[K3CAL] CARA Weekly Net Notes 11/13/2023

[Matt Orr]

Sorry for missing the net. I dosed off to sleep in my chair just before the net. I blame a big dinner and food coma!

I wanted to reply to Dale, N3ILH about his question about APRS mobile radios here in the group as maybe others may be wondering the same thing.

Currently, the only new radios available are from Yaesu and some Chinese radios with built in APRS.  I think Anytone offers it in some of their models.

The Yaesu FTM 200, 300 and 500 offer APRS built in.

The Kenwood D710GA was the holy grail for APRS ready radios since they had a real built in TNC. The built in TNC was a real TNC that allowed you to connect a computer direct to the radio and use it for packet if you wanted to.

The Yaesu and other brands do not have a real TNC, and just perform APRS functions only.

The Kenwood D710GA is the second generation of the radio series with the first generation being the Kenwood D710A. The difference was, the "GA" model had a built in GPS receiver and fixed a serious hardware problem inside the radio. I can't recommend the first generation since the flaw involved failed filters needing serious work and modification to make the radios reliable again.

However the D710GA has been discontinued now for a couple of years. A shame as it was a really nice radio.

For something brand new, I can only really recommend a Yaesu. I have an FTM-400 here at home, and it will APRS just fine after some minor menu setting tweaks. I haven't used one of the Chinese radios myself, so I cant truthfully report on how well they work on APRS.

If you just want a simple vehicle tracker, Byonics makes an all-in-one APRS tracker. It's a 10 watt dedicated radio with antenna, GPS receiver and cig lighter plug. https://www.byonics.com/rtg
One thing nice about this setup, you could hide the equipment somewhere out of the way, wire it to your ignition switch and have a poor mans LoJack system if your vehicle gets stolen. It might help locate your car, maybe.

Hope this helps!

Matt N3IVK

________________________________
From: k3cal-bounces at mailman.qth.net <k3cal-bounces at mailman.qth.net> on behalf of ERIK Johnson <emtpej at comcast.net>
Sent: Monday, November 13, 2023 8:33 PM
To: Calvert Amateur Radio Association - K3CAL <k3cal at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: [K3CAL] CARA Weekly Net Notes 11/13/2023

CARA net Monday, November 6, 2023
K3CAL.org 146.985 repeater and 444.950 repeater (linked)
Net Control: KB3WFV

N3ILH: looking for APRS mobile – taking suggestions for best transceiver.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.qth.net/pipermail/k3cal/attachments/20231114/7d02d1e2/attachment-0001.html>