The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Smallholding => Equipment => Topic started by: Norfolk Newby on August 26, 2010, 10:56:13 am
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I was given a pair of small walkie-talkie radios a while ago. They are very useful when I am working in one of my fields. They come as a pair and I have one and my wife the other.
They have a range of about 1 mile but it is line of sight. So they don't work if one is behind a building or below the horizon.
We occasionally get bits of other peoples conversations. However, the radios have several channels so we just change to another when the interference gets annoying.
The other issue with these radios is their battery life. These radios have 3 AAA batteries in (each) and they last about 8 hours. It would be nice to have radios with a longer life battery which can be recharged (like a mobile phone) but we will continue to use what we have while they work. Replacement batteries are easy to get and not too expensive if you buy supermarket ones in a reasonable quantity.
If the idea sounds interesting, Google 'walkie-talkie' and you will get a lot of product offers. Choose the best you can afford. Some are weather proof, and some have other features like more channels and bigger batteries. A socket for earphones would be nice to allow you to hear the radio when wearing ear defenders while working a noisy machine (chainsaw/strimmer/tractor).
NN
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We used to use them but they are rather cumbersome. One day we had some very abusive words from someone using the same channel who couldn't understand why another woman was apparently there with her husband ;D Ooh the air was blue :o Now we find it easier to use our mobile phones
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i got some recently fully rechargeable and use them on the field my little girl is starting to play with them. i used to use them when i was a "boy racer" years ago when we had a convoy it was cheaper then credit used on mobiles . i love listening in on convo's i think its funny and when theres silence you say something to kick it off again i had some one looking for me as i told him to shut up a few yrs ago thought it was a friend and he was sure he was going to kill me so i thought what the hell he cant be to far from me i got in car drove around and found him when 15 cars turned up he did say sorry for the abusiveness of his talking and we let him off . its a piece of fun at the end of it.