Walkie talkie antennae

[American Eagle 813]

On 27.385mhz how well would a ⅛ wave (51.25 inches) antenna work on a cb radio walkie talkie compared to a cobra ha-ta (27 inches) antenna?

[Sandbagger]

Jul 12, 2017 22:43:42 GMT -5 American Eagle 813 said:

On 27.385mhz how well would a ⅛ wave (51.25 inches) antenna work on a cb radio walkie talkie compared to a cobra ha-ta (27 inches) antenna?

That depends on the matching network attached to it. A 1/8th wave radiator is not a direct feed 50 ohm impedance, so it's going to require the proper impedance matching network to correctly couple the transmitter output to the antenna. Generally speaking though, with walkie-talkies, the longer the antenna, the better it puts out. I had a 5' "eyepoker" on a Midland 1 watt back in the early 70's and I could talk 4 or 5 miles with it. One of the best walkie-talkie antennas was the Radio Shack center loaded antenna. That actually matches pretty closely to 50 ohms. But just about any of the newer short "rubber Duck" antennas suck eggs. I could get just about as far with a 100 mW WT on the 5' antenna as I can with a 4 watt unit with a rubber duck.

[American Eagle 813]

I am going to be using it on a Magnum 1012 which I am pretty sure has a matching circuit built into it.

[Sandbagger]

Sept 7, 2018 1:23:35 GMT -5 @leonrer said:

I have experience with Uniden GMR-5095 2CKHS. It is a top of the line walkie-talkie, but it is heavy, but it still floats. This walkie-talkie is also quite durable, with a projected range of 50 miles across flat waters. It is cool device but bit expensive. I found here thebestwalkietalkies.com/ nice review and decided to buy it.

A classic case of (much) exaggerated claims. Those units are UHF GMRS handhelds with about a 2 watt power output on high. Unless you are on a 5000' mountain top talking to someone else on another 5000' mountaintop, there's no way you're going to get 50 miles out of it. Realistically, typical users should expect anywhere from 1 to 4 miles depending on terrain and conditions.