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My first Cobra 200GTL an absolute nightmare

Thisd is the way I look at it aswell its like ANYTHING ELSE rather it be automoniles Radios ETC.
I and someone else can by the same vehicles and mine can be greaty just simply awsome the others could be a POS manufacture flaw most likely then theres mine thats still a great vehicle and theres my buddy whos adding performance parts monthly because 220H.P. just isnt good enough for him. Now hes really having issues factorys fault??? ABSOLUTELY NOT I AGREE SOMETIMES ITS LUCK OF THE DRAW ON PURCHASING THE LEMON OF THE BUNCH BUT THIS CAN AND DOES OFTEN HAPPEN.
100 watts is plenty as I have said before thats what most HF rigs are set at at the factory. I have also seen these radios cranked and holy smoke look at what she does now well then holy $hit this things going crazy audios all messsed up sometimes it stops transmitting in the middle of a conversation and the damn fan is continuously running. GO FIGURE!!! IF MORE POWER IS NEEDED BUY A DUAL TRANISTOR LOWER POWER RADIO LIKE 2950 GALAXY CONNEX ETC AND AN AMPLIFIER. BUT be prepaired to spend 2-3 times the money for the indavidual items. I kept this all in mind when trying this Cobra 200 I have plenty of radios and other equipment to take ot of a closet for mor mobile or base PEP power. I was only looking for a little extra boosst when conditions are bad and like my HF rigs have proved 100 watts is plenty. Its quite the convinience running just the radio and its factory power cord and acceossories and not having to run more wires and such for that extra punch. When this radio went back I told the guy the problems I have found and that I only want the power at 100 watts thats what my wifes kenwood ts-50 does and thats plenty he repaired what I found and the 100 watts i asked for thats now what this 200gtl does and its great another thing I have to say is think about this we all know what these final transistors are capable of and if only ran at 100 watts do you realize how long they will last? I have 2 texas stars here a 400 and a 500 both bought in the 1990s they both worrk excellent and sound great I have never replaced finals in neither of them. Anyways if any probs shall arrise Ill post them but I used it several hours lastnight and it was flawless. Anyone thinking about one of these or buying one KEEP THAT POWER AT 100 WATTS
 
I wouldn't touch those Cobra exports with a 10 foot polecat!
A bunch of drivers here bought them. They sound like garbage and
they didn't last very long at all.
 
WellIll tell you what this one did sound like garbage and oow its fine perfect as a matter of fact. It sounda great on AM and sideband I havent messed with FM yet but Im happy so far well ahppier than I was thats for sure if it stays good Ide buy another one but have it gone through as this one was. I here bithes andcomplaints about every radio made from Cobra ,Magnum,RCI it doesnt matter I believe its how and who sets them up. Its simple to just tell the person thats doing the work how you want it setup power ETC . As far as Im concerned its like everything else things can go wrong and as long as its taken care of thats the most important and this radio certainly was taken care of its a night and day difference.
 
OK THIS PEICE OF SHIT IS GOING HOME FOR GOOD!! LMAO I had this thing actually run about 4 hours since ive owned it the rest of the time it was sent out to Cobra warranty / service centers and Cobra themselves. I bought this in March and its been a nightmare ever since. This one had the so called new trouble free board with Talkback ETC. I just got this back after 3-4 months and whats it do?? Work flawlessly for a day then back to the big time power drops. I call Brian in service at Cobra and he was like ahhh ahhh well uuuuum I gues we will give your money back because we have no more of these in stock and there now being discontinued :shock: :shock: I thought HMMMM GO FIGURE!! Now I was gonna buy a Magnum S-9 but this Bruce from DX CITY says no I get all kinds of those S-9 back in for repairs. He then decided he wanted nothing to do with my radio because he had lost money already on our deal. That made me extremely happy to hear as you could imagine. So there I went shipping it to warranty centers at different location and each time I got a fixed radio for 1DAY until it fawked up again needless to say that Cobra and uniden are the only 2 companies that do not and will not cover the shipping so at $20.00 a throw times 4-5 plus the original price of the radio that brings me up to where I could have just bought the magnum ande now tomorrow I have to shell out anotgher $20.00 to ship this back to the junkyard I mean Cobra. so I will lose $100.00 dollars on the deal. So now do I even attempt to buy a Magnum S-9 or S-980 or do I just stick to my HF rigs and skip the glorified CB thing?? I love to try new things but this last one really stung me and left a mark to boot. Im just very bitter right now and I hope I didnt offend anyone. And bruce at DX city can kiss my Ass for selling me a refurbished radio as a nmew one on EBAY which I am also taking care of the best part was him telling me he wanted nothing to do with that troubleed radio he sold me. Do not buy from DX CITY there on EBAY if they havent been removed yetby other complaints. Well Im all done venting now Thanks forum family for what its worth I feel better now :LOL: but please beware of DX CITY.
 
Im just curious did the output go to nothing? one day its working the next day its not? If so sounds like the first problem I had with mine. The driver took a shit. had an earlier discussion on mosfets on the forum but here is my problem when I was running my antron it poped drivers because of a litle static. dont know if they ever replaced the driver in those things? The RD16HHF? Radio would still be flawless if it was not for the driver or atleast here :( Last time it blew one i decided not even to bother sending it back and just order a couple of those drivers and do it myself. Anyway hope you get yours fixed! I love the sound of mine and cant seem to part with it. Oh yeah and as for power output it keys 2 on low on AM 30 on high does about 100 PEP on SSB on high and 12 on low FM is 4 on low and 30 on high. i have had no problem with heat at these power levels.
 
the s9 is not a very good radio, i had mine for less than 2 weeks and sent it down the road.

just buy the hf rig you want, its more money up front but whens the last time you heard of one breaking?
 
I have alot of radios I mean alot I collect them I have a few 2950 2990 galaxy 2527 3 cobra 2000 3 cobra 148gtl 2 uniden pc 122 2 uniden (president) hr2510 2 yaesu ft-840 a yeasu 990 a kenwood ts50 with matching at50 antenna tuner thats a few of what I have I have sold alot that I had owned previously and I was looking for something new to tinker with Carl what about the s-9 did you not like?? my buddy has one of those s-980 and payed almost $700.00 peaked and tuned all setup with D104 from the place he bought it at and it sounds like garbage on the airways he told me the otherday that his 148gtl's that I setup sounded better than his $700.00 beast that he just purchased. I told him that was to much to spend on a glorified CB radio and he should buy a Kenwood TS-50 or simular for that kind of money and that an hf rig would have the propper cooling (a fan) to boot. I just setup a magnum S-380 for someone last weekend and it hammered on my test meter but when put on the air it doesnt sound right so both these guys are complaining about there MAGNUM radios sounding like shit so that has me wondering if I should even bother. As I said I have plenty of radios but occasionally like to try new things out. And yes that is what mine was doing is running great then power eventually drops off and funny thing is Im running an ANTRON 99 so you figure it was the antron causing static?? Did you try it on another antenna?? And is it now ok?? mine runs great for a day or 2 then poof half the power is all I get. They said lastweek that it was a bad transistor they had replaced so you may be spot on with that determination Cheech ;) .
 
$700 for an S9-80???? OUCH! i wouldn't be happy with that NO MATTER how it sounded. 35 years into radio & i have discovered that if you plan on using ANY freq between 26.815 & 28 megs, a UNIDEN GRANT XL or LT is THE radio to use. they can be had from e bay NIB for what they cost when they were discontinued. they can be modded til the cows come home, or just a basic tweak to the XMIT & some classic RCV mods & you WILL have the proverbial cats meow....though i hate cats :evil:. sure, i have more then a couple, & have owned plenty more, HF rigs. if you're an AMer, you probably won't be happy. a hardcore sidebander MAY be impressed. your friends will probably only be impressed with the amount of disposable cash you have. as for export radios? i've owned 'em all. many suck. most are worse. WHAT exactly are you getting for your money? the same freqs my grant gets. so an export can go lower....most DX below 26.815 is SSB, and it's WAY down-like 26.300 somewhere. after 27.995, you're just asking for trouble, & my grants get up there with no problem. FM-WHO USES FM ON 11 METERS???? really, come on, unless you're in england, you AIN'T using FM. toys???? AHHHHHHH!!!! i DETEST beeps & echoes & talkbacks....though i admit the magnum endless echo CAN be entertaining if I am the one abusing it, but even my kids grew tired of it. so remove the crap & what's left? a cruddy copy of my grant. just find & get the real thing. yes, i still own close to 50 radios, including many exports. among those i kept are an S9, delta force, 257, ar 3500, stonewall jackson, general grant, president grant export, SS158, connex 4800dxl, cobra 148fgtldx, the list goes on. among those i disposed of are my non-SSB radios including strykers, magnums, connex, etc as well as some SSB radios including northpoints, northstars, cobra 200, etc etc etc. OH YEAH, i've had almost a dozen cobra 200 gtldx radios-each was worse then the last, even as i obtained 'updated' models. glad to see cobra discontinued that mess finally.
so, what do i use on AM? an ft 101e, an ar 3500 or uniden grant. on SSB? those 3, as well as an ic706mkIIg, ic735, ic746 pro, or a kenwood ts2000.
enough of my rant.....point is, exports suck, most mobiles will be a compromise if you use 2 modes & for base-get an antenna switch, no one radio is the cats meow :evil:.
sorry :roll:
 
Back in feb. 2006 i got a cobra 200gtl from Wizard, the radio never works on hi and when i called him he was a very impolite person. He sold me a used radio with alot scratches, He may be a good tech but bad customer service. If it wasnt for that incident i'd buy one of the new base amps 1k or 2k. Then I sent the radio to Justin a couple times to have it fixed. bottom line i spent over $600 and its still not working.
 
davegrantsr said:
$700 for an S9-80???? OUCH! i wouldn't be happy with that NO MATTER how it sounded. 35 years into radio & i have discovered that if you plan on using ANY freq between 26.815 & 28 megs, a UNIDEN GRANT XL or LT is THE radio to use. they can be had from e bay NIB for what they cost when they were discontinued. they can be modded til the cows come home, or just a basic tweak to the XMIT & some classic RCV mods & you WILL have the proverbial cats meow....though i hate cats :evil:. sure, i have more then a couple, & have owned plenty more, HF rigs. if you're an AMer, you probably won't be happy. a hardcore sidebander MAY be impressed. your friends will probably only be impressed with the amount of disposable cash you have. as for export radios? i've owned 'em all. many suck. most are worse. WHAT exactly are you getting for your money? the same freqs my grant gets. so an export can go lower....most DX below 26.815 is SSB, and it's WAY down-like 26.300 somewhere. after 27.995, you're just asking for trouble, & my grants get up there with no problem. FM-WHO USES FM ON 11 METERS???? really, come on, unless you're in england, you AIN'T using FM. toys???? AHHHHHHH!!!! i DETEST beeps & echoes & talkbacks....though i admit the magnum endless echo CAN be entertaining if I am the one abusing it, but even my kids grew tired of it. so remove the crap & what's left? a cruddy copy of my grant. just find & get the real thing. yes, i still own close to 50 radios, including many exports. among those i kept are an S9, delta force, 257, ar 3500, stonewall jackson, general grant, president grant export, SS158, connex 4800dxl, cobra 148fgtldx, the list goes on. among those i disposed of are my non-SSB radios including strykers, magnums, connex, etc as well as some SSB radios including northpoints, northstars, cobra 200, etc etc etc. OH YEAH, i've had almost a dozen cobra 200 gtldx radios-each was worse then the last, even as i obtained 'updated' models. glad to see cobra discontinued that mess finally.
so, what do i use on AM? an ft 101e, an ar 3500 or uniden grant. on SSB? those 3, as well as an ic706mkIIg, ic735, ic746 pro, or a kenwood ts2000.
enough of my rant.....point is, exports suck, most mobiles will be a compromise if you use 2 modes & for base-get an antenna switch, no one radio is the cats meow :evil:.
sorry :roll:
Click to expand...
were in the world disd ya xsee a s9-80 for
700.00.thier only 350.00 at coppers.and all the magnum ssb
rigs ive heard sounded great on ssb.one local had a omegaforce
sounded every bit as good as my other local who had ft.101
but if thier mistuned thier not the greatest. id recommend bobscb.com when it comes to buying a magnum.
 

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