Christine Allison wrote: > > Let me say that Dave Krugers comment is exactly on the mark in respect to > the utility of VHF radios. Although I am new to kayaking I cruised for > years with a VHF radio and found it's greatest utility to be for weather > monitoring and communication with bridges and marinas. > > I do feel that here in the north east a ten mile range is a bit pessimistic > I would think that 20 miles (to the Coast Guard) is more realistic. I was not very clear, I fear. My comments referred to a **handheld** 3W or 5W VHF, operating the usual rubber ducky antenna -- from water level, not a 25W VHF driving an 8 foot whip off a boat mast. In my experience, 8 miles is about it from beach to beach, handheld to handheld. If one of the handhelds is in the hands of someone sitting in a yak, on the water, the range is less. Yak to yak, both paddlers on the water, three miles is about all I have been able to get. Finally, I have reliably gotten 10 miles when I had a **clear shot** to a CG repeater (normally on a tall peak), but a clear shot is many tiems impossible here. YMMV, but I bet it can't beat these figures, if you are talking about a handheld VHF. -- Dave Kruger Astoria, OR *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Wed Jun 07 2000 - 18:22:16 PDT
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