*** Hand-Held Aircraft Radios ***

From:	 Rick De Castro [decastro@pacificnet.net]
Sent:	 Friday, June 26, 1998 7:19 PM
To:	 sar-l@listserv.islandnet.com
Cc:	 sar-l@islandnet.com
Subject: Re: Aviation radios

Georges Kleinbaum wrote:
>I am looking to purchase hand-held aviation radios for ground-to-air
>communication.  Looking at a catalog (Sporty's), i found things like the
>Bendix KX-99 and the ICOM IC-A22.  But, I have no idea how useful these
>are in actual field use.

>I have no experience with hand-helds. These radios are to go out with SAR
>teams in the field (or at least to the SAR base) to enable them to talk
>with air support who don't always have the capability to reach the ground
>frequencies.
>
>Price is not a major concern at this point, quality and capability are.
>Acquisition of the NAVAID frequencies is not necessary as these are for the
>ground teams, not for the aircrews. If you know a dealer and/or prices
please let me know that also.
>Thanks in advance!
>
>georges kleinbaum
>State SAR Coordinator
>Salem, Oregon, USA
>gkleinba@oem.state.or.us

If you're talking to civilian aircraft or helo's, theyr'e real handy.
Almost all civilian aircraft have a VHF-AM radio or two. Most don't have
FM of any sort. Most military aircraft have UHF-AM and/or Tactical FM,
which isn't too helpful.

The best solution is to have an appropriate FM radio on the aircraft, but
having aircraft band radios on the ground team is good too. Of the two
you mentioned, I would personally get the Bendix, since it's a durable
radio that has interchangeable accessories (except antenna) with my
other BK radios. I actually have a Comm-Spec handheld, which was one of
the first small, synthesized AM radios made. It's just been discontinued.

The really cool thing about it is that while handheld aircraft radios
typically put out a watt or less, Comm-Spec has (had?) an amplifier that
cranks it to 10 watts. Since most aircraft radios are 7 or 8 watts on a
good day, and I have better cable and antennas, I can reach further than
they can.

Icom also makes (made?) a very fine aircraft band radio, that had
interchangeable accessories with the H/U16/IC-02AT type radios. I thought
that if I had to replace the Comm-Spec I'd get an Icom, since I also have
 bunch of accessories, but since I'm switching to BK's, I'd get the BK.
Any radio that is firefighter-proof has to be OK.

As far as a dealer goes, you might try buying them directly from
Bendix-King on the Government GSA contract. If you want a dealer, I can
recommend Nida Communications, in the (818) area code (Los Angeles area).
Price should be around $400 or so, I think.

Rick De Castro
decastro@pacificnet.net Warning: I am a trained professional.
No, Really! Do Not try this yourself - it could get ugly
Rick N6RCX NREMT SAR Tech
Richard A. De Castro -  To those who have defended it, Freedom
has a flavor the Protected will never enjoy.