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communication gadgets

athoyleathoyle Posts: 21
in General Chat
My partner and i are thinking of cycling the length of japan as part of a career break. We have been looking into walkie talkie/hands free equipment that may be beneficial for the long hours on the bike in order for us to chat, rather than shouting at each other all day.
Has anybody used anything or have any advice with this sort of thing. Being a technophobe I am clueless.
Andy

Comments

  • ZacniciZacnici Posts: 1,385
    You may want to check out the local legislation on that, 20 odd years ago if you had a 'walkie talkie' in the UK you could be prosecuted for using an illegal transmitter. Don't want to have your trip spoiled by being hauled in by the local coppers.

    I dare say that there would be no probs as the Japanese love their gadgets but it would be worthwhile finding out what they have there, bound to be years in advance of us.
  • willieverfinishwillieverfinish Posts: 1,381
    I'll ask my brother - he studied Japanese for 4 years, lived there for 3 and was a government translator and teacher.

    He'll know. I'll come back to you tomorrow.
  • willieverfinishwillieverfinish Posts: 1,381
    I would have thought that these would do. I have some Oregon Scientific ones at they do work up to 5km..... really good. Outstanding. I got them for off piste skiing and they honestly are fantastic.

    http://www.oregonscientific.co.uk/cat-O ... esign.html
  • BmanBman Posts: 442
    The problem with walkie talkies would be that you gotta press the big button to talk, and wold need a free hand, which in a potentially chaotic japanese city, wouldn't necessarily be available. You will presumably be using using mobiles over there, and Im not techno whizz either here, but if you have bluetooth earpiecefor under your helmets, check out phones with a walkie-talkie function. Ive never used an earpiece or know of phones with this function but there was interest in it a while back.

    Not sure if it would be classed as a phone call or if you can just establish a direct link between the phones but could be worth looking into.
  • ZacniciZacnici Posts: 1,385
    The potential problem with using UK devices is frequency allocation. It could well be that a UK device may use a frequecy allocated to military, police or emergency services in another country and could land you in hot water.

    Suggest you wait for Willeverfinish or do some more research,

    Whoops did a quick trawl got this:
    http://www.soumu.go.jp/main_sosiki/joho ... /faqs.html

    And worringly this:
    Just for your information I contacted the FCC Wireless Bureau and the ITU. If you attempt to bring two way radios of any kind into Japan without a license you will be imprisoned by the JARL report. Also if you attempt to bring any radio in not authorized in their frequency band (GMRS and FRS are not) you must have a permissable purpose. ie. transporting them to a manufacturering or servicing facility for service or repair is the only one that you could use. If you transmit on the radios, the minimum penalty is 90 days in jail and 100,000y. I don't know if this a lot or not today but it is too much for a penalty of this kind.
    http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/japan/87 ... japan.html
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