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Basic Communication Outside of the WRC few rally cars have on-board communication other than a mobile 'phone in the co-drivers' pocket. Occasionally competitors will use a Private Business Radio (PBR) or Citizens' band (CB), but as most drivers don't have any sort of support crew to talk to, the need for radio comms in the cars is almost non-existent. Radios are used by the officials and safety teams though. The most visible of the safety personnel are the marshals and surprisingly, you may think, the 'foot soldiers' in the marshalling ranks are not equipped with radios. Instead they report to and receive information from radio cars placed strategically along the special stages. The marshalling radio cars, ideally staffed by two people, stay at a fixed pre-determined location for the duration of a special stage. They are in radio contact with the course controller on '81FM', the 10 watt f.m. simplex 'Safety & Medical' frequency of 81.5750MHz. The radio sets used are mobiles connected to roof mounted antennas. Long before the event begins the course controller has to find a place to operate from that is at a high enough position to ensure solid communications with all the radio cars and the main Rally HQ. This requires careful planning as the start and finish of some stages can be several tens Kms apart. As the name given of the channel implies, medical crews may well be on the frequency, either monitoring or in communication with the controller. The Motor Sports Association (MSA) requires CTCSS to be used and has currently authorised two tones, thus allowing radio cars on different stages running at the same time to operate without radio traffic for one stage being heard by radio cars on the other.
The TAIT 2010 4-channel radio is popular with 81FM users and typically has the frequency with the two different CTCSS tones programmed to channels 1 and 2, with 3 and 4 programmed to channels with the MSA designations 'Red Open' and 'Blue Open'. They are low-band v.h.f. channels in the UK General licence allocation. as well as the Red and Blue channels there are Orange, Green and Yellow channels, these are also low-band UK General frequencies around 86MHz. The colour coding is MSA specific and not used by any other UK General operators. each colour has an 'open' channel, plus 1, 2, and 3, e.g. Green Open, Green One, and so on. All channels of one colour are on one frequency. The channel numbers are for different CTCSS tones. The UK General licence allows the use of any number of 5W hand portable or mobile radios on 15 specific frequencies between 77 and 450MHz anywhere in the UK, and at a cost of just £60 for three years.
If you would like to know more about the control of Radio Frequencies within the UK, please visit
The Radio Communications Agency is responsible for the management of the non-military radio spectrum in the UK, which involves international representation, commissioning research, allocating spectrum and licensing its use, and keeping the radio spectrum clean.
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