Marine Band radio for inland lake, any suggestions or what to look for?

[93nav]

I have been tasked with finding a marine band radio for use in a boat in the midwest. Large lake. Is there anything I need to look for specifically, or what to look out for? Need the antenna also of course. Will a handheld reach five miles?

Do they all come with NOAA? I would think so, but you never know. I am off to look at the reviews on Amazon

Just found out, just started looking, and of course there is a deadline.

Thanks

[drcoastline]

No they do not all come with NOAA. 5 miles is a very short distance for a marine radio. If that is the maximum distance you need any radio will work. As with anything boating related it is best to be redundant. Get a fixed mount that runs from the boats power that will give you range (distance) and a water proof hand held. Should power go down on the boat and the fixed mount is inop you have the hand held as back up and available in the event you need to abandon ship. Of course on a five mile inland lake a cell phone is probably just as good.

We are often 50, 60 miles off shore. After seven miles cell phones are useless. Then you need to deal with the horizon. So the higher the antenna the longer the range. A good feature to look for is MOB (man over board) or SOS. This can be used obviously to mark a man over board but also to mark the vessels location in an emergency.

[911_Dude]

For a lake just get a handheld, unless your on water the size of the Great Lakes. I love iCom radios, and the GPS store has competitive prices and fast service. Something like this:
https://www.thegpsstore.com/Icom-M25-Floating-5W-Handheld-VHF-Radio-P4507.aspx

[JeremyD]

I like Icom - for an inland lake a handheld should be more than fine. If you are going beyond 5 miles offshore you should have a fixed mount with an extended antenna - and back up VHF that floats and a Epirb or PLB - I have an ACR PLB for offshore

[nota]

do the locals even have VHF RADIOS

if not do they have CBs ?

are you out of cell phone range ?

[93nav]

Thanks for the replies and info.

A friend is going to Lake Oahe in SD. Other boats will have VHF, if friend wanted to go, his boat had to have VHF. Looks like he is buying a mounted version from Cabelas.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Oahe

I think these guys normally go to Canada and may not have cell phone coverage where they went there, hence VHF.

[unclebilly]

Buy a Baofeng UV-82 and be done with it. They have an even more powerful version now.

These are under $50 and work awesome.

[svandamme]

https://www.marineband.marines.mil/Audio-Resources/

[unclebilly]

https://www.baofengradio.com/collections/uv-series/products/catalog-uv-82

This is what we use on the ski hill, this is what we use in our race car and in the pits for endurance racing. You can program in the marine frequencies or just dial them in. You can get these for about $25 on fleebay and the quality is exceptional. You can upgrade the antenna to get better reception. If you want.

[93nav]

The sound would be nice, but I don't think there is enough space for the install.

Originally Posted by svandamme

https://www.marineband.marines.mil/Audio-Resources/

For those of you recommending a Baofeng, some of the boats already have VHF installed, so that is the standard.

(just saw unclebilly's post). To late, there was a deadline, and no time to order online, though I may look into it anyway for future use.

Thanks again guys.