Motorola Talkabout® T5522 (7 Channels) Two Way Radio

I bought a cheap set of these from eBay a couple of months ago.

I bought these for use with Airsoft (along the lines of paintball) and they perform great. Most of the time these are used in pretty dense woodland and I have been able to get a signal where my old radios would not work (around 3km).

I also used these for a family day out at Chester Zoo and Alton Towers and they were perfect all day long, and they helped us find the rest of the group many times!

The radios feel great to hold with a nice weight - just a little heavier than my mobile. The whole radio is chunky and can take an decent impact - as proved when I dropped one of mine!

Although they have officially only 8 channels - they do have the CTCSS (privacy tones) which increases this to a reasonable 304 (if my maths is correct) channels. 8 channels each with 38 CTCSS tones.

Charging is a breeze - after the initial charge they just drop into the desktop charger for 16 hours (overnight) and that's it!

These units are the UK/Europe PMR446 radios. You could buy radios from the US cheaper, with more power, but they are invariably illegal to use in the UK/Europe and don't work with the PMR446 units. I would not recommend this.

Something else to consider is the accessories you would use with these. I have tried a great throat mic, boom mic and a speaker mic (all bought from eBay!) and they work brilliantly. They are pretty cheap too. Just make sure you buy the Motorola 1-pin accessories.

Overall these are a great radio with a decent range - with batteries that'll last most of the day and really good value!