And here is why you buy quality radios, as compared to Chinese no-name junk.

Goodbye.

Love mine.

Dayum!



I never expected that coming from the U.S. dealer!



I thought these radios only sold for about $40.  Never bought one but if I had, I'd chalk them up as "disposable" to some extent.

Mine was defective from the get-go.  I bought mine from overseas before they were available from US dealers, so I never bothered trying to get it repaired or replaced.

Link


It has happened on my Wouxun UV-3D only once about a month ago.  I've had the radio for just over 2 years and still carring it daily.  Total memory was wiped out, I reconnected my programming cable and reloaded the program.  Not really a big deal.  I do need to get a new antenna for it though as I'm a little rough on my radios.  I recently added a Baofeng just for fun.  I'd really like to find a new FT-60 on-sale for a more "brand name" HT.

Pfft.

I wouldn't care less if my $38 Baofeng shit the bed tomorrow morning. I'd have another one on order before sunset.

It would seem that cheap is not always better.

His name was Wouxun.

I think I understand...

I never really saw the advantage to the Wouxon radios - they were the same price or barely less than many competing radios from better companies. Boafeng has the advantage of extremely low prices, and effectively becomes a disposable radio if something goes wrong. $175 dual band Wouxon? How about the Alinco DJ-V57 for $130, or a Yaesu FT-60 for $150. It isn't even cheaper than a lot of the competition! And going up to the $200-300 range gives you some absolutely amazing radios.



I recently picked up a UV-5R, but it's pretty much a toy and a temporary fix while I'm selling other stuff until I get my hands on a brand new high-end HT.

They have jumped in price. I bought my 1p almost 3 years ago from MTC and want to say it was $75-80.

There is no way I would buy one now for $175.

I've been telling people to stay away from these radios but, all I usually get in return is " AWWWW SHUT UP THEY ARE GREAT, CHEEEEEP "





Bah! Nonsense.  Whats worse is, people give these as gifts to new hams! O M G !  What a CRAPPY way to introduce radio to a new person.  Give them a POS!

Still the best $120 I spent as a newb with a box full of accessories....bought them all from Ed back when I was new here on the referral of fellow ARFCOMer's.

Both of mine have been Stellar Performers, the 220mhz/2m does a fine job as a base station.  For Me and my budget, they've fit the bill....if either of them fail...they'll be replaced with a Baofeng for $30 from amazon.com

Follow Up Email Received:

Chalk me up as one that likes his $30 Baofeng.

This I got mine from cheap ham in that same similar price range a couple years ago...  I would not pay over $125 for one...  That said I have three 1P and they have been good to me.

My new EDC HT/ go to HT is currently the UV-5RA.  If it stops working its only $30.



I currently still have 3 good working Wouxun 1P models...  Couple years old now but if the Baofengs would have been around a couple years ago when I got the Wouxuns I would have went that route for $30 each...  
I wonder how much of that information has to do with trying to sell his own brand and/or can't compete at selling the Wouxuns for $100+ vs Amazon selling the similar Baofengs for $30 each...  Also notice his own marketed Baofeng for $50 has bit the dust as well...  Probably hard to compete with the Amazon @ $30 each.

I am sure he had many many defective radios, lots of defective Baofengs out there, people just toss em and chalk it up to being a $30 HT.  
If 100 thousand radios are sold, having a few hundred defective ones are to be expected when there is NO quality control which can be seen if you open up any of these Chinese radios!
That said I am not throwing my working ones out any time soon...  

But yea $30 dollar Baofeng or go big IMO!

Only other decent/ relative article I could find reference the Wouxun loosing memory issue...  (other then this thread)

http://www.amateurradio.com/why-does-my-wouxun-lose-its-programming/

I also use the Commander software but have not had any of these issues...  I also store my spare Wouxun 1P models with no battery attached.

I will be very interested to hear if any one on ARFCOM has had this issue...  Especially with my other two Wouxun radios in new condition have been programed and set aside for SHTF type situation (actually reprogrammed several times every time I update my frequency lists.)  Not that I couldn't type in some frequencies manually as I keep a printed sheet its just not something I would want to deal with during an emergency situation...

I would think if this was a very common problem it would be plastered all over the internet and other forums...?

I gave two Bao Fangs as Christmas gifts last year. One of them failed. We had to send it back.
I can understand and justify buying a $30 throw-away radio but there is no way I would buy a Wouxung if it costs almost the same as a Yaesu/Icom/Kenwood radio.

I say let the market work... some find good value in an inexpensive/cheap HT and will accept the risk. Others won't. Eventually things like Ed's divorce from Wouxun will result in better, less expensive radios for all of us - Japanese or Chinese, HT or mobile, UHF/VHF or HF, analog or digital.

[ WARNING - Gratuitous link whoring follows ]  

No one was talking about Chinese radios a few years ago and now there are more players than you can shake a stick at. Now we have Wouxun, Baofeng, AnyTone, Baojie, ZasTone, Xiegu,  HF-One, Hora, HYS, Kirisun, Leixen, Puxing, TYT, etc.

Cheers,
Brick
The Radios

This is very true!  I also found your article:

http://www.brickolore.com/2014/01/wouxun-defects.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BrickOlore+%28Brick+O'Lore%29

Have you heard of/ had or known any Wouxuns to do this?

I do agree the Wouxuns price range was getting a little to high for what it was...

Cheap radios with no warranty or repair possibilities may be an acceptable risk for some, but there is something to be said for buying a Japanese rig with a warranty.

Support is a good thing and I am not convinced that the Woxun or Baofengs are going to be around in a few years.

Having a drawer full of dead Chicom HT's is not appealing to me.

See I believe the opposite of those Chinese manufacturers, due to their price, I think they will become more popular.  Along with many additional brands we have never heard of...  Most of these brands have.  

I agree support is very important...  According to what I could find Baofeng has been in existence since 2001 and like most Chinese radios, they have been prevalent in other parts of the world for years...  South Africa, Europe etc...  They are still relatively new to the US market and have changed the Ham side drastically...  A mono band 2m HT when I first got licensed was in the $150 range...  The dual bands were all 200+!  I got my Wouxun for $75ish and the double AA battery pack was $10 while a similar battery back for one of the big name ones was $30+  The past two~ three years and since I have been a ham has seen a huge price influx!

That said I have two Yaesu 2m mobiles, and an Alinco HF rig...  None of which I plan on changing any time soon.  I use my mobile about 10X more then I use any HT though.  HT just goes along for the ride most of the time

ETA/ Most of the Chinese radios and HTs are actually marketed at specific users not to include the HAM side...  (Be it businesses, or some type of public safety.)  Most people in other country's getting these radios program them and leave them, no VFO side usage for the most part.  But again that is all based on internet research.  (we all know everything we read on the internet is true!)

So YMMV

I like my $35 and $50 Baofengs. I have a UV3R and a UV5R. I love them, but do not suggest them to a new ham.

I have never had a Wouxon, I don't see the point; for a few dollars more one could get a very nice FT60R and at least once a year those go on sales for about the same price as the Wuoxon dual banders.  

I think that the programming on the Yaseu FT-60R is pretty straight forward and a great radio for a new ham. All my cheap Chinese radio friends argue that point, that the KVD?? are cheaper and just as solid, but then they always have some convoluted process to program a memory channel or something, or tell other new hams who they convince to get a cheap radio that they must get a cable because you cannot program the radio effectively without it.

I see that as major difference between the FT-60 and the Wouxons and really all cheap Chinese radios. I can program a repeater, even with a weird offset, tone, etc.. in my FT60 from the keypad and save to memory. I can do it on the spot at an event when the comm plan is shared. The cheap Chinese radio guys can't do that as well and most people I know consider themselves lucky if they can manually get a repeater set up on the VFO, let alone saving to memory.

Do I want to program my FT60 by hand and 100 channels from the keypad. No.. I'll use software for that thank you. But I can dial up just about anything I need to configure in the field with nothing else when needed.

Interesting. Here's my story.

I just ordered 4 of the wouxon GMRS radios for a field camp at work, and one speaker mic.

The speaker mic wouldn't key the radios
One radio would transmit carrier, but no audio. It also had part of its internal gasket extruded out of the case so watertightness = not so good
One radio had a similar gasket problem.

I returned the 3 faulty items, and powerwerx is shipping replacements. Not a good track record, eh? more than 50% infant mortality, for an admittedly small sample.

With ham radios, one generally gets what one pays for. If the price seems too good to be true...it usually is.



If you are into ham radio as an emergency coms user...why would you buy junk that will fail when you need it?



There's a reason Icom, Yaesu and Kenwood are the big 3.

Well,

Sorry to hear about that dealer...that sucks...

But, I've bought many baofeng radios...even had a doa...the direct china from eBay replaced it ASAP...

I was actually expecting to just scrap it...but it was taken care of right away..

I currently have 12 that are now about 3-4 years old...going strong...

I've also had doa units from Motorola, kenwood, yaesu...and my percent of fallout has been about the same...

I'd say that the "big 3" are all sourced in china these days anyhow...

My two cents

Bret

I posted about Ed's divorce from Wouxun and took his comments at face value. A couple of European dealers have spoken out and said they haven't seen the same problems.

Quotes are here.

Each seller has their own reasons for sharing what information they do, so I guess that comes right back to what I've said all along. Buying these radios is a question of value vs. risk.

Caveat emptor!

Cheers,
Brick
The Radios

sounded like a vine full of sour grapes....

IMO:

if something sucked so bad, why were you selling 300-500/month? @ $120/ea?

and I could go on and on regarding his other points...but I'll quit right here...

You guys that like them. Great.

I wouldn't stake my life or someone else's on one in an EMCOMM situation.

Like Lorcin, Jennings, Hesse, Olympic, there will always be a place for low cost items.
I just won't own any of them.

Every public service event I've worked since these things have come out has had one or two people show up with them and cannot program the event frequencies and tones in them. They get sent packing.

I bought my Wushun (as one of my grey-haired ham buddy says) about the same time as a lot of you guys. Been great so far. Broke down and go the SO a Bofung for Christmas. I figured she wouldn't touch it, but she actually broke it out the other night, and with my help (learning experience for me, too) we programmed in the local repeater and simplex channels. I told her I she had the manual programming down ok, I'd do the rest with CHIRP and set the channels the same as my FT857d and Wouxon. This is just so we can "Goto channel 4". I really like the cheap radios, and if they 'shit the bed, I'll have another ordered by sunset', also.

Redman

Thanks for sharing that!

I swear you guys have sent me back to the 1960s via DeLorean and flux capacitor.

When Japan started exporting goods to the USA in the 60s some of it was good, some of it bad. Much was made of the bad stuff, the horrid translations in the owners manual. "Don't drink the battery" was one from a Honda owners manual.

Jap stuff is junk. Jap stuff is just a copy of someone else's design. Jap stuff isn't up to American made stuff. Some of it true. Some of the goods were complete junk. Yes many of the goods were flat out stolen copies of someone else's design. However Japan learned from their mistakes and made better product at a price point the USA manufacturers couldn't touch. Japan gain market share.

By the 70s Japan was driving many USA manufacturers out of business. Better product and better prices. Granted a big chunk of the better prices was the cheap labor at that time in Japan. However you couldn't deny that Japan was producing good stuff. If not good then at least acceptable quality.

When the 80s rolled around Japan had a solid footing in the USA market making damn near anything we wanted. In some market segments they owned it. In the motorcycle market you could get Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki, and Yamaha. They all worked better than the USA manufactured bike. More reliable and cheaper. Sure the technical differences between the brands were negligible but you could pick one and ride it 50,000 miles with routine maintenance. This is the time the phrase 'Universal Japanese Motorcycle' came into being since all the brands were that similar. In the early '80s Harley Davidson was in trouble, big trouble. Their bikes leaked, broke and were expensive compared to the UJM. In a stroke of luck HD asked and was granted an import tariff of 45% on all motorcycles 700cc and over. For the 5 years the tariff was in place it gave a chance for HD to get its act together to compete with Japan. It can be argued that the only reason HD is around today is because of the tariff.

On the ham radio side by the '80s all the old time manufacturers had either folded or gotten out of the ham market. Hammerllund, Hallicrafters, Heath, and Drake. (Sounds like a law firm doesn't it?) In their place was Yaesu, Icom, and Kenwood. The gear worked. Innovations were coming along nicely.

Fast forward to today. The Chinese are trying to get a foothold in the USA market. In the ham radio niche some of the stuff is good, some of it bad. I see history being replayed with the players being China and Japan instead of Japan and the United States. We'll see how this plays out. To win this one party has to step up their game. Whether it will be Japan with technical innovation or China with a decent product at a decent price point I don't know. Either way we literally have front row seats to the global consumer product manufacturing chess game.

Myself I look at Chinese radios as this. The quality and user interface isn't up to what we've become accustomed to. Also after sale product support just isn't there either. Until it does I'll stick with the big 3 from Japan. However with some radios the price point is so cheap that it can fill a niche. Think near space balloons where the possibility of the payload being lost is very real. Think deployable simplex repeaters in an emcomm situation where the unit can be taken over by fire, flood, or other calamity. Think the new ham that just doesn't have the disposable income to step into a VX-3R.

I've been looking at such a radio for a project. There is a real possibility that the radio may be destroyed. Probably not but the possibility exists. I'd much rather see $60 get smoked than $160. However the effort to get that $60 radio to interface with the project is going to be a lot of work. I'm going to stick with a radio from the big 3 just for the ease of interface and hope for the best.

As for passive components, resistors, capacitors, transistors, ICs, etc., I've been buying stuff up on online auction and getting weekly ePackets from China. So far they have been in tolerance and appear to do the job. It's not a hard choice when I can get 10 L7805 voltage regulators for $2.39 shipped where at mouser.com the exact same item is $4.60 PLUS shipping.

And so, after Japan blatantly stole so much (see TV's for a fine example) they had the cash to fund their own R&D.  Which they wouldn't have had if they had to invest that money in their first gen products.  At what point does stealing become OK?

Reverse engineering of someone else's idea to make it yourself has been going since some hairy dude put a pointy rock on a stick and another hairy dude thought that was a good idea.

A TV circuit is a TV circuit. Not a whole lot there to innovate yourself. Just take a standard circuit, put it in a box, sell it for less than Zenith and you'll be making money. Where I went with the stolen designs was consumer non-electronic stuff. Still remember mom and dad looking at the bottom of items at the strip mall to see whether it was "Made in USA" or a knockoff "Made in Japan". There is a reason every company on the planet vigorously defends its intellectual property. It's the only advantage they have over the competition.

I'm happy with my 1P.   Use it daily with no problems for going on 2 years.   I hope it doesn't crap out anytime soon, but if it does, I'd look at a Baofeng UV B5/B6 or a Kenwood D72A.  

Well said.  I agree completely on the whole America vs. Japan vs. China thing.  I wish that fabulous new American made HTs were flying out the door at great prices, but it just isn't happening.

I have Yaesu and Alinco HTs, but I also have some UV-5R+ radios.  They are cheap, but for the cost they can't be beat for certain applications.

Yes!

I have Quite a bit of yaesu gear, and all my base rigs are yaesu...mobile rigs too...

But, ht's...Ive tried a few different ideas over the years...I run comm for something on my property usually every day in the summer...even just the supper is done is a lot of help...I own and live on a small farm/orchard

The last many years go like this...

Th79a's...great radio...used to own 24 of them...well, quite a few years back was down to two still working...Kept them for ares/races and such...
Then went Motorola...great radios too...but went through average of 3-5 a year broken...
Now, for about 4 years been primaryly using uv5r's...going through 3-5 a year...I have 22 right now...

Bottom line...HT's break...if you use them daily they get broken...I have many farm hands and friends that are over here for lots of different reasons....from shooting at the range, using my machine shop, etc...and when a radio is say run over...or dropped in the bottom of my pond...or even shot...I don't care what radio it is they break...

Now, the only failure I've seen was one radio the backlight quit...but I'm sure it was banged around first...

Bottom line...it's cheaper to replace 5 baofengs than 1 Moto...

Now, all the radios are programmed via chirp...so the poor menus aren't an issue for me...and at chirp being free and $25 for a cable...I don't see why anyone wouldn't program them that way...Moto has been only pc programmable for years...

Now, for ares/races and such...I too have seen people show up with a radio and no knowledge...just as much before Chinese as after...

I feel the new ham just doesn't get the need to know thier equipment till they are turned away a couple of times...

I don't care if you have a vx7, if you don't know how to work it your of no use...

So I see it as a learning curve...and I can easily program a uv5 from the keypad...but I had to learn it...

Bret

Good post.  I agree

More from Ed of Import Communications aka Wouxun.us HERE - including some e-mail exchanges with Wouxun.

Cheers,
Brick
The Radios

Damn. Still in the 60s. Just like some of the early Japanese manufacturers. There's nothing wrong with our units. Tough shit dealer/importer. Handle it. Those companies are no longer in business or at least not doing business with the USA.

A difference between the Chinese and Japanese culture is worth mentioning. In Japan it is the ultimate insult to shame their family or company. Not so much in China. A business failure in Japan is cause for suicide. Not sure what the Chinese response would be.  Pretty sure it's not making a BASE jump without a rig from a 30 story building.

Again like the 60s there were Japanese brands by the dozens. As those who couldn't adapt to the USA marketplace fell out it was filled by those who could. Like I said in my long post above, we've got a front row seat to the global consumer manufacturing and marketing game. This may not be the first fail between a Chinese manufacturer and an importer/dealer but I can guarantee that it won't be the last.

Worthless trivia: When a certain Japanese car maker started to export to the USA they came up with a completely new name for the USA arm of the company. In case the business venture went bad the name of the parent company would not be soiled. As it happened the model line took off. There were a few stumbles along the way but the parent company learned from the mistakes and made a better product at a very good price point. The company was Nissan with the initial imported name of Datsun.

Always nice to see more than one side to the argument.

Thanks Brick!!

I hope this isn't a MTC vs Ed thing. American retailers shouldn't fight among themselves, but fight Wouxon. I remember Ed talking about the Wouxon mobile years ago. The price was never set but hinted around $250 for a dual band, dual receive with cross band repeat.

This was at a time before the $30 HT's. This was a Chinese radio for $75 or a FT60 for $125 (that was only single rx). It got all most as many of us on the air as the Beofeng. When I saw the other day that the Wouxon was over $100 I was shocked. At that price I would get the FT60 or stick with a Kenwood single bander.

I remember when the mobile was released and the price point put it beside the TM-71 and FT-8800. I remember the PR damage control Ed did when people saw the price. Like he said in his email he had over 300 people ready to buy.

I am don't blame him for cutting ties with them on price alone, much less any other BS.

I've traded e-mails with Ed and I do not get any sense of "MTC vs Ed" at all.

Cheers,
Brick
The Radios

After looking at the OP's link I see that they are no longer dealing Wouxun but are still carrying Baofeng, Anytone ect..That does not seem to compute? most of the Chineese companies are about the same as each other when it comes to warranty stuff.  I went through it with TYT over an TYT 9000 that went TU on me EVENTUALLY solid radio replaced it but ebay had to intervene and it took alot of back and forth.






 

The DeLorean comment…if any of y'all are in the Houston area take Beltway 8 across HWY 59 (east bound lane) just before you get to the 1 lane bottleneck, look right at a warehouse. You can't miss it, has DMC in big letters. If you have the cash to spend, last I heard it only takes $58k to get them to pull an new parts and build you a brand new 1983 DMC-12 (only cost about 5 times more than it originally did).

Anyway, I don't see a downside to the Chinese stuff. A lot of people think they arrive DOA not realizing that the accessory jack (which is how they are programmed) actually isn't hot swappable. Most of the dead Zastone (Baofeng and I believe Wouxun as well) products I've seen are dead due to that one reason. They are good radios for new comers simply because they are cheap…pain to program…but cheap to start with as well as having Part 90 certifications on most of them.

If I was going to pay more than $140 for a new HT it better be a commercial HT. If I was concerned with it actually working in a ECOMM situation, it's gonna be either my Icom F4021 (bought that for $134, new) or a Motorola GP300/HT1000/HT750, whichever I grab first though it's hard to go wrong with anything from Kenwood LMR, Icom LMR and Motorola.

Oh, there are American made HT's flying out the doors…I forget the name of the company as one of my Marine friends showed me a picture of it. Purchased by the US military, they run around $4000 a pop.

The radios, or the new hams that actually showed up to a special event?

what he said up there