This is the Clansman VRC-351M Back-Pack Radio that was mainly used by the Royal Marines. The radio is basically a PRC-351 that has been upgraded to work with the Clansman BID system, British Inter Departmental. The BID system is some sort of army voice or data encryption system? that is still secret and unavailable.
The upgrade is a interface board connected internally to one of the audio sockets of the PRC-351 which now acts as the BID interface. The radio can still be used as a normal PRC-351 with-out the BID system attached.The PRC-351M is a 4 Watt portable VHF (FM) Radio, made by RACAL BCC Ltd. in England. The PRC-351M has been designed to provide command communications at battalion and company level for dismounted troops. It was also used in vehicles by mounted troops.
Frequency Range 30 to 76.000 MHz in 25 Khz steps giving a total of 1841 programmable channels. The desired frequency is set by four knobs on the side of the radio which can be operated even while the operator is wearing Arctic mittens, or in the dark by counting clicks from the end-stops.
Intermediate Freq 11.525 MHz, Frequency Stability 5 ppm per year. Voice F3E Narrow with +/- 5 Khz deviation, Telegraph F2, 75 Baud.
A Whisper mode is provided for use when quiet conditions are essential. In this mode the receiver's audio output volume is reduced and the microphone sensitivity is increased. A Loud mode is also provided for operation in noisy environments as well as a Noise-On switch position which allows the radio to operate with the squelch in the off mode.
Local Squelch facility by either 150 Hz tone modulation of radiated signal, or by 160 Hz superimposed on receive signal. Auto-Rebroadcast operates on 150Hz Modulated receive signal.
Output power of the radio is 4 Watts into a 50 Ohm load and the transmitting range is up to 10 Km when used with 1.2 meter standard whip antenna in open country side, and up to 20 Km when used with a vehicle antenna. The radio can be capable of transmitting to much greater distances by adding an external clip on 20 Watt RF amplifier. In this configuration the radio would effectively become a Clansman PRC-352M which is available elsewhere on this website.
If more than one radio set is used in close proximately a Selective Unit RF 4 Watt SURF should be installed on top of the PRC-351M radio. The SURF prevents one radio interfering with the other radio. The SURF is then tuned to give optimum performance and achieve maximum range with the radio set.
The radio is powered by a standard Clansman 24 Volt battery pack. The battery clips on to the bottom of the radio. The radio can also be powered / recharged with a Hand Generator which clips on between the radio and the battery. It can also be powered externally from Vehicle power supply or a 24 Volt DC Power Supply such as the UK-AC1-2870 14/28 Volt AC Adaptor, connected to the radio with a modified battery extension lead.