Hot Springs Off-Road Park, Arkansas

Quick trip on a cool Presidents Day weekend with Yet Another Jeep Club. I passed a subway car on the highway. 😉

I stopped along the way from Plano, TX to Hot Springs, AR for a couple meals. First time eating with a couple outlaw deer. I was lucky enough to reserve the same cabin this year. It’s in the perfect location and has the most vehicle room.

I wasn’t there when the group found a flipped JKU on Sunday, but the vehicle joined us on Saturday. Apparently the driver was not very experienced, and was on a demanding trail. Glad nobody got hurt. I hear it is a total loss.

I replaced my Yaesu FTM-400DR (discontinued yet in huge demand) with a Yaesu FTM-500DR. I thought about it for a few months, but made up my mind when I got a chance to try on in my buddie’s Jeep. Sure the screen is smaller, but the difference is overrated. The new radio has much better navigation, a fantastic speaker in the head unit, the mic attaches to the face plate (or the body), and the menu system is very well designed. IMO huge improvements over the older radio.

The old Yaesu FTM-400DR is at the
bottom, below the Wouxun KG-1000G.

RT Systems software makes a macOS version of their programming software, which makes programming easy peasy, even more so given the Yaesu FTM-500DR has a microSD slot. Pulling in all repeaters for a location, with a max distance, was a button press away. Brilliant use of API to connect to repeaterbook.com. #integrationFTW

RT Systems’ support is excellent, quick responses and fixes to a couple issues I found and reported. They’re a great company, providing a solution better than Yaesu’s own software. CHIRP doesn’t yet support the model, so too soon to say how it compares to RT Systems’s software.

The menu system is much easier to navigate, who would have thought navigating though well designed menu options could be better than using the older radio’s larger screen. Updating the firmware with the new radio is so much easier than with the old radio. As expected, the new radio arrived with the newest firmware versions.

Very happy with the FTM-500DR. I was able to find a couple locals here in Hot Springs who I was able to do some testing with. Happy to report the Tram 1181 antenna worked fine after switching the radio. I did have to find a good quality Cat6 Ethernet cable, since Cat5 doesn’t seem to work on newer radios. I was able to get the right length to run from the radio body (under the driver’s seat), to the radio head (mounted to the passenger grab bar using a CMM 1″ ball mount). Sad to say after two years of requesting a rubberized version of the ball mount, no response from CMM. Likely due to patent issues with RAM Mount (who won’t make a grab bar ball mount).

Not many pictures today, feel free to check out my previous trip blog.