Motorola RDV5100 Two Way radios

[FIRE]

Considering these radios are VHF, can they be hailed on a specific channel from your boats VHF? I received a set from a friend in the business for general husband to wife communication and got to thinking....It'd be kinda cool to use the boats tall antenna and higher power to reach the radio much further than handheld to handheld.

Anyone ever do this? Maybe there is a way to "tune" the radio for a specific frequency that matches a VHF channel?

 

[TowLou]

Well for starters you will need a radio that will do 2M the upper portion for VHF. Possible with the big M but most of them you need software to program.

Now the legal part. Fcc part 80 for marine use. You need the radio to show the marine channel you are on not frequency and to be able to transmit down to 1 watt. I believe a non programmable radio by hand is allowed but a amature radio where you can program from the keypad is not allowed kinda like a baofeng uv5-r which is more then cappable of what you want but fcc not happy. You are better off to get a hand held marine vhf which is build for the water and can handle getting wet.

Edit I looked up the model. Those radios require a business license and with 10 channels only to program plus not being able to kick it down to 1 watt is a no go for proper use for marine frequencies on a handheld.

 

[Shrew]

Marine VHF band is on 25KHz, while personal two-way radios operate on 12.5kHz. You're better off simply using a VHF handheld. However, personal 2-way can be used person to person and while on land. You cannot do that with marine VHF. That is vessel to vessel. Vessel to land requires a station license for the land station. IT is my understanding that the land station is supposed to be a fix station (marina, dockmaster/harbormaster office, etc). Dockhands do use handhelds on the dock, but my understanding is they are technically operating under the station license.

These may have changed over the years, and I'd love someone to correct me. Seeing as how the frequencies are get saturated over time, opening up marine VHF to chatting with wife and kids on the beach would be a nightmare.

 

[FIRE]

Shrew - This site never seems to disappoint! Your points are well taken and make sense. Thanks for the response!

 

[FIRE]

Thanks TowLou. Appreciate your thoughts.

 

[High Wire]

No one is around to enforce the marine vhf handheld used on shore. For example, take the dinghy to a marina and call back to the boat for a part number. No one cares. Now if you ride around NYC acting out a DieHard movie on CH 16, maybe.
Sell the radios on eBay and buy one or more waterproof marine vhf handhelds.