TYT TH9800 Quad band?

[The Heretic]

Seems to be a clone of a Yaesu FT 8900, but with more capabilities (like RX on AM in 10-11M which would be good in a SHTF situation) and some other wider freq ranges (including FSR/GMRS?).

It is also two thirds the cost of the Yaesu.

Reading reviews are mixed. On Amazon most seem to like it with a few getting duds. On ham sites, it seems about 50-50 with the older the review (back to 2014) the worse it gets. With a few duds, some having problems after 6 months to a year, and so on.

Maybe TYT got better quality over time?

A ham I used to be in the USCG recommended it to me when I asked him about the Yaesu.

I really like the fact that it has 10-11M AM RX as listening to CB band and others could be valuable, even if just driving down the highway on a normal day. There seems to be some controversy as to whether it can transmit AM on 10-11M.

My goal is to have one or more mobile radios with more than just 2M/70cm capabilities for my rigs. I would like to have a C4FM Yaesu but as far as I know they don't make any quad band C4FM mobile rigs, and Yaesu has their freqs locked down so that they are FCC type accepted. Plus, Yaesu rigs are 50% to several times as expensive. The TH9800 is $200, which means I could afford 4 to 5 of them for the cost of one Yaesu C4FM rig.

I do not have intentions of using freqs outside those spec'd by the FCC except possibly in an emergency (which is legal to do in a real emergency), but I want the ability to do so, and I especially want at least the ability to listen to CB band without having another radio.

Cross band repeat would be very useful - I could see having to leave my vehicle in an emergency (like coming up on a car wreck and having to help) and using a handheld on 70cm to transmit on 2M via CBR with higher power from the mobile rig.

Same from my house - being out on the property and using a handheld to call for help via a CBR setup in the house - or to reach neighbors using handhelds/etc.

There is also a 'scrambler' built in? Yes, I know this is illegal for ham - but in an SHTF situation...

Thoughts?

Read More

 

[Stomper]

When I saw "TYT" in the thread title I thought of "The Young Turks" with that fat turd Cenk and shrieking shrew Ana who NEEDS to be better than everyone else at any cost.

I can't imagine living my entire life (or even a portion of it) being as vitriolic and toxic as those two.



Sorry... back on topic.

 

[B3dlam]

I have a pair of anytone AT-5888UV radios one in my truck one in a pelican case battery powered portable setup. They're only dual band but I have been quite happy with them. The lower end radios are never going to be as nice as the high end radios but they definitely have their place. It can be nice having a cheaper radio so you arent as worried if it grows legs.

Cross band repeat is definitely an awesome feature to have and especially for low duty cycle situations like you described you shouldn't have any issues. I'm happy to talk radio comms anytime you like. I have my tech license but mostly operate public safety and buisness band. Oh and a coastie here too.

At $200 I would say give it a try the price is attractive especially when you consider you're goinig to be spending probably $200-300 just to get a mobile radio fully set up by the time you get a good antenna, mount, wiring etc.

 

[The Heretic]

I would start with it in my office with a power supply and a base antenna on the back of the house, just to see how it would work.

I have my amateur tech and GROL (commercial) licenses.

I got the GROL with radar endorsement (IIRC) when I got my EE degree so I could put that on my resume. My first job out of college I worked setting up 1kw meteor burst TX for a DoD contractor - very interesting. Working 30 to 80 mhz approx. bouncing signals off meteorites and sporadic-E with FSK/PSK/BPSK/QPSK.

I have forgotten almost all of that - including Ohm's law - as it was 30 years ago - but some of it stuck and I can derive Ohm's law from the theory so I managed to pass the tech exam but failed the General because I did not study for it.

I don't get on the air - I should, but I just don't have the time.

I wonder if a person could CBR from 2M to 11M with the latter in AM?

Saw some people claiming the TH9800 would transmit on AM.

I think except for the IF and finals (?), most radios today are basically SDRs - so the modulation/etc. would just be a matter of switching modes in the firmware. I would have to go back and read up on the theory.

Eventually I would want to get a C4FM setup, but right now I have higher priority things to spend $ on so I am looking at value. I have 3 autos - a CUV and two 4x4 trucks, so even if I have three mobile transceivers that isn't too much, I would still have room for a base station. And in the one rig (one ton 4x4 with 12' flatbed), the plan is when I retire, to convert it to a RV, so I could have a mobile in the cab and/or a bigger all band all mode transceiver in the back for when the rig is parked and a base antenna can be setup.

The one thing I have read is that the TH9800 can get hot. It has a fan and heatsink. I wonder how it would do installed next to my battery and other electronics in the trunk?

 

[The Heretic]

At $200 I would say give it a try the price is attractive especially when you consider you're goinig to be spending probably $200-300 just to get a mobile radio fully set up by the time you get a good antenna, mount, wiring etc.

The rig comes with the remote setup, which I have read is extra for Yaesu, but yeah, a base antenna can easily run $200, and a mobile mag mount $100. Yaesu sets have some nice options like BT and GPS and so on, but I am just starting out and I don't use the TXs - I need to so I know they work and I understand how to use them, but... - so I am not inclined to spend a lot at this point.

 

[B3dlam]

For my truck rig I have a comet 2x4SR antenna with a lip mount the pair of those was around $150. Along with that I picked up a few items to wire the thing in properly. Plus programming cable, remote head cable and mount etc.

 

[The Heretic]

I picked up a 12/15 amp power supply for $50 this week - now I need a TX set to use it.

I need to figure out which end of the house I want to put a base station antenna(s). I am leaning towards the back side (lengthwise of the house, which is about 50' long) where my office is which is where the TX would be, making for a short cable run and separating it from the WiFi planar antenna (that gives me internet) which is almost at the other end of the house.

Granted - the WiFi is somewhere between 2 and 5 gHz, but it is low power - also, I want to put up a WiFi antenna from a repeater hooked up to my WAP so I can get WiFi coverage outside the house into my property where I spend much of my time. I do not have good cell coverage here (even though I can visually see the cell tower about 3 miles away) so I do better to switch my cell phone over to WiFi when I am home - but more than 100-200 feet away from the house and it drops WiFi.

 

[The Heretic]

Well, nobody said "OMG don't get that piece of junk!" so I ordered it.

Now I need to pick out some antennas.

Could not find a good quad band base antenna, so I am going to get a good tri-band and get a separate antenna for 10M, and get a duplexer. Not exactly what I want as I want to scan 11M while also scanning other bands, but it will have to do. I will have to wait and see how useful this is on 10-11M and then go from there.

Comet makes a decent quad band mobile - the UHV-4 - that I think will work with the mag mount I have for my dual band HT - so I will probably get that.

 

[B3dlam]

Just get the comet antenna and a ground plane kit like this: https://www.amazon.com/MFJ-1401-Mob...&keywords=Ground+plane+kit+for+pl-259+antenna

 

[The Heretic]

Just get the comet antenna and a ground plane kit like this: https://www.amazon.com/MFJ-1401-Mob...&keywords=Ground+plane+kit+for+pl-259+antenna

I saw those, but the radials they use for the ground plane only work well for VHF/UHF, not HF - or even 6M which is way at the lower end of the VHF band, 50 mHz being much closer to HF than it is to 150 mHz.

Granted, the mobile quad antenna with the radials for a ground plane would probably work about as well as it would with a mag mount on my car, but then the base antenna is going to be much higher off the ground (about 15-20' instead of five feet) so this will change how the antenna works at the different freqs.

A base station antenna is designed for this fact, and also, I want the base to work better than the mobile - or at least, to be optimum for the location (I am surrounded by trees, I am on sloping ground with the mountain behind me and a valley in front).

Mobile antennas have space and size and height constraints, base station antennas not nearly so much (especially for me - I can put my antenna quite high if I want and it can be as large as possible, since I am the only one who can see it, and for practical purposes, no one can complain about it).

So I don't mind spending more money to also have a different base station antenna.

 

[AMProducts]

So my MIL got me this rig for christmas last year (it was on my amazon wish list), I've used it at the house, and a fair amount driving around in the jeep. I've talked quite a bit on 70cm and 2m, and I've used it to get into a few of the 6m repeaters and 1 of the 10m repeaters in the area. No complaints on signal, it seems to be regular and reliable. The biggest issue was the antenna. I need to come up with a more permanent mounting situation on my jeep, as I was using a large mag-mount base, which I'm not crazy about, and I kept hitting it on trees.

 

[The Heretic]

What antenna do you use?

I am always going to use a mag mount - never going to drill a hole in my roof, and people would steal the antenna either way by unscrewing it.

I got the Comet UHV 4

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00QIZ4SBS/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

[AMProducts]

What antenna do you use?

I am always going to use a mag mount - never going to drill a hole in my roof, and people would steal the antenna either way by unscrewing it.

I got the Comet UHV 4

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00QIZ4SBS/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I got something very similar, except it didn't have the J-Pole looking thing on the end of it. Looking on amazon I think it was the HH-8900, the antenna has been fine for the most part, except until I locktited all of the set screws it had a tendency to lose bits due to being rocked around by the wind constantly.

I have a bad habit of building my own antennas, and I'm pretty good at it, what I was considering doing was building a diplexer, and then cutting down an 11m whip, and then using a tri-band 6m on top of the vehicle. In general I've found a lot of ham-style antennas have rigid mounts and just get trashed when you spend any time where there's a tree with a limb over a road that's less than 10' above ground.

 

[MasterChief]

Are you two using the RT Systems software? How do you like?

 

[The Heretic]

Are you two using the RT Systems software? How do you like?

Not yet, but I need to get it.

 

[Kruel J]

I've heard the TYT's are ok. It looks like an interesting rig. Shoot, all I have is 2m/70cm radios. Three Yaesu's and a Wouxon. My Yaesu's are all 2m only radios.

 

[cigars]

I recently got a Btech UV-50-x2 dual band for the mobile. I love the readout on it. You can monitor 4 frequencies at once. My mobile antenna is an MFJ 1442B. I hit all the repeaters in the area no problem. I bought a second one for my kids room. It's not a high end radio but there's a lot packed in it for the money. If you put any stock in Miklor, he was pretty kind to it on his review.
Review BTech 50X2 Mobile - Miklor

 

[AMProducts]

Are you two using the RT Systems software? How do you like?

RT's software sucks, always has probably always will. I recommend CHiRP if it supports your radio. In the past I've used VX7Commander and a few other yaesu specific programs, IIRC CHIRP supports most common radios these days.

 

[MasterChief]

I have used CHiRP and like it for my Baofeng HT's.... I saw someone on Amazon saying to use the RT Systems with the TYT and have never used.....any pros for using it over CHiRP?

 

[Oathkeeper1775]

Would that 50 watt radio run on a 12 volt mower battery; fed by a trickle charger?

Which antenna did you end up with?