RE: Why Have 72 mhz Radios Not Come Down In Price?
I guess the short answer is that these radios are still being produced and there is still a demand for them.
When 2.4 technology first came on the market, there was a flood of posts in this and other RC forums extolling the virtues of the 2.4 and the obvious shortcomings of the 72 MHz stuff. I suppose that was from the elitists and those who have a need to be the first to own new technology. Many of those posts even bordered on insisting how stupid/ignorant/backward were the folks still using the 72 stuff. I think many of those were implying that only the upper crust could afford the "good" stuff.
It is my impression that things have moved toward a more level playing field now. There don't seem to be nearly as many posts bad mouthing the 72 stuff and its' users as there were at first. I think that could be because most of us have realized that the 72 stuff was enormously good at first and still serves us well today. There are situations in which use of 2.4 stuff is a no-brainer, specifically big meets where the 2.4 radios don't have to be impounded and nobody has to worry about their multi-thousand dollar plane being shot down by an idiot. But there are still many places where the 72 stuff is fine. The field where I fly is an example. We fly in the boondocks where nobody has ever suffered any interference from outside sources that I am aware of and there are never so many pilots that keeping track of who is on what channel is a problem. I even still have a coupld AM radios and planes with AM recievers that work with no problems there.
I have 14 planes with 72MHz receivers in them and four with 2.4 receivers in them. If one of my 72 receivers goes bad, what am I going to do? Am I going to replace that receiver with a $30.00 to $40.00 receiver or a $80.00 to $100.00 receiver?