A current selling model is the midland 75-822 which is a handheld that you remove the battery pack on the bottom and slide on a 12v/antenna adapter for car use. Then you can get a 6 alkaline battery pack of an 8 nicad pack. I bought a pair of the nicad packs and keep eneloops in them and charge them in an nimh charger instead of the nicad charging curcuitry built in.

Just to complicate matters a bit. These days what may appear to be FRS (Family Radio Service) radios, which don't require a license to operate, may actually be so-called hybrid radios that transmit on the GMRS (General Mobile Radio Service) frequencies. GMRS radios requires a license to operate.

If the radio has 14 channels, then it is a real FRS radio, but if it has 22 channels, then it is a hybrid.

Last I looked FRS radios were becoming very hard to find - Motorola doesn't make them anymore, and unfortunately lots of people are starting to use the GMRS radios illegally.

My guess is GMRS will become unregulated like CB did many years ago, then the radio makers will decide on a new frequency band and come up with a new name and get everyone to buy those instead of the frm.gmrs/cb.
The main problem I have is the frs/gmrs radios have taken over the name walkie talkie so now when you search for a walkie talkie thats all the hits you get. But I remember when walkie talkie was a handheld CB so I still use that term out of habbit when I serach for CB stuff and have a hard time findng anything. Some of the smarter ebay sellers are the worst, they will put a description like "frs radio not gmrs or cb" so they get a hit no matter what you search for.
The funny thing is with CB channels other than 19 are all dead air anymore so there are still 38 channels for use when you drop off 9 and 19 so there really isn't any need to buy FRS and GMRS unless you just like spending money.

I have a Uniden CB radio / hand held unit that is nearly 25 years old now. It looks like a walkie talkie. The extendable antenna unscrews from the top and screws into a magnetic base to put on the roof of your car. The battery pack comes off the bottom and a lighter adapter plugs in for power. It all fits into a small zippered pouch. Convenient to throw under the seat and have available.

The downside is it has an effective range of 2 miles at best. When on the road, any truckers rig will stomp all over your signal. It works great at listening to the truckers and finding out what is causing the trafic up ahead, but forget conversation. I looked into a more powerful non-walkie talkie model but never quite got around to purchasing one.

If your group is planning on traveling interstate, you will have trouble communicating on any CB you will purchase from an electronics store. The truckers have their rigs boosted so much that as soon as they start talking, you will be drowned out and no one will hear you.

Were you trying to talk on the same channel as the truckers? In my Jeep club, we are always talking on our CBs traveling down the interstates to our wheel'n destinations. No doubt the truckers are running boosted signals, but we've never had a problem with it. Maybe your radio is out of tune, or the crystals are wearing out?

That is a good point. It has been years since I last used it. It was primarily me trying to ask questions concerning traffic or "bear sightings" on the heavily used trucker channels. There are a lot of channels that get very little use and would work for group travel.

and even on the trucker channel with them running high power its not uncommon to hear traffic reports from miles away. I have to drive down into the center of my city then back out because its still faster than going around the outerbelt which has an ~10 mile radius and when I'm near the center of the city I can hear truck drivers from all around the outerbelt and outside of it. So after you take out channel 9 and 19 and a couple of the highest are usually reserved for SSB communications you still have 35 to choose from. Then if your running one of the newer smaller CB's most are maxon made and have the same tuning IC and can be modified for 120 channels though I beleive you need a ham license to operate the extra channels since they are outside the unlicensed CB band.
I'm going to get a mobile scanner for my truck then I can monitor channel 19 while leaving the CB on 'my' channel, right now I just use the channel 9/19/normal switch.

I have one of these:
http://www.amazon.com/Cobra-75WXST-Weatherband-CB-Radio/dp/B00005N5WW/
The great thing is that it takes up almost no dash space, and is relatively easy to install, and seems to work fine. The key to perforance is the ANTENNA. I would rather have a cheap radio with a great antenna than the other way around.


Of course, I had to get a tiny CB, becuase my car also has one of these taking up space:
http://www.gigaparts.com/parts/gpcpa/original/zic-2200h.jpg
I can talk about sixty miles with this thing using 65 watts of power. Through a repeater, I can cover most of the state of Colorado. Highly recommended.

I looked at those for a minute and everything I read about them said they sucked no matter how good of antenna. I ended up with an old fashioned Cobra 25. It has the Wx channels too and will tone out (loudly) when a Wx alert is issued. Works well for on the farm and camping I can hear the tone when outside the truck even with the windows rolled up.

I agree that they are probably not the best option, but the one saving grace of that cobra is that they take up almost no space in the car.

You said "truck," so you are lucky that you probably have enough space to mount stuff like that. Where I live, Subaru's are popular (especially the Outback and Forrester). Those things do not have ANY place to put any sort of radio where it won't be banging into your legs. Fortunately I have a 93 Lumina, so I have space to mount some stuff. But my 2M rig comes first, and the CB was thrown in as a backup. So, I got the smallest CB that I could find.

At least with amateur radio gear, you have lots and lots of radios with remote-head attaching. This means that most of the radio can ride in the trunk or under a seat, and only a small control panel mounts on the dash. CB radio makers still have to learn this trick.