New RCI 29 Base - Unboxing & Initial Impressions - CB Valentine's Day Special
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- Опубліковано 1 гру 2024
- In this video I am unboxing and doing my initial inspection and giving my first impressions about this new RCI-29 Base 10 meter radio from Ranger. This radio shares the same enclosure as the venerable Galaxy DX-2547 that's been around for year. This refresh was dearly needed for the market. This radio contains a Ranger EPT9900 series board like the RCI-69FFB and RCI-69 Base Plus. So basically it's a mini RCI-69 Base Plus, but unlike the 69+... This one finally has a 10KC switch! Thanks to RCI Ranger!
This radio DOES NOT require and e-chip like some other newer ranger radios. This one has a resistor to remove and/or a jumper at J27 to move. Your mileage will vary.
Unboxing a CB radio like a Wawa like a Wawa CB radio like a❤ Chihuahua go like a Wawa like a
When Ranger first came out with their RCI2950 I bought one and used it as a base station. I loved that thing!
Now I'm old and on a fixed income so the best I can do is watch and drool now.
Thanks for sharing!
All those CB Base Stations back in the day was awesome. Big brand names to the almost unknown. My father was into CB in the 60's and owned a few different radios. His favorite old base 23 channel radio was the - USL Contact 23A.
Never cared for the CB trucker lingo stuff and all that, but liked evening rag chewing on AM. So many companies building radios back then. They wasn't all that cheap either. I paid $550.00 for mine in 1978. I liked to talk skip (ssb dx'ing) on the upper channels.
I like this radio better then those RCI 69's and the likes .. 2995++ and etc. This one has an uncomplicated clean, but sharp look to it. It looks a bit like a piece of test equipment. :)
Would like to see more companies build bases instead of just mobiles. Nowadays its like mtd and the mowers.
I don't know how old you are. But I consider those types of raidios as old school. Reminds me of when I had so much fun as a teenager on the CB. Something nostalgic about a ten Metter rigs.
that a nice looking radio like old days style, real nice, sort like kenwood dial chrome front ham rigs nice ,
Looks like there are still some engineering tasks at hand. Some small things that must be smoothed out. But as far as functionality, it's on par....I also agree about the channel indicator color.
This will be great folks who like say AUUUDDDDDDIIIIIIOOOOO
Least there CB radio in the USA Yet Ihear you guys when conditions are good. in Canada not much up here at all anymore CB 27 mhz is real good mode, wish cb er s had some kind of interchange for contacts and reports though
Good looking radio and review of it and i agree the channel display should have been the same color as the frequency display. I just hope they have made some improvements in their board as over the years ive been constantly swamped with Galaxy, General Lee, Connex etc radios with their boards with alot of cold solder joints its never ending.
Just got mine! Really like it but spec says originally 28.7650 to 29.2050 and only goes after conversion up to 28.305
I still haven’t caught a video of you talking to cheese-O or wallpaper you gotta get them guys to answer their phones so we can hear a good ol qso. Enjoy the videos, always good content. Thanks for posting. CC on the tip top side of the buckeye 🎙️🎙️🎙️
I have an Icom 718 converted to work on 11 meters. 100 watts max. It also works on all the amateur HF bands from 80 meters up. I'm using an LDG auto tuner, which seems to favor the higher frequencies with my antenna. I paid $499 for it several years ago brand new. I see they are now $1100, and may be being discontinued in favor of computer radios.
I love vintage look radios 73.
Really great video. I am interested in one of these radios if they can be modified to slide between frequency. I like to talk on 4100, 4200 etc.. etc..
It only slides about 1 to 1.2KC unfortunately. Later on I’ll see about modifying the clarifier for a different pot or a dual pot like the 69FFB radios.
Same circuit used for 40 years. Some small improvements, master vco, IF stage Schottky diodes. Same drifting mixer vco for a fun SSB operation. Your super slide pot is only stable in a fixed environment. A precision resistor even fixed has no temperature compensation for frequency drift! Its receiver has a Fixed narrow IF bandwidth. The Audio DSP they call GNF.
Alpha channell is a 10k jump. The older radio this one replaces is just a glorified ranger crippled rci8719 pll cobra 148 uniden grant xl circuits with SMT parts. Nothing special just same rig in new packaging!
The newer ept9900 bord uses a very similar stable vco circuit the Stryker 955 uses. Temperature compensation is key.
A radio that’s impressed me with design and improvements is the 955 Stryker. Incredible ssb vco is stable.
The new 2970N4, the receiver is excellent (no overload pumping agc) and better selectivity and channel rejection. The transmitter is on frequency without drift. But the new finals suck! It needed the bias set correctly on both the radio and amp lid. It still self oscillates on ssb tx with no mod and carrier balance is set correctly.
To have these problems out of the box is terrible and nothing new!
The new RCI-29 is the EPT-990015Z. It’s stable. It just sucks you can’t slide 5KC to actually use it on 10m. It only slides about 600-700Hz. If you had the coarse fine control like the 69 Base Plus it would be a lot better.
Nice rig very nice radio..............
Nice radio!)
I HOPE I CAN GET THE GALAXY STOCK MIKE WITH THIS RADIO. I GET GREAT AUDIO REPORTS WITH THE RCI-GALAXY MIKE.
It has the same teardrop style mic as the Galaxy 2547 and 959, or Texas Ranger radios. But this time it has some more weight to it, like they added some tire weights. I like the heavier feel. It sounds good.
clean looking rig
There nice I like them I also have a rci 69 ffb4
The RCI/Galaxy radios have horrible white noise issues. I would like to hear more about the receiver in this radio vs an old classic with high quality Crystal filters.
It's huge!
It’s small compared to all the other ranger bases with the handles but it has the same board is the 69 base plus
Could you use it to push a straight 6 pill Base amp?@@DX-Rev
you are able to convert all if you really wish too
Retail please? Looks good sounds good too
$600ish. They’ll be out to the retailers soon. Walcott already has them. Anderson and some others are taking preorders.
Cool video. 73
nice lookin rig. curious how you have the monitor radio setup. i have been wanting to do that. anytime i try, i get feedback. whats the secret?
I have it switched to a dummy load, the RF gain half down and the volume barely open, then an older Motorola communications speaker way off to the side plugged into it
@@DX-Rev ah ha! fantastic! Thank you!!
Ok, at first I was like what a rip on my 2547....but after thinking about it, guess I will sell my 2547 and buy this one. It's a Better radio with out the drifting pulse would drive a straight 4 pill. No telling what this one will cost, bet higher than Willie Nelson on a Friday night!
The 2547 when it came out was $299 or so. Now it’s around $500. This new one will be around $600 depending on retailer. But for what you get out of the box, 100w or so, 6 bands, echo, stable surface mount board… it’s definitely an upgrade over the 2547 for stability and functionality. But I think they’re all overpriced these days. The Chinese brands like AnyTone and Stryker still run circles around them out of the box and only cost $200-350 usually. But I do like it.
@@DX-Rev well it only has 2 bands 10meter and 11 meter the switch is labeled wrong like most. Hope it gives you many years of good use.
I never understood the need for a channel display and a freq counter. One or the other is fine.
Be interested to know who is selling them (with the chip). I'd be interested in getting one.
After discovering it is indeed the EPT990015Z board like the N1 and 69FFB series, you don’t need the chip. Just move a jumper on J27! Good news all around!
👍👍
What's the price of this radio?
Nice video.
I agree too with the colour from channel, it looks better if the lamps all in white ( or may in green my fav 😅).
Greetings from germany
Around the $600 mark
@@DX-Rev ok, that isn't a low price 🙈 ty for your answer.
@@13_TH_559 it’s the same as the RCI 69 Base Plus in a smaller box. Priced the same way.
Do you have a price on it when it hits the market ?
So far I see Anderson selling them for $569, Walcott for $599, seen one or two on eBay for an exorbitant $699. Inside it’s the same as the 69 Base Plus, minus the hi low switch for the bands. So it’s about the same price.
Why would an 80 Watt 10 meter rig have CB channels and echo on it? Oh, let me guess.
Oh, Let me guess? you're a ham operator and you look down on the 11m people?
This is coming from a guy that started and still uses CB. I’ve been a CBer since 8yrs and a ham since I was 14. I love them both! But this nonsense and old design in a new box. Few new circuits but nothing different than from the few clones out there. Revamped 148 grant and galaxy from an old French export company called Dirland. Some mistake connex for them. New wrappers same stuff inside. They made the move to SMT. It’s still the same circuits.
Now, some of the engineers got together and decided to improve the old 3600-9900 chassis over the years and made the EPT9900. It’s better but still the same thing with a few mods to the vco for stability, new mosfet finals and SMT components. The Stryker 955 is a great example and rig for this!
More illegal crap and ya need 80w to talk across town. I could say the same thing about a ham that just gets his technician license and has a 2 m 70cm walkie-talkie and expects to talk across town but has to use the repeater to do it and not simplex. The organized qrm -ming with the contests and just wanting to say everyone’s a 59. They just gang up on a single call and say nothing substantial. They said that you made a contact. You didn’t establish anything and didn’t ask about how the weather was. You know, like, what did you have to eat. The equipment, nothing about the equipment or the radio system! Any info about it? Then it’s just a bogus signal report and to the next station!
I don’t look down on them. I just wish they’d do something more productive for themselves and the hobby. Instead of a who can walk on who and make the most sound effects or sound board contest! It goes on, on hf ham radio too. Unlicensed or non identifiable operators that don’t give their call sign and like to do the same thing on the hf bands.
I talked 70miles Columbus Ohio to Athens Ohio with a TRC-221 4watt cb walkie-talkie loaded with a fresh set of Ni-Mh batteries fully charged up with a Astatic D104M6B mic an antenna adapter for that rca jack on the side and a 102” whip antenna on a bike. I was at the intersection of Hamilton and main st!
I talked for better than 10 minutes to a mobile station parked on old peach ridge. He had a old 11m, I mean 10m, export Galaxy Jupiter (not the Pluto but same inside) A Texas star 350 killer bee and a Francis amazer 96” antenna. All this on a 74 ford pinto! Yeah he was illegal and I could hear him well with the amp off! Yeah it’s still a 25w radio and we’re 75miles apart. He was no s-9 or was I. But both were above the noise floor of S-2-3 and I’d guess he was a solid S5 and myself to him a S3 to 4.
I do admit it’s fun to have it on! Yeah I used to walk on my buddies and then get them a bigger amp. Then we all had them and couldn’t use them until we all got on the same channel to talk. But I soon found out. When the band isn’t open, even with an amp (DNA warrior all tubes wired in parallel! Must hit it with driver of at least 50w to get it to key up! , I used a maverick to drive) 2300-2500w peak and an antenna SPT-500 up 75ft. Still could only talk 75 - 100miles. Then I got a Yaesu ft-101e a heard 75-40m ssb. It never closed the propagation was always there. Some days (years) better than others.
Propagation is great on 11m and it can be done easily with good practice, equipment and antenna. The antenna is 90% of the station! Why break the rules? Just study and take a test? Wanna run 1500w legally? Go up 200ft at the base of the antenna and have that much tower under your antenna legally? Talk on a hf band with propagation all the time, not seasonally. Yes the other bands come and go. But 40m is always open for 800-2000mile contacts. You could string a wire dipole and cast all your RF to the sky. (Because your antenna isn’t at least a 1/2 wavelength above ground for polarization purposes.) Talk a few hundred miles with that 100w hf rig. A vertical will put all that at the horizon for that dx work. It doesn’t take allot of gear. Just a well designed and efficient antenna system and good practice. Hf is great regardless of the band!
@@MrBonez208 Old technology is almost always better than the newer trash. I recently bought an AM only GE CB NIB on eBay, made in 1977. Says made in Japan on it. It works way better than a new Cobra 29 AM made in the Peoples Republic (China) I got my amateur technician license in 1987, but had to wait till they got rid of the code before I could get the general. When I got it I immediately went out and got myself a brand new HF radio. And sold it a few months later. Seems like all anybody wants to do on the amateur HF bands is make contacts. As many as possible as quickly as possible. No actual QSOs. Plus you have a ton of rules to follow, and tell the whole world who and where you are, right down to your residential address. I use 11 meter SSB with 100 watts and a decent antenna way up there. WAY more fun. Amateur radio has become a joke. It's all about computers now. Everybody has an SDR digital radio. No thanks. No longer anything amateur about it. It's plug and play. Go buy a bunch of expensive equipment, connect it together, and start talking. Just like commercial radio. Amateurs used to build their own radios. None of them even know how the new computerized radios work. They can't fix them. They have to send them back to the factory, and even they can't fix them. They just put new boards in them.
anybody know the frequency spread 24.350mhz to 32.100 mhz ?
but is stable on SSB
Used Icon IC-718 price range.....
See i told you so!!! That fan came loose due frame twist!!!
I thought this radio did NOT require an E-Chip for the conversion !?? The radios that take the Echip have continuous coverage. For example, the 2950 and the 2995 cover from 24 MHz to 32 MHz after you plug the Echip in.
Why does this radio loose the entire phone portion of the 10 meter band after the conversion ??
This is a HUGE FAIL on Ranger's part.
If you can confirm that it does not take the Echip, which I believe it does not, then there should be a way to use one or two switches to all ow it to work in both 10 meter mode, and 11 Meter " converted" with the flip of a switch or two
If you can get that work and I'll buy it from you today
N9KGC
You’re right. But before I bought the radio I didn’t know what board it would have or how it would be. But some radios without continuous coverage do take an e-chip like the mirage MX-36Hp. This one is just the simple jumper block.
There may be a way to make it 12 bands with a mod like adding a hi low switch somewhere. But it’ll be useless for 10m phone because the clarifier only goes up and down about 1.5KC. Haven’t figured a mod for that yet.
@@DX-Rev OH ! With only less than 2 KC movement on the clarifier and no other vfo function that would be a problem on 10 m. It would be impossible to get to 28.400 for example
@@DX-Rev The ultimate mod for that radio would be a way to select and change ANY digit on the display ! Like my 2950 or my 2985. It is kind of disappointing that Ranger made this radio the way they did. But then again it is really manufactured and marketed for the CB world
Is ilegal to transmit with that power on cb band
Yes. That’s why these are really categorized as export radios. In the US they’re only legal to use on 28-29.699 for a general class or higher. I’m going to figure out how to put a hi low channel switch on it so I can use it on 28.300-500 as soon as I figure out how to make the clarifier shift more than 1.5KC. I usually hang around 28.420
@@DX-Rev good for you🍻👍
@@DX-Rev Let me know about that. That's the only thing keeping me from buying it. I figured the clarifier has to move it a minimum of six KHz both directions. Or maybe at the very very minimum five khz
Do you know the meaning of "Export"? Do you know UA-cam is worldwide?... Just so you know, FCC has no jurisdiction outside the USA.
You know bigbone88, who gives a rats butt. As long as it's clean and not a splattering mess...Who cares!
It's a shame that the squelch is broken on that thing
Seems nice 🎙️🎙️🎙️
Want to sell any of those old radios cb
Нормально сконструйована техніка повинна працювати без вентиляторів, особливо та що ти слухаєш. Це ж не електросварка. Кітайці люблять робити на максимальних температурних значеннях, як освітлювальні лампи.
make video on the 11 meter conversion
I had it sent with 11m in it. It’s just a jumper block like the 69ffb2 or the n1
I'd be livid to get a new radio that was scuffed like that from the factory. I won't even comment about the issue with the fan, or the clarifier not being centered. Not impressed at all....
FYI : You do not have a license to operate that radio.
Greetings: "need a license to operate".... As if that matters.
Cool radio. But why would anyone pay $700 (by the time you include shipping and a mic) is beyond me. For the same money or less, you can buy a used REAL ham transceiver that will be 100 times the radio as this Ranger.
They’re all overpriced these days. The 2547 was $299 when it came out and now it’s $500. Just stock radio. I can’t figure why ranger doesn’t just make a real radio out of the 2995. I had one of mine on 21-29.699 and it works fine on 15 meters after a tune. A lot of CBers don’t want a low level AM radio like the icom 7300. They mostly care about AM. Would be nice to have a ranger that works on 80m AM so the FT-101s can be retired. All the Icom, Yaesu, kenwood radios currently in production suck on AM. Personally I’m a 10m and 20/40m SSB guy. But I like to dwell on channel 3 AM with my local buddies I’ve been talking to for 30 years that’ll never get the ham ticket.
Junk. Another CB disguised as amateur radio equipment.
Is it FCC approved
Greetings: Another overpriced chinese glorified (2547) CB set.
Actually made in Malaysia, but still junky
@@DCDura Greetings: Yep
Everybody has their own opinion no matter how wrong it may be
@@Radionut Greetings: Indeed. Other than made in Malaysia, explain how it is wrong..
Don't matter where it made but the fact it has twisting issues in transport just like 2547s
Video begins at 4:20
I am betting Christmas took forever at your house
$600 plus for JUNK! A uniden \ president Washington In good to nice condition for
$125 - $250, will IMO Out perform the 29. Everything offered on the 29 Can be added to a Washington, if you Absolutely need the bells & whistles. I operate A president, Madison, and Keep a Washington for backup. It's been 10 years since I've had The Madison Recapped an aligned and, It's been issue free since If you're going to pay $600 plus for a brand new transceiver, there should be a good amount of Quality control And it's obvious there is none of that Going on at RCI. There are several things that seem to be wrong with this brand new transceiver. I'm not about to list those issues. It's those reasons I called it junk. Of course it's just my option.
i lost faith in ranger years ago after buying a $500.00 radio from them
Typical Ranger with S5 of noise.
poder cambiar a Español
pile of junk
Not worth the money,not stable on frequency on ssb and the meter is the same as the galaxie so power meter is wrong.
Bland
Looks cheap
Ranger Galaxy !! Never again .Their QC/QA is non existent.. Cheap nasty components and frequency drift comes free... Total garbage.. Anytone AT5555N2 all day long. .Nothing at the
price point comes near.. I have the 2547 Base never used a waste of space..
Yep, the AT5555 is a quality bit of kit for very little money, bought mine new for only £200 in the UK.
Super impressed with the receive on the AT555N2 @@georgebarnes8163
I spoke with a well known radio ych s?hop in floriDa they WILL NOT sell that model because it uses same board panel and mounts a?s gala.xy 2547 which has large number of returns cause twwists a nd cold joints!!!