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Why is Ham so much cheaper than CB?

  • 23-10-2012 11:36AM
    #1
    martinedwards
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,046 ✭✭✭


    a return to radio after a load of years away.

    searching round ebay for a radio. cbs on ebay are ridiculously expensive!!

    even a 40 channel set is going to come in over £25

    and the sideband rigs go for the same sort of money that they did back in the wild days of the 80s. I saw a Ham Intl Concorde 3 going for £150 recently.

    and ham gear?

    2m.... Baofeng dual band hand helds are under £40 NEW

    I got a Piezo 2m FM mobile set (no repeater codes) for £15.

    and I'm awaiting delivery of a vintage Yaesu FT-101B.

    now, for LESS than the Ham Concorde went for, I have a AM/CW/SSB set that covers all the frequencise that the Concorde does, as well as 10, 15, 20, 40, 80, & 160m

    AND it has more than 4 times the power output......

    AND it plugs into the mains electric!

    When I told my good lady wife that I was going to get back into radio she rolled her eyes and said "that'll cost"

    but here I am, with a HF/VHF shack, 4 antannae, frequency counter, swr meter, 10m matcher all for under £300. (or what I got for the guitar and mandolin I sold on ebay to fund the exercise)

    all I'm missing is SSB on VHF, but I'm in no hurry for that!

    and there are no sweary morons who play music on the call freq's either!!!


Comments

  • #2
    watty
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 32,461 ✭✭✭✭watty


    You can spend €6,400 on a rig, but a good second hand FT101ZD might be under €250, 80W and performance on 10m that makes a brand new CB look like junk.

    CBs are poor value and even the SSB models are poor technically. But a 5W FT817ND is seriously more expensive than a 5W SSB CB, but is all modes, far higher quality and does all Amateur bands from 1.8MHz to 440Mhz excluding 4M/70MHz. It's got a separate receiver for FM band II, DDS and 100KHz to 460MHz approx RX with two gaps.


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