Episode: 156
Title: HPR0156: FRS/GMRS Walkie Talkie Review
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr0156/hpr0156.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-07 12:30:58

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Hello and welcome to an episode of Hacker Public Radio
I'll be your host for today Deep Geek
Today on Hacker Public Radio this show
a product review of FRS GMRS Walkie Talkies
A Reload Radio Shack
Perhaps you've seen these Walkie Talkies at Radio Shack
Now I'm going to talk to you about today that I recently purchased
They're like hang on a peg and there's a plastic package
and there's a pair of walkie talkies
And the packaging says FRS GMRS Walkie Talkies
Up to a 10 mile range
And these units retail for about $40 for the pair
Which comes $20 a piece
So there are pair of walkie talkies there
I got to mention that they are a good looking pair of walkie talkies
Back when I was a kid and it was CB radios
And the walkie talkies were big clunky
They looked more like something out of a World War II movie
These things are small sexy units
With a tiny built-in antenna
They have a gold faceplate
Looks good
You know
The kiddie walkie talkies
I looked at them recently
And preparation for this episode of HPR
And the kiddie walkie talkies
A thousand feet
Yes feet
Range
So the kiddie talkies
One channel
You're not going to get out
You're not going to get any distance out of them
Certainly because
The range in the real world test
Is only a fraction of what they say
That's what they say up to
But I'd like to talk about that later
Want to get a little bit more technical
About these units
Okay walkie talkies
What's the big deal? You know
You push the button
You're talking to it
The other one pops alive
Well these things are a little bit more functional
Than what I expected
First of all, they have a built-in scanner
So they come with 22 channels
You push the scanner button
It scans all 22 channels
And you can pick up some interesting things
Out there
You can pick up a couple of powerful base stations
In the distance
I can tell because I can hear the static
You know as they broadcast
I also found a
What appears to be a
Spanish language taxi dispatcher
Operating
And closer to the city
It's been a lot of fun
What can I say?
Picking up all these things out there
In my neighborhood where I'm at
There's not a lot of use of these
Point to channels, getting a free channel
Isn't a big deal at all
However, from reading the web
About these I can see that
A very popular usage is
Family outings
And going to theme parks
And I understand that using these
In a theme park
It can get quite busy on these frequencies
Which is the second
Really interesting feature I didn't expect
Is that there's a thing called
Privacy codes
Like the range
Instead of just telling you how powerful something is
Off the bat
They're a little zealous about
Simplifying things from marketing
It's not really privacy
What it is is there's a code you set
And that code
Will only activate
Other units
They're listening for the same code
So it really should be called
The screen out other units
Function but that would sound really bad
They call privacy codes
And the ones I got you know
Had a hundred of these
So even if the channels were getting crowded
You know you could say okay
Use channel 22 on privacy code
14 and then only
When I used it
Only people listening for privacy code
14 would pick up
Provide they had the privacy code set
Eavesdropping is still a big issue
So
These little units
Will is up to 10 miles
Well
You know maybe if you have
Two people staying on a mountain top
To 10 miles of distance between them
And nothing in between
You can get 10 miles
Inactuality testing these
Driving around from Cauticore
I got one mile
And in really bad terrain on foot
I got a half a mile
So
You know
They're really
I'm going to when I talk technical
A little bit more technical about these things
I'll talk about the power involved
It's an issue
But before I get to that
I do want to talk about licensing
Because there's a very good chance
That if you're listening to this program
You're listening in the states
In the United States of America
And here two way conversations
By radio governed by the Federal Communications Commission
FCC.gov
These walkie talkies are supposed to be licensed
The license cost $80
Requires no test
And applies to your whole family
So for $80 for five years
You and everyone in your family
Can use these walkie talkies
Nice and legal like
So I highly recommend getting the license
Of being official about it
However I do note from reading the
Statistics on the web pages
That there are a lot more sales
There are license applications
There are a few slight restrictions
On the use near Canada
Apparently a few of the frequencies
Are being used from other services
And Canadian jurisdictions
But that's all in the manual
So read the manual
So let's get a little bit more technical
Let's talk about that range
Now these walkie talkies they say
Up to 10 mile range
And I said that I got in a real world
About a mile
In a car
Well they're really
One watt walkie talkies
So
If you were interested in these
I would definitely look online
And get a pair of five watt
Five watt walkie talkies
In this class
Other
Most powerful walkie talkies you can get
That will
Actually effectively triple your range
So you should be able to get
Three miles in a car
And I can really bad
Train on foot maybe
Mile into half
Which could be really useful
So I would recommend
Going paying the few extra dollars
You know maybe you end up paying twice as much
Be much more useful
You know I have a rather large family
That I'm married into
And we can actually use the extra units
So I don't mind
But that might not be your situation
Half a watt to five watts
Now
The walkie talkies that I'm particularly talking about
The 10 mile range radio shacks
There's eight channels
For family radio service that do not require licensing
And if you switch to one of those channels
It cuts back to a half a watt
And then you can use it
Without license sure
As much as you want
For whatever you want
And it's not like amateur radio
Businesses forbidden
You're allowed to discuss your family business
So if your family owns a business
And you're delivering stuff
Use these to your heart's content
But the other channels
The other
Fourteen channels
Are more powerful in this unit
Progressive one watt
Need the licensing
And if you get the more powerful one
The five watts
So you need the licensing for those
And they broadcast in the
Four hundred
Megahertz band
Do you guys remember
The old UHF channels
You know you like
There used to be a dial on a TV set
Between two and 13
You would have these other
Fourteen through 83
That puts it about
The old channel 80
And they got rid of that
That's where these are
You know the public does get a few
Channels out of the deal
Instead of the FCC just
Making money at an auction of
Frequencies
And that band is known
For its line of site communication
So the licensing used to be
A lot stricter
And the CB systems band
Radio service days
When those were a fed
And a fashion
You used to have to license
To operate around 27 megahertz
Not 200 megahertz
And at 27 megahertz
During the right
Weather conditions
Or meteorological conditions
Would be more correct
Can increase the range
But this frequency
It's strictly line of site
Where the conditions show
And affect it too much
What this frequency does
Effect very nicely
And not radio enthusiasts
Don't understand this
But radio frequency affects antenna size
And so
This very high frequency means
That you have a very small built-in antenna
Whereas the old
You know 27 megahertz units
Used to have an antenna
That would
Untell a scope and be
You know maybe six feet above your head
So
For the bank for your buck
Not use cell minutes
Go back and forth
You got to move cars around
Or stuff like that
I would recommend getting units
Just like these
Okay, today's gig tidbit
I was actually considering doing
I talked about CB radio a lot in this episode
And I was actually considering
Doing a CB radio retrospective
And talk about the
Wild and woolly days of CB radio
And I said you know what
So I decided to spare you
So but the best anecdote
And to give you a
Concept of the change of
Technology because we are
Interest in technology here
In the time to have one good story
One really good story
It has to do with
What's known as free banding
Which is a word that
The amateur radio scene uses
For to mean operating
And frequencies you aren't supposed to be on
Now the old days of CB radio
You know you might remember
There were 23 channels
And we didn't have microcontrollers
Yet in those days
I'm going way back to the 70s now
You know
Someone nicknamed me Gramps
At the Hope conference
But then pull up a chair
And that grandpa tell you a story
You know
CB radio used to be
All solid state electronics
This came after tubes and before chips
So if you opened up your CB radio
You would see 23 pairs of crystals
Standing in a row
And each pair was for
Each channel that you could select on the far the radio
And one was a transmit crystal
That controlled the frequency you transmitted on
One was the received crystal
And the transmit crystals
Were cut a little bit above
Or a little bit below the received crystals
And CB radio was big in the 70s
I mean you know there's a bunch of movies
I'm sure you all seen Smoky and the Bandit
You know
A lot of people for a lot of people
What that meant was that we had to pretend to be truck drivers
For a while
But for
Hacker types
For people who were interested in technology and experimenting
There was a whole scene of
Pushing radios in directions
They weren't meant to be pushed in
And CB radios were particularly vulnerable to this
You know
Pushing radios very
They don't mean to go
You know one technique
Involved in hacking in general
Is to just try switching things around
Or mixing and matching things
Case in point
Amateur radio operators in this country
Often use which knows a linear amplifier
So if they're in a car
And their car radio you know
They might put through an amplifier
That would multiply it by 300 times
And they would go up to a legal
1500 watt
Limit for amateur radio operators
The limit for CB radios is 4 watts
Alright
So like one of the things people used to do
You know
To get out further with the radio
Is they would take a ham radios
Ham radio operators
And then you amplify it
Plug into the CB radio
And have you know
The equivalent of your local
AM news station
In a car you know
And then they would wonder why the paint melted
Where the antenna was mounted on the car
These things happened
But you know
The country wasn't to CB radio
It was a fashion they were making movies about
Involving CB radios
They were making TV shows that featured CB radios
And creating each other
What we're driving talking about
Work hops were a crap
It was crowded
And we all wanted to use it
So some people sought to alleviate the crowdingness
So what some people did
Is they used the old hacker technique
Of you know
Pulling apart components
And stitching things around
And if you opened up your CB radio
And took the last one
Channel 23
All of a sudden you had a really really quiet channel
Where you, your friends
And maybe a few people around you
Who were as clever as you
Hung out
Well this was all fine and good
After CB radio died down
We found out the truth of the matter
Which was
That this practice event
Effectively put you on a frequency
Reserved for the Central Intelligence Agency
Of America
If I can imagine a list of
Federal agencies
I don't want to screw with
They're on it
So you know
Back in those days
We were hijacking the CIA's frequencies
Nice to find out later
Oh well
That's my gig tip it for today
Have a great day
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