Introducing the Home Patrol One. Don't stay home without it.

Originally posted by Violater1
This is what I use in my B.O.B.
www.greamerica.com...
GRE PSR-500. You can get a little better than this,
and that is the PSR-800.

I have heard people talk about GRE, is that one APCO-25?

Around here most of the emergency services are now APCO-25

I see it now, P25.

It might be a better scanner than the Home Patrol 1. I like the interface and automatic everything in the Home Patrol since I am a novice.

Originally posted by LrBc1275
Like how you can punch in your zip code and it will scan for agency frequencies. However in a SHTF scenario you might not have power so how are you gonna get this to work without a crap load of batteries??

What? You don't have a crap load of batteries already. or a generator? If you don't have either, you can't claim you are in any way prepared.

And does this allow trunked frequencies?? if not its probably useless, because in a SHTF time, most agencies are using trunked systems so people cant listen in.

Why, yes, as a matter of fact, it does allow trunked frequencies! So much for that criticism.

And also, I typed in my zip code and it found frequencies that I already have on my hand held scanner for half the price. I would use your handheld and and use this to find the freq www.cityfreq.com...

Sure it did, but you had to program them in, plus your scanner has nowhere near the capabilities of this one. cityfreq.com is the most awkward place to use I've ever seen. Anybody: Go there and see what you're up against, then compare it to the way this sucker works. It's no contest.

good luck my friend..sorry no star for you

Nor for you.

Originally posted by schuyler

Originally posted by LrBc1275
Sure it did, but you had to program them in, plus your scanner has nowhere near the capabilities of this one. cityfreq.com is the most awkward place to use I've ever seen. Anybody: Go there and see what you're up against, then compare it to the way this sucker works. It's no contest.

good luck my friend..sorry no star for you

Nor for you.

edit on 10/16/2011 by schuyler because: (no reason given)

I just took a look at the new GRE and you know it is trying to keep up with the Joneses now.

It has the chip in it and the database installed at the factory, and firmware updates and similar features except it went for the Walkman Mp3 player type interface.

I think the touch screen has that beat. I have heard people say they like the vertical orientation of their regular scanners, but I think for me, the larger horizontal screen, just makes more sense.

Now if they would only make a ham radio like that or even a GMRS/FRS transceiver I bet they would sell a lot of them. It might become the new CB of our time. Except I guess with CB occasionally you get skip and can reach some distance. I don't see why they don't have some ham bands that don't require a license.

Or license the antennas if it is the antennas that are the danger.

You know when TSHTF it will be the CB bands where you will hear all the screaming. That is where all the unprepared people will be.They will pull their antique CB out of the garage or attic and be yelling help into it.
Sure as shootin.

Originally posted by Rocketman7
89 bucks for a Uniden CB for the van
At least on the van the antenna would be less of an issue.

That is a nice cb, but not a export and you would be stuck with a 40 ch radio that could get crowded with skip. But if you get an older Uniden, the pll chips can be modified for extra channels lol... This is so ancient technology to me.

You should look into a RCI 2950DX or maybe something like this lol www.copper.com... That is a Connex CX 3300HP, Connex are very rugged radios, they would out live you. It has dual Finals at 40 Watts, way better than a Uniden.

Originally posted by Rocketman7
I will be able to use it as a repeater with my handheld if I want to, to boost my hand held signal from 5 watts to the 50 watts of the mobile correct?

Use your handheld as a repeater? Yeah if you rx and manually tx to another freq. but it's not going to give you 50 watts. you would need a 50 watt 2 Meter Linear Amp because that radio only does 5 watts. As well, to turn your radio into a true repeater would require some modifications, a simple way would require two radios.

Edit: ah! yeah wouxun mobile would boost you to 50 watts....as a repeater, same thing as above,,, thought you talking about the handheld lol.


get two handhelds use one for rx and use the 50 watt mobile to retransmit using vox or some silly little rig like that....


or get 3 handhelds heh..2 for the repeater. amp one up to 200watts,,, no need for the mobile....just make sure you have a good antenna for your home made repeater.

reply to post by schuyler


Thank you for your pointless reply.

What? You don't have a crap load of batteries already. or a generator? If you don't have either, you can't claim you are in any way prepared.

I actually do have a generator, and a crap-load of batteries. I also have a Phono-Solar attachment for a generator. Anybody: google it. So thank you for insinuating my ill-preparedness.

Why, yes, as a matter of fact, it does allow trunked frequencies! So much for that criticism.

That was not criticism, that was a question...but again thank you.

Sure it did, but you had to program them in, plus your scanner has nowhere near the capabilities of this one. cityfreq.com is the most awkward place to use I've ever seen. Anybody: Go there and see what you're up against, then compare it to the way this sucker works. It's no contest.

It is actually a simple website to use, and it contains all of the same frequencies that are found via location/gps. It was not meant to be "better" it was an example of how to find freqs to the OP.

Never once doubted the this product, just wanted to have some dialogue with the OP about it. What, you never questioned anything before you attempted to purchase it??

Confirmed my order today to Universal Radio. They have everything in stock, except the better antenna for the Home Patrol 1. They said 2 to 3 weeks to get it. The bulk of the order will take 7 business days so I won't see anything till next week probably.

I could shop elsewhere but you know those Diamond antennas are the cats meow baby.

And for the Wouxun hand held the Diamond antenna for it gives 6 to 10 times better reception according to reviews at E-Ham.

Originally posted by Rocketman7
Confirmed my order today to Universal Radio. They have everything in stock, except the better antenna for the Home Patrol 1. They said 2 to 3 weeks to get it. The bulk of the order will take 7 business days so I won't see anything till next week probably.

I could shop elsewhere but you know those Diamond antennas are the cats meow baby.

And for the Wouxun hand held the Diamond antenna for it gives 6 to 10 times better reception according to reviews at E-Ham.

Good luck with it...make sure you let us know how you make out!

I do not know why everyone has to have all these thing on their cell phones. I bought my wife's Garman GPS for her car several years ago on sale for like $125.00 A friend has a TomTom. You can get the magellan and Garman GPS non car hand held units like outdoor people use, but they are more $$$ GPS satellites should be up in most cases. The military is putting up new satellites that are not going to use the same frequencies as the current ones. I do not know if the current ones are getting old or what.

Originally posted by Papagrune
I do not know why everyone has to have all these thing on their cell phones. I bought my wife's Garman GPS for her car several years ago on sale for like $125.00 A friend has a TomTom. You can get the magellan and Garman GPS non car hand held units like outdoor people use, but they are more $$$ GPS satellites should be up in most cases. The military is putting up new satellites that are not going to use the same frequencies as the current ones. I do not know if the current ones are getting old or what.

You would think that unless its CME doom the GPS should still work. Until it needs maintenance. Then it won't get any updates from the ground and then it might go down.

I bought a hundred dollar unit for my car a while back just because it looked cool and I wanted one. I drive delivery in my city and hardly go anywhere so really I had no need for it, but I was surprised that it had a nice British female voice, and it would plot the best route through traffic as soon as you press a destination, and then give you voice commands to turn right or left.
You know the most fuel efficient way to get where you are going.

That was quite impressive. And it was quite up to date for my area as far as the map went. So I used it all the time until I sold that car. But you know with all that wonderful technology, they still had a problem with just turning the thing on and off and charging. Some times it just didn't want to turn on, or off, and some times it wouldn't charge. I guess thats why it was only a hundred bucks on sale when the original price was $270.

Its like the paper towel dispensers in public washrooms. Some day they will get that figured out and be able to do that correctly too. Lord knows they never give up trying.

SO I bought a second Wouxun today and added it to my order, and had to send back and forth 5 emails before I could get anywhere because of the shipping. If you ship ground, its 25 bucks, 5 to 7 business days, the next up from that air, costs $120 for shipping. I think maybe because 4 pounds of radio equipment looks like it might be a bomb so they have to inspect it before they will let it on the plane.

Hopefully I beat the Christmas rush on the main bulk of the order.
The cool upgrade antenna for the Home Patrol 1 is on back order 3 weeks, so that will put it into the Christmas rush probably. So I will be lucky to get it around Christmas some time.

He wouldn't ship it US postal service because it was worth over $500 and I assume that is because anything worth more than $500 will just never get there at all.

I tried to get them to give me 10 bucks off the second radio because I spent $700 but no dice. (I thought America was hard up???)
I might have been better off just buying it from Hong Kong direct and they can probably ship cheap by air.

reply to post by Rocketman7


I finally bought my 1st Chinese radios heh... I used to avoid Chinese products like the plague, but these radios are way to nice to pass up. I went with the BAOFENG UV-100, bought 3 of them just in case for that shtf repeater! It is exactly like the UV-3R but with a different housing and way cheaper than a Yaesu VX-3R. I wanted a radio to fit in my pocket or throw into my BOB, and this is the one.

I forgot to add:
If you don't hang your repeater antenna high enough, your 50 watts would be useless and a battery killer. For a shtf repeater I would rather use solar-power, 2 to 5 watts with a DIY antenna and coax.

I would start my shtf repeater like this: simple and fast....
www.youtube.com...




Don't forget to let us know how you like the Home Patrol One.
I wasn't joking about connex radios.

Originally posted by imitator
reply to post by Rocketman7

 

I finally bought my 1st Chinese radios heh... I used to avoid Chinese products like the plague, but these radios are way to nice to pass up. I went with the BAOFENG UV-100, bought 3 of them just in case for that shtf repeater! It is exactly like the UV-3R but with a different housing and way cheaper than a Yaesu VX-3R. I wanted a radio to fit in my pocket or throw into my BOB, and this is the one.

I forgot to add:
If you don't hang your repeater antenna high enough, your 50 watts would be useless and a battery killer. For a shtf repeater I would rather use solar-power, 2 to 5 watts with a DIY antenna and coax.

I would start my shtf repeater like this: simple and fast....
www.youtube.com...

Don't forget to let us know how you like the Home Patrol One.
I wasn't joking about connex radios.

edit on 27-10-2011 by imitator because: (no reason given)

Cool. That looks easy enough.

And the BAOFENG UV-100 those are quite reasonably priced.

Well I checked on my order at Universal Radio a couple days ago and after 9 days they had not yet filled the order.

So I canceled it and went looking again. The reason I chose them in the first place was because they had everything in the one location, but then they said the one antenna was on back order.
And then they just ended up being lazy about processing my order even though I said ship the antenna separately later.

So I ended up having to buy the Home Patrol 1 form one place and the Wouxun from another.

And instead of two Wouxuns I got their last one.

I went to Scannermaster for the home patrol 1, and it shipped the next day, passed from Holiston MA to New York, and into Canada and is now on route.
Great service great price.

I went to Technology Direct Canada for the Wouxun and got it at American or Hong Kong pricing so it will probably be here in a couple days.

I paid twice what I could have gotten the BAOFENG for
(for the Wouxun UVD1P)

I paid 114, then added a battery eliminator and I will show you...

1 x Wouxun KG-UVD1P Dual Band Two-way Radio w/ PTT Earphone (KG-UVD1P) = 114.99
1 x Wouxun Dry Battery Case - AA x 5, 7.5V (AACASE) = 9.99
1 x Wouxun 12~24V Car Battery Eliminator (12VELIM) = 15.99

So maybe instead of buying another one, I might buy 2 BAOFENGs. Let me know how they work and if you are satisfied.

The cool thing about the car battery eliminator is it is not a charger. You take off the Lithium battery and you stick this unit on and it draws right from the car battery. Good for SHTF.

I think it might take a cross bow to get over this tree.

I will show you what I thought would be cool. I bought an RC helicopter. I found one with a range stated as 1000 meters (1km) 2.4 Ghz. And it could stay in the air 15 minutes with the battery provided. 800 mAh.

So I ordered a better battery 5500 mAh which should give me an hour fly time. If I need it.

Then I ordered a spy cam that goes under it for recon. And it is 2.4 Ghz as well.

So then I will use my SONY Glasstrons, for the cam, and even if it is 1 Km away, I will have a cockpit view.

So I bought the helicopter on sale for 89 bucks without researching it since its my first one and I expect to learn how to fly it. It comes with simulator software that you connect to your computer and use the controller in the USB port to practice flight to avoid this....




So that might lift a wire but what I really need to do odd jobs like that would be this...




But that one costs 900 dollars, so I am looking for a cheap Chinese equivalent for 150 bucks.

That thing sucks. I can get a Wouxun ham radio 136-500 mhz and program all the freqs from my area that that thing pulls in. Its not what the police are using in a lot of citys they have gone over to the 800-900-mhz cell phone ranges now. Also the 136-174 is 2 meter ham. You have to unlock it but thats easy with the 15 dollar programing cable and software. If anyone wants more info on that radio ask I have a few sets. There great for the SnR work B/C there dual banders I can have two freq on at once for inter agency coms. Oh the best thing you can buy five of the wouxun for the price one of the homepatrol-1..

So basically what I am trying to accomplish since I already own a pair of video goggles, is this




But instead of 10 thousand dollars I want to spend 150 dollars.

If it gets shot down with buckshot oh well.

I will try to find another one and maybe a better one in a partly burnt out building.

So then since my RC helicopter claims a range of 1 km, I would like to boost that to 30 km.

So I can even be on the mountain close by here and see what is going on in the city before returning if I need to flee the city.

So then boosting the 2.4 Ghz signal is a challenge. I really don't know how to do that yet.

Battery life for fly time is no problem with LiPoly light weight long life plastic RC batteries.

In China, a 5500 LiPol is 40 bucks. So I bought one. I even shipped it the long way. 2 weeks to a month free shipping. Since I am in no hurry right now for it.

But how to boost the 2.4 gHz signal? On the helicopter, the camera and the controller. To get line of sight 30 km range.

So Ideally on a windless day and we get plenty of those here, so much so that I complain about the lack of breeze constantly, on a windless day, I would like to just have the lap top fly the helicopter.

Use the simulator software, and get some similar control software, and hook up a long range 2.4 bridge or antenna system or whatever, like this bridge claims 30 km range...
2.4 Ghz Bridge

But then you would need the helicopter and the camera to have that range also.

Supposedly, you could plot a course, on the lap top, tell it 100 feet off the ground, and then let the lap top fly the helicopter on a mission. Then just record the footage you view and look at it after.

If need be you take over and fly manual.

Now thats a lot of wishing right there but it might be possible.

One thing you can do is connect a speaker, and broadcast or a small siren.

I doubt there is a light weight radio that you could add to it, to increase your hand held range.

They have a 3Km city range I think.

Originally posted by Arkansas
That thing sucks. I can get a Wouxun ham radio 136-500 mhz and program all the freqs from my area that that thing pulls in. Its not what the police are using in a lot of citys they have gone over to the 800-900-mhz cell phone ranges now. Also the 136-174 is 2 meter ham. You have to unlock it but thats easy with the 15 dollar programing cable and software. If anyone wants more info on that radio ask I have a few sets. There great for the SnR work B/C there dual banders I can have two freq on at once for inter agency coms. Oh the best thing you can buy five of the wouxun for the price one of the homepatrol-1..

Well I bought one Wouxun and one Home Patrol 1.

The Wouxun is not APCO 25.

And so you can't get hardly anything because that is the new standard like Trunking is in Europe (TETRA) in Europe.

But I think the Wouxun comes with a programming cable but if it doesn't I was going to buy that separately.

I also want to get a better antenna for it and the Home Patrol 1.

But after the problems I had just getting something ordered, I thought I will do one thing at a time.
Get the radios, then get the accessories. So the radios should be here Monday or Tuesday.
(I hope)
They are in transit.

reply to post by Rocketman7

I paid twice what I could have gotten the BAOFENG for
(for the Wouxun UVD1P)

That's because the Wouxun UVD1P has more features and watts than the BAOFENG. I still plan to get a Wouxun, it's a very nice radio spec wise. I only choose BAOFENG UV-100 because of it's very small size and price.

The cool thing about the car battery eliminator is it is not a charger. You take off the Lithium battery and you stick this unit on and it draws right from the car battery. Good for SHTF.

Good ideal, I probably need to get one of those. I bet you could build one easily from a bad battery just using the housing. I looked at BAOFENG's "car battery eliminator" and they looked like a car battery charger plug. lol

But that one costs 900 dollars, so I am looking for a cheap Chinese equivalent for 150 bucks.

I dunno, it seems a slingshot would be much easier, unless you plan to do reconnaissance. I would rather buy a Russian trench stereo periscope lol. But really you could slingshot a camera too, just the same as raising an shtf antenna etc.

The first time I've seen that helicopter was in this video lol:
www.youtube.com...

Originally posted by imitator

The first time I've seen that helicopter was in this video lol:
www.youtube.com...

edit on 28-10-2011 by imitator because: (no reason given)

Nice accessories.

Yes I took a look at that BOAFENG and I saw it was 2 watts but I read at eHam a guy with a BAOFENG got 10 miles and hit the repeater on low power setting.
Which I don't know 0.5 watts

Its not the same model. They didn't have the same model reviewed there.

You know where those BAOFENG get there transceiver from is those red and yellow radios.
I think the guts are made by Wouxun because they have the same software.
MTC has made their own now using that same board I think but they sell them for 65 bucks.

I think I am going to buy two Baofengs from here

If I spend 110 bucks for two radios, they are bound to be better than 2 GMRS family band walkie talkies for 70 bucks.

If my Wouxun breaks down I will have two spares.

And as you say, you could make a SHTF repeater.

Makes sense to me and also if when TSHTF you find 2 Russian girls who need a lift, you can give them each a walkie talkie.

Ok so finally it came in the mail today.

Here is a picture

I ended up canceling my order at Universal Radio and going to Scanmaster since Universal was too lazy to process my order. Scanmaster did a good job and even warned me that there might be duty or taxes at the border.

Surprise surprise the postal delivery guy wanted 68 bucks! to cover taxes.

Oh well, when you want something, who cares about a bit of taxes.

So today I ordered a Diamond antenna for it. Scanmaster didn't have the high gain antenna. I live in a little valley and as a result the standard duck antenna doesn't pick up anything.

But it was easy to set up, once I figured out that I needed to install the software in WIndows XP rather than Windows Server 2003, the software wouldn't connect to Home Patrol's website and upgrade the firmware unless I was using WIndows XP.
No big deal I have a multi-boot computer system.

SO! So far so good, and tonight I will take it on my delivery route with me, and see what I can receive with that standard duck antenna.

I also got my Wouxun KG-UVD1P yesterday and ordered a Wouxun KG-UVD3 today. I figured better to get two similar radios, then you only have to learn the functions of one, and with a cloning cable, I can program one and do both at the same time.

Also ordered the Diamond antenna for the Wouxun.

I feel good having some equipment now for my bug out bag. It is nice to be informed when TSHTF.

And may be nice just to hear a human voice. Who knows.