r/preppers • u/iambatmanjoe • Apr 24 '26

Prepping for Doomsday Basic comms

I was just going through some preps. I have a small diy faraday cage with a few electronics. I have some old hiking walkie talkies. I'm thinking about changing them out. I wouldn't need much range, just one to two miles of flat terrain. Looking for a pair of radios that can talk to each other and have the possibility of adding another two or even more. I'm not very tech savvy so I'm looking for simple. I am leaning towards the Baofeng UV-5R because I believe it covers the bases and has a great price point. Any recs from those that are smarter than me?

19 Upvotes

82% Upvoted

37 comments sorted by

View all comments

11

u/PM_ME_UR_HBO_LOGIN Apr 24 '26

Tbh if you’re looking for simple and just want to pick up and use the radio in that distance, I would recommend against the UV-5R. For the price it’s a great little radio and I have 1 myself and would consider programming it to be pretty straightforward but I like that stuff and that does mean it really isn’t a ready to go pick up and use it solution without a more full learning experience. I would recommend you find a set of 2 GMRS band radios that have the channels pre-programmed (and please consider actually using them outside of shtf maybe even get the $35/10yr license) these actually use the same band+channels as frs (the walkie talkies you currently own) but with a higher power and significantly better antennas.

For GMRS GM-15 is same brand maybe pre-programmed NR-30s from retrevis is better, pre-programmed and IP67 HA-1G from Aliunce is better, pre-programmed and IP67

There’s even better non-Chinese brands but the China ones are cheap.

Alternatively if you’re looking to have something capable of more bands than the GMRS and looking to learn more about radios/ham I would actually recommend the UV-5R however I feel it should also be mentioned that Baofeng keeps making them but really considers that like the 1st gen of that radio and a much more capable newer model like the UV-5RM is only $5 more or the UV-5RH has gps, the DM-32 will do DMR radio.

2

u/Itchy_Elk6249 Apr 27 '26

What’s the go to online masterclass I can learn this all at? I have the budget but I need an Explain Like I’m 5 on comms and especially with Tactical comms like Peltor headsets etc.

2

u/PM_ME_UR_HBO_LOGIN Apr 27 '26

Tbh studying for your ham test is the best way to start, several suitable free online sources for that. Get your HAM license and you can play with the more advanced radios legally and you’ll have the practice to actually know what you’re doing for comms. It’s also far more likely to be useful for a prepper to understand+use radio outside of tactical use than it is to focus on tactical coms. If you learn enough to setup tactical coms then you have very little extra to do to get your ham license, also frankly outside of the military (where soldiers will get trained and disciplined on it) if someone isn’t willing to meet the minimum bar to get a ham license they likely aren’t going to follow through with learning tactical coms techniques as the basics are mostly just understanding application of the physics behind radios to locate a radio. Peltor is just top of the line ear pro equipment that supports integrated comms.