Topcom Twintalker 9500: A Toy Walkie Talkie Plus

The extremely cool tape-and-cord arrangement was not included in the package or recommended by the manufacturer; I just tried to make sure not to lose the radios when using them in the kayak!

Some years ago, after a kayaking incident in Norway, I started wondering if it might be a good idea to have a handheld radio when on the water in my sea kayak. Obviously, a radio is not (necessarily) of much use if you are out there on your own - I rarely am - but being able to communicate with your kayaking buddy even when there's some open water between you two can be a very good thing. In fact, it just might turn out to be a life saver kind of a thing, in addition to being plain fun!

To get the hang of things, I started looking for a two piece set of cheap so called PMR radios and then purchased the Topcom Twintalker 9500. These radios are very small, very lightweight and powered by four AAA-batteries. The radio does surpass the cheapest toy devices: the 9500 offers 8 channels, DCS sub channels (modern tech to keep channels separate) and voice activated (VOX) transmission, among other things. They should also withstand some rain, I noticed beforehand - however, not splashing waves and definitely not getting submerged!

The range of a (handheld) radio transmission is always an interesting topic and it is affected by a multitude of factors: terrain, the frequency band available, the antenna and the output power to name four foremost ones. A PMR radio does by definition not rank high on coping with any of these and the 'max.10 km in open field' claim really does not mean anything at all - except possibly that you always get less than this incredible range. PMR is a 'line of sight' radio and even in that case a couple of km /miles is plenty. Beware: any obstacles in the way and the range just might suddenly drop to almost nothing.

Me and my wife were surprised to find how quickly the 'radio habit' became a second nature; our kayaking ways also changed a bit since quick communication was now at our fingertips. Not having the radio clipped to the PFD soon felt strangely awkward and even slightly uncomfortable. However, after a while it became very clear to us that the close encounters with water were slowly killing our toy radios. Back to square one: proper marine radios or just skip the whole thing? We decided on the former, got our VHF-licences (yup, you need to do some studying in our neck of the woods) and purchased two Standard Radio HX870E marine radios; see my separate post here.

In summary: the Topcom 9500 is okay for leisurely activities, weighs almost nothing, is really tiny, has pretty good battery life and decent audio as well. Build quality is good considering the price. As to the transmission range: your mileage will definitely vary but over a short distance, without any obstacles, it works fine. Forget about marine use though!

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