The Icom F3S is a very durable and well performing two way radio. However there are a few caveats to beware of:

First this is the radio that the US Army issues to it's soldiers under the Commercial Off the Shelf Program. The radios they use are the F3S-3 which is a 136-150 Mhz narrowband only radio. This radios is now showing up in large lots on the surplus market. Many have been subjected to adverse operating conditions, which is self explanatory. All of these former Army radios are virtually useless for the land mobile market without modification. The reason being is that they have been tuned to put out less than 100 milliwatts of RF. This keeps the transmissions out of range of the bad guys.

These will make great two meter radios for HAMs but you must be familiar with the circuitry and tuning the radio on a service monitor. If this is in your range of skills then by all means purchase the cheap and plentiful f3s-3.

Most users will want the F3S-2 which is 146-174 MHZ wide band portable. This is what is most commonly used by businesses and public safety agencies. This model will program down into the two meter band fine without modification. The cables and software are also commonly found on Ebay. As well as the other accessories you might require such as batteries and antennas.

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