass navigation info (left at the fork, right at the T, bad washout after the cattle guard, stuff like that), coordinate gas stops, etc.
But like I’ve said, that’s a Level 3 setup, requiring another couple hundred at least for a helmet kit, PTT, etc. But it’s awesome when everyone is running that setup.
oh yea totally unrealistic. I didn’t mean to imply to get everyone ham qualified (that would be absurd), but I’m also fairly certain that not everyone is paying the GMRS license fee either and it’s nice not being stuck to certain channels also the privacy settings can help. FRS is the lowest cost option but you’re limited to 2W.
It’s such an inaccessible hobby if you’re trying to figure it out by yourself and even tho it’s a moto club, I’d be happy to help anyone learn more about RF.
there’s this new fangled fanciness called “mesh networking’ where everyone acts as a repeater for everyone else. Dope concept. Way more complexity.
radios are force multiplier for sure but you gotta pander to the lowest common denominator sometime and I think the club’s SOP hits that sweet spot between simplicity and capability quite nicely.
I recommend you hold off on the helmet kit, PTT expense until you’ve had an opportunity to use the standard setup.
Helmet comms are useful when all / most of the guys you’re riding with are using them also, because communication is just much easier and better. However, when you’re riding with more guys with shoulder mics, most comms are limited to “very important” information – rider down, lost rider, Where’s Waldo, etc – and therefore much less frequent. In which case a shoulder mic is good enough.
