Hello,

If this is too off topic, scold me and I'll never do it again.

I have a UV-5R. I love this $25 radio for what it is, except.

I want to use headphones. However I cannot stand to have audio in just one ear. Plus I drive noisy lawn gear and tractors. I use ear buds with gun muffs over the ear. Microphone will come later when I get my technician test passed.

The head phone output is 2.5mm TRS (this alone bugs the crap out of me.) In addition, the tip only carries audio and the ring is TX data. When the radio is scanning there is a low frequency thump in time with the scan that comes out the data port ring.

If I plug a 2.5mm TS the data port ring will short to the sleeve. I'm not sure this is good idea. 

So, I think my only option is to buy a 2.5mm TRS and make a mono cord that only uses the tip. I can then split it to a stereo TRS 3.5mm female to plug my earbuds into.

Any other ideas would be appreciated.