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You can’t miss a feature you don’t have. I use the screen’s showing of the caller’s Callsign all the time on my HT when I am not sitting at a desk with a pen and paper. One of the great benefits of digital!

I agree. When I bought my first DMR radio the fact that it could store 200,000 contacts seemed important. Since the I can count on three or four fingers how many times I have actually downloaded the list and loaded it into my radio. Of course within months 200,000 wasn’t enough, so the second time I chose to just load European and North America. Then just North America. Now, I don’t even bother.

Likely this. Aviation stuff is wildly expensive. I can definitely see them having 1 air-band radio, using that for unicom or tower frequencies, and then using GMRS or FRS for air-to-air comms. Slightly different use case, but Civil Air Patrol planes do something similar. Air-band for their aviation work, then air to air and air to ground (for SAR / other mission work) is VHF FM on their designated frequencies. (And can be configured as airborne repeaters, which is pretty rad).

My Kenwood commercial DMR radios can't download any digital ID data base, that's not their market goal, Amateur use. I don't miss it one bit. When one is running around with the radio in a pocket or on a belt, using a headset or speaker mic, I doubt anyone is going to yank it out to look at the display every time they hear something. That makes the builtin DMR database feature sort of pointless.

Not Boring at ALL ! Quite fun actually, especially for those of us who Don't have the real estate for Full size towers and hf antennas.

I can only speculate, but perhaps they reserve the air band radio for conversations with the tower and leave it tuned to that frequency. Chit chat on GMRS doesn’t affect that.

This begs the question, why bother using GMRS for aircraft to aircraft comms when you can just use the already installed VHF radios? When I've flown with my cousin in a group flights, that's how they did it. Other than the fact that other aircraft not having GMRS would then not be privy to your conversations?

A few months ago, and on ch. 16, I heard what appeared to be aircraft communicating here in the Phoenix Area talking about should they land at Sedona or Kingman for fuel.

I'm surprised that FR/GMRS does not have any altitude and power restrictions like Part 90 does. Part 90 restricts, or at one time restricted, the altitude not above 5,280 feet AGL and 10 watts.

The services that would be limited by FCC rule are the services that have height limits on antenna's. CB would be a good example. A CB antenna per the rules is limited to 50 feet AGL. So you couldn't use CB radios in an aircraft. Commercial radio under Part 90 would be another since at least repeater antenna's are both power and height limited per the issued license. GMRS really has no AGL restriction. The only thing in the rules regarding height is that if a mounting structure (tower) is over 200 feet that it be registered as an obstruction and properly lit within the guidelines of the FAA regulations for it's height. Ham radio is the same way. They aren't really height limited, they just need to follow the 'hazard to navigation' regulations that the FAA has for towers exceeding 200 feet in most area's and whatever regulation is imposed in area's around airports where there are additional restrictions.

I travel to Charleston a few times a year for work; probably my favorite location on the eastern seaboard. It is really surprising there are no repeaters there...most of the guys I know down there are the kind who would use them. Here in the DC area we have a big selection of powerful repeaters. Of the two I frequent the most, one is 30 miles away, the other 52 miles. I can talk on either from a handheld inside my home. I scan everything and we have far more GMRS than HAM traffic.

Thats cool stuff.

Range will be very good in an aircraft. We have a guy that flies a lot and we can talk to him for a long ways on 2m and 70cm. The range of 70cm will be pretty much the same as GMRS. We really get good range on the repeater while he is flying. The repeater antennas are at 900-950 feet on a 1000 foot tower. We are blessed to have access to the local radio station's backup tower.

It is perfectly legal to us GMRS radio in aircraft over the US and it's territories. I have talked to a friend of mine while in a private plane. I was mobile in Woodbridge Virginia and they were flying as far away as 47 miles from my location.

There you go…. I bet these guys get some good range…. …. &n

95.307…Operation of Personal Radio Service stations in any location outside of those described in the following paragraphs is not authorized by this part. (B)Aboard any vessel or aircraft registered in the United States. With the permission of the captain, while the vessel or aircraft is within or over the United States or its territories, U.S. territorial waters, or upon or over international waters. So, it appears it’s allowed.

There is an aerial acrobatic group that practices out here every Thursday and they use GMRS (or FRS) channel 6, and I've wondered the same thing... But haven't wondered enough to bother looking it up either.

So kicking back at the lake tonight and i catch a conversion with two guys on Ch 16, one pointing out where he off roads in the Kern Canyon.. I can tell they are in Helicopters and I'm assuming two different aircraft. Via the conversations they are returning to Bakersfield after doing aerial surveys somewhere in the Kern Valley.. Not that i really care about these two guys yapping but it got my curiosity going. GMRS is a ground-base communications service, does this mean you or not allowed to use GMRS radios on Aircraft. I guess i'm being lazy, i couid read the rules again,, , but last i did, i certaainly don't recall anything in the rules specifying aircract use..

W.A.G. for the win.

Apparently the Ocala repeater is "down for maintenance" these days.

It is. And they call it a "tactical unit number." I have no idea what is "tactical" about it.

The Tac Number is what they give you when you're a paid member. I'm not longer a Member but I had one for Ocala because that was the repeater in Florida nearest my Home. Ocala 818 I think it was. The trouble is I never used it. When I go to my other home in Gatlinburg I use the other Repeaters that are free and not linked

Maybe the tac number is something they give you when you are a paid club member.

So, I've done some research and I can't figure out what a "tac number" is. There's another metro area repeater that is not part of their network that has also asked me for a "tac number." I assumed it was something GMRS related that I was too green to understand. It is unique to them? As to Zello, I don't think so. I heard some guy the other day saying that he missed it. I guess I'm a little late to the game as I didn't even know what Zello was until a few weeks ago. I downloaded it and put it on my phone for about 10 minutes before I deleted it. Couldn't figure out what I would use it for.

Tac Number. Do they still have it broadcasting on Zello?