I am betting that CObra or Uniden will have them remove the band switch and associated parts and take it down to a single final and make it a Cobra 148GTL or Uniden Grant XL.
I hope they do not make this radio a full size 1970's chassis. I do not drive a pedo van or a 1980's Suburban. It would be nice if it could mount in a modern 4 door sedan not a Buick Estate Wagon!
If Ranger would have gotten off their rear end 10+ year ago and made an RCI2950 in a Din Package or at the very least 30% smaller than current one in all directions, used encoder that do not flop around out of the box, given use a receiver that does not need a tech to modify it to be less noisy they might still be relevant. Instead they gave a garbage made so cheaply as to be almost worthless while increasing the price point constantly. They kept focusing on putting cheaply made amplifiers under an already too large chassis making it unmountable in anything not a full size truck or van and demanding an electrical system not available on most stock vehicles!
Keep the RCI2950 control layout but shrink it down. Clean up the receiver. Give it punchier audio on AM and SSB. Make the audio on par with the old tube and tube hybrid Kenwoods so that they kick butt out of the box. Decrease the power and the price at the same time! Why decrease the power? Because we have too many IDIOT boxes right now that can not interface safely with 99% of the CB amps built in the last 50 years! Give the ability to fully interface with a PC like a SDR with waterfall when on a PC or Phone. Make the audio so good that the chinese will be caught witht heir pants down! So a stock radio with audio very close to what you might get with direct inject or hifi mod. True eSSB. No technician needed out of the box FANTASTIC! Make sure it can do all modes including digital with no modifications or expansion boards! DSP built in! EQ built in!
Bring it to market for $249! I worked in manufacturing for decades. I know this is doable easily! I worked for General Motors you would not believe how cheap parts are when purchased at scale! It is not that they can't do it rather they do not want to do it!
If they did this they could still sell to people driving 1980's Suburbans but now they could also sell to people driving Toyota's, Kia's, Tesla's etc.....Everyone like me with smaller amps 1, 2, and 4 pills amps could use this and people with 32 pill amps could use it as well. When turned down it could be used as a QRP rig. You could be riding your electric bike and talking ont he radio at the same time!
Imagine being able to use your cellphone as a blue tooth VOX device witht he radio for example. Imagine if the phone not only was the VOX device but also had the EQ and noise gate and downward expander etc with an app!
No Ranger has enjoyed peddling garbage at top dollar for decades now!
I tried to save an American company a decade ago. I gave them a business plan that would turn them around for free! It would not only have made them profitable but it would have guaranteed they stayed ahead for the market for some time to come! They did not listen and now they are out of business. I gave their competition the same plan for free and that foreign company now dominates the market. It took them about 2 years to start to execute my ideas but they executed my plan about 75%. I was passionate about keeping that industry in America and was willing to work for free. When they shunned me I was just as happy to see them crushed under the weight of old thinking and old business models!
The American company ended up selling their tooling for pennies on the dollar and defaulting on a lot of debt. Last I checked the industrial property is still not sold. Part of their problem was county, city and state taxes combined with ancient business model.
If they have not already been doing R&D and just sitting on the designs shame on them for milking their past designs and the market with out investing in themselves and their future market dominance!