I’ve noticed that the RF power output from the Chinese radios can be quite variable from model to model, and even from individual radios of the same model & batch.
I’ve bought an RF Power meter (GY561) to do some tests on the HTs I have at present.
All tests were performed with the radio fully charged & still on the charging base, to make sure the supply voltage remained constant at 8.4v throughout the tests.
Frequencies used were 145.500 & 433.500 for VHF & UHF respectively.
The power meter was connected with ~8″ of RG174 Coax.
High Power:
UV-5R 1 (S/N: 13U1136132):
VHF: 6.3W
UHF: 4.9W
UV-5R 2 (S/N: 13U1136114):
VHF: 6.5W
UHF: 5.2W
UV-5R 3 (S/N: 130U541416):
VHF: 7.1W
UHF: 6.3W
Low Power:
UV-5R 1 (S/N: 13U1136132):
VHF: 2W
UHF: 1.2W
UV-5R 2 (S/N: 13U1136114):
VHF: 2.3W
UHF: 1.5W
UV-5R 3 (S/N: 130U541416):
VHF: 2.7W
UHF: 2.1W
Just shows you the variations in the power settings. There was a 1 watt difference between high power on my 2 UV-5R’s.
Indeed, the power output on these Chinese HTs seems to depend very much on the particular component variation, there’s very little in the way of consistency.
I don’t think the extra ~1W or so of extra output power makes any different with range though.
As the final PA supply isn’t regulated either, the power will drop as the battery discharges with use.