Last night I was listening to KGO, the top-rated station in San
Francisco, and the host did a commercial for C. Crane. They often
advertise their AM/FM radios on KGO in the evening and overnight
because KGO has regular listeners all the way up to British Columbia,
so they have a ready-made audience of people who want radios that
can pull in distant stations well.

Anyway...this is the first time I've heard the 2m ham band mentioned
in a commercial for an AM/FM radio! I don't know whether the "CC Radio
2" is a new product, or whether they just hadn't mentioned this band
before. (It also gets the weather band.) They said that they had
included the 2m band in the radio so that listeners could get valuable
information during an emergency. Yay us! :-)

I just looked at their website, and they provide even more positive
mention of amateur radio there. Their CC2 page:

http://www.ccrane.com/radios/am-fm-r...ccradio-2.aspx

says, "The addition of the 2-Meter Ham band may make the CCRadio-2
a life saver during an emergency like hurricane Katrina. 2-Meter
Ham operators are early on the scene and they donate their time
while handling perhaps 90% of the emergency coordination efforts."
They have even put up an entire page called, "What Can I Hear on
the 2-Meter Amateur Radio Band?"

http://www.ccrane.com/library/2-mete...adio-band.aspx

After going on and on about how wonderful hams are, that page tells
how to get a ham license and gives a link to the League's website.
All in all, very cool!

Usual disclaimers: I don't work for C. Crane, don't know anyone who
does, don't even own any of their radios. Just really liked this
good publicity they're giving us!


Patty N6BIS

p.s. Do any folks from Newington read this group? If not, I'll
send this info to someone there.

Patty Winter wrote:
Last night I was listening to KGO, the top-rated station in San
Francisco, and the host did a commercial for C. Crane. They often
advertise their AM/FM radios on KGO in the evening and overnight
because KGO has regular listeners all the way up to British Columbia,
so they have a ready-made audience of people who want radios that
can pull in distant stations well.

Anyway...this is the first time I've heard the 2m ham band mentioned
in a commercial for an AM/FM radio!

This is the first time I've seen a company named "C. Crane" mentioned.
Do they market solar-powered or hand-powered radios? Are they an OEM, or
are they rebrands of some other manufacturer?

W1AC
(Filter QRM for direct replies)

In article ,
Bill Horne wrote:

This is the first time I've seen a company named "C. Crane" mentioned.
Do they market solar-powered or hand-powered radios?

Yep. They have a number of emergency radios.

http://www.ccrane.com/radios/


Are they an OEM, or are they rebrands of some other manufacturer?

I don't know.


Patty

Bill Horne wrote:
Patty Winter wrote:
Last night I was listening to KGO, the top-rated station in San
Francisco, and the host did a commercial for C. Crane. They often
advertise their AM/FM radios on KGO in the evening and overnight
because KGO has regular listeners all the way up to British Columbia,
so they have a ready-made audience of people who want radios that
can pull in distant stations well.

Anyway...this is the first time I've heard the 2m ham band mentioned
in a commercial for an AM/FM radio!

This is the first time I've seen a company named "C. Crane" mentioned.
Do they market solar-powered or hand-powered radios? Are they an OEM,
or are they rebrands of some other manufacturer?

C.Crane is a specialty mail-order/internet retailer who started out selling
the GE "Super Radio" and similar products to AM DX listeners around
the US. They have since expanded both their range of radio products and
also branched out into semi-related products. Including alternate-power
receivers, flashlights, etc.

They seem to be branding products from several OEMs. I wouldn't be
surprised if a ham or two were working for the company somewhere.

On Sat, 15 Aug 2009 11:11:08 EDT, Patty Winter
wrote:


In article ,
Bill Horne wrote:

This is the first time I've seen a company named "C. Crane" mentioned.
Do they market solar-powered or hand-powered radios?

Yep. They have a number of emergency radios.

http://www.ccrane.com/radios/

And a lot of other products, too. See their main page
http://www.ccrane.com .

I never bought a radio from them. But I did buy two other items.

One is an LED flashlight I got 9 years ago which I use frequently. I'm
still on the original alkaline batteries.

Another was a miner's-cap headlamp. I could not stand the odor from
the straps which held it to my head. They took it back, and refunded
not only the original price plus shipping, but an extra $5 for my
trouble!

Are they an OEM, or are they rebrands of some other manufacturer?

I don't know.

I remember an ad for one of their radios saying something like: Made
by big German radio manufacturer to our specifications.

Dick, AC7EL

Patty Winter wrote:
Anyway...this is the first time I've heard the 2m ham band mentioned
in a commercial for an AM/FM radio! I don't know whether the "CC Radio
2" is a new product, or whether they just hadn't mentioned this band
before. (It also gets the weather band.) They said that they had
included the 2m band in the radio so that listeners could get valuable
information during an emergency. Yay us! :-)

I wonder how useful (or lifesaving, as they claim) it would be to listen
in on amateur 2m communication during an emergency?

Maybe it would be more effective to budy a normal radio and one of
those Chinese 2m (or even dualband) portables?
(wouxun puxing weierwei fdc etc.)

This would at least have transmit capability...

On Sun, 16 Aug 2009 21:04:26 EDT, Rob wrote:

Patty Winter wrote:
Anyway...this is the first time I've heard the 2m ham band mentioned
in a commercial for an AM/FM radio! I don't know whether the "CC Radio
2" is a new product, or whether they just hadn't mentioned this band
before. (It also gets the weather band.) They said that they had
included the 2m band in the radio so that listeners could get valuable
information during an emergency. Yay us! :-)

I wonder how useful (or lifesaving, as they claim) it would be to listen
in on amateur 2m communication during an emergency?

Maybe it would be more effective to budy a normal radio and one of
those Chinese 2m (or even dualband) portables?
(wouxun puxing weierwei fdc etc.)

This would at least have transmit capability...

I spent a few minutes searching the web for wouxun, puxing, weierwei
and fdc radios. I found models of wouxun and fdc which transmit in
the ham bands. These radios would be useful, provided that someone
buying one of these understands that (1) to transmit with it legally
they need a ham license (and abides by this rule); and that (2)
lacking a ham license they are not allowed to transmit with it unless
it is a real emergency and no other means of communications is
available.