Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

[Fenrisianspirit]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

Radios are fine when everything works.

I had one experience of airsofting with radios so far and to be honest, it sucked pretty bad. But that was mainly down to the kit, the earpiece/mic was very uncomfortable and had a knack of falling out of my ear, I also think we lacked a PTT so you needed hands on the radio which was inconvenient. Then people were too concerned in the firefights to use them or had little useful info to relay.

That being said I am looking at a comms set. Looking at Com-Tacs, PTT and a radio (duh) that will either fit a MBITR case or a working replica as I'm going for a unit impression. Also looking forward to the headset protecting my ears a bit from bbs lol.

[Half Trigger]

Me and the team recently purchased radios, they're not the best by far, but most of the time they get the job done!
I have personally been having difficulty with finding a headset for it, as its a micro jack :/
But they work a treat, and help us communicate on where to rally up when we get split up due to dying etc..


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[meddy]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

i sometimes use my radio when others on the team are using them but when not many are or are a team of there own i don't bother. many times i'v be to a site and different groups had different frequencies (as in from hk and stuff)

[Caveira]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

That'd mean telling the marshals what frequency you're using,

Only if they're after one specific group of people. What I was thinking is that they could scan/channel hop and see what they hear. Just the fact that people knew it was happening would reduce the problem.

and providing them with a radio if you're using a personally-licensed frequency.

That's quite true, but I don't think that most people who are serious enough to buy expensive radios are the biggest problem here. OK, there are dicks at every level of airsoft expenditure, but I've seen this from people running 2 or 3 cheap radios far more than I have from people using expensive kit for a whole team.

What's really sad is that I have seen/heard it quite a few times over the years

[akey]

Our team use them but for them to be effective you need some discipline. We tend to use them to coordinate defence, or when the team splits ie sniper deploys out or a pair go flanking that's when we find them most useful


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[sharpy]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

Me and my team have been considering upgrading our coms to a licensed version as the 446s are good but over longer ranges, you loose contact with others anyway and the most annoying thing I have found with being on the same frequency as every one else is when someone is sat on their PTT button and all you hear for 20 minuets is them talking about how many pints they downed the night before

[No1_sonuk]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

Check out the "BUSINESS RADIO (SIMPLE UK) LICENCE".

£75 for 5 years, and allows the use of a few frequencies over 4 bands, including some low-band VHF (that'd help in the reinforced bunkers mentioned).
Power level up to 5W (10 times PMR446 limit).

This is the licence needed for the Mitex radios some sites use, and you DON'T have to be a business to get it.

All it needs is for one person on the team to get it and authorise the others to operate under that licence.

[sharpy]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

that does sounds tempting and at under £20 per team member for five years seems very reasonable

[No1_sonuk]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

The Mitex radios are relatively expensive, but come ready to go, programmed with channels in the UHF band (unless you get the VHF one). You can get cheaper radios from China that are suitable for the licenced bands, but you'll need someone to program those properly.
They usually have lower power than the Mitex, but still more than 4 times the PMR446 power. You do, though, have to be careful which model you get, as a lot of them have odd headset connections which may not be catered for in PTTs.

BTW, the Mitex radios use 2-pin Kenwood headset connectors.

[FireKnife]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

I have used one to contact a marshal on a large site.

But more often than not I just use my voice and shout, the enemy can often see what you are up to during a firefight so radios and low volume isn't much of an issue.

As for using it for an ambush etc, I would say in a good ambush you should be able to see each other at least each element so things like looks and signals can be given.

Radios do have a use, but often on standard fields that are not that big you can communicate easier with voice or a whistle if you wish to signal a marshal. In terms of pointing out a rallying point in bigger games they can be good but again you need to have the whole team in on this and no-one else listening in. Plus radios can sometimes leave you with a 'do I speak up, did the other person hear me' kind of effect which is only answered by a sudden response or a mis-interpreted order.

'FireKnife'

[Portnoy]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

Only in Medium/big operations. CQB or skirmishes they are largely useless.

[No1_sonuk]

Re: Radios, are they used enough in airsoft?

Only in Medium/big operations. CQB or skirmishes they are largely useless.

I dunno. We sometimes use them in squad actions to keep chat volume down. Visual signals not always useful in woodland.