What kind of emergency radio do you have?

[cwatson]

I wasn't sure where to post this. You would think I would know by now but anyway here is the question.

I am looking for a new emergency radio and was wondering what kind you have and the ups and downs of what you are using. I was looking at several of them but the reviews seem to run the gammet on both sides so I figure I would ask the people that know..........the backwoods home forum people :)

Thanks and I appreciate your input

Christine

[grumble]

Christine, I have a couple of them, one decent, another not so good. The decent one is a SW, AM, FM, WB by Kaito (model Voyager). I think I paid about $40 for it on Amazon IIRC. It has a crank, small solar charger, standard AA NiCad batteries, and an AC adapter.

It works, and is loud enough to hear from a few feet away, which is more than I can say for the other one, a little Eton Microlink.

[MissouriFree]

I just went through a lot more reading than I wanted to on the subject and order a Sangean Cl 100.
It was rated high and had not bad marks. BUT it cost $70 or so at Amazon.
from what i read a lot do the job much cheaper but on many the workmanship is pretty bad and they break easy.
will let you all know-- it is suppose to get here next week.

[cwatson]

Thanks Grumble, I was looking at a Kaito too. I will take a closer look at that one.

[cinok]

We just have cheapo midland weather alert radio with a small antenaa. Set up to SAME freq for our county and surrounding counties. Alo have cell phones linked to local news/weather chaneel for any alerts.

[cwatson]

Thanks Cinok, We have had two of the midland's and ended up taking them both back couldn't get them to pick up anything. We don't have anything set up with our cell phones I might take a look into that.

Thanks

[cwatson]

Hi Missouri. Sorry I missed your comment some how. Please let me know how you like your radio when you get it. I will do some reading on that one too. Thanks

[cinok]

Thanks Cinok, We have had two of the midland's and ended up taking them both back couldn't get them to pick up anything. We don't have anything set up with our cell phones I might take a look into that.

Thanks


Here is a link to NOAA with the freq and the coverage area's.

http://www.weather.gov/nwr/Maps/

We are on fringe area so we had to go with an external antenna looks like a cb antenna

[randallhilton]

I have an old radio shack weather radio that uses AA batteries which are easy to find and keep. It works well.

I have an Eton Solarlink ARC FR-500 which has a hand crank, solar panel, a separate battery pack for the solar panel, a place for AA batteries, a place to charge from a 12v charger as well as a USB outlet for charging phones etc. The radio seems to be pretty good but I haven't done a lot of short wave surfing but the signals I've picked up were very crisp.

Downsides: I think it could benefit from an external antenna jack but that's no biggie.

The solar panel is puny. Maybe a couple of days of sunshine would yield a full battery charge but don't count on it for all day listening by any means. Fortunately, it has an alarm built in so one could set the alarm for news times or other important notifications, thereby saving on battery power.

I probably wouldn't buy this one again but I won't give it away now that I have it.

[cubcadet]

As far as real reliable radios, I went for a Sangean ATS 803A shortwave-AM-FM unit about 25 years ago. It is still the all time best rig I have had. I have another Sangean, the ATS 818 ACS, which has a cassette deck built in. Both cost me about $200 each. You can get comparable units on ebay cheaper. I also have a dinky little analog portable that runs off 2 AA batteries. It cost me a whole $5 in a thrift shop. I have had bad luck with windups. If you want good reception, go for one with phase-lock-loop (PLL) digital circuitry in the tuning end. You won`t be sorry.

I have a Midland SAME weather radio too, that works pretty good. I live in the very hilly NE Pennsy stretch of the Endless Mts., and any radio recep. is spotty in FM, or SW, at best. Try locating weather radios in different areas of your house, it may help.

[yardburd]

I am a radio addict and have somewhere beteen 8 and 15 radios. Most are Sangean, Panasonic or Radio Shack (Sangean). I have learned that these are the most efficient brands. All are AM/FM/SW. I have gotten all of them at garage/estate sales for little money. The most expensive was the Panasonic RF-2600 which resides in my kitchen. Paid a whopping $20 for that one. Be patient, be vigilant. You will find one eventually. If you find a SW model, be sure that it has single sideband (SSB) capability so you can listen to ham radio operators. After an emergency, these guys will ALWAYS be the first to emerge from the rubble. In many localities, the local emergency response people (Fire Dept., local Emergency Ops Center, etc.) have pretty good weather band radios available for the asking. If you have the funds, invest in a good CB radio. Again, get one with SSB capability. It will give you 120 channels instead of the usual 40. Install a good antenna (homebrew will work) and put a good exterior ground on it and you will be amazed at what it will do. CB isn't very popular anymore so what you find will be really cheap. Lastly, it will take a whole bunch more out your piggybank, but get a technician ham license and a ham radio. The technician level exam is really easy to pass (mostly rules and regulations) and you will find the local ham club more than willing to assist you to get a license and a radio. Sorry for the long post. I get really excited about the world of radio.

[OzarksJohn]

Howdy.

You should have multiple radios that do different things for you and also provide some overlapping redundancy in your emergency kit. Multi power AC/DC/battery is desirable. In an emergency you'll want to be able to monitor the following:
AM/FM commercial broadcast band
National Weather Service
Shortwave Commercial Broadcasters (WWCR, WWRB, WBCQ, Etc.)
High Frequency HAM (requires SSB(single sideband) feature on shortwave radio)
Local Public Safety and Utilities Operations ("police" scanner)
Local 2 Meter HAM ("police" scanner again)

Being able to listen to all these frequencies and modes with multiple radios will give you an enormous amount of information that will provide your family huge advantage in an emergency. It's difficult to listen to everything at once if you are by yourself but rarely is that the case. Personally I can handle about two scanners and the NWS in operation at once during "tornado time" and still screen out the unimportant to me traffic. I know this sounds like a lot of "toys" to some folks until you experience it once in an emergency, but hearing storm spotters relaying info into a local emergency ops center literally minutes before it goes "public" will make a believer out of you.OzarksJohn