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ahh yes.. right where someone would intuitively look for that setting.. Any idea if the channel can still be changed when locked?

We are talking HT antennas here and the human body holding the HT acts as the ground plane. In my anecdotal experience, I have always had better performance using my 5/8 2 meter telescoping antenna on my HTs, including my DSB Quansheng UV-K5(8), than either a 1/2 wave or rubber duck. Especially for those times a little extra “umph” gets me into a repeater or successfully complete a simplex QSO

Noticed Shaw Butte is back up this weekend, but the PL tone seems to have changed. I can hear it but can't get in.

A 5/8 wave requires a good ground plane. The reason it has a slightly better gain is the reflection off of the ground. Without that reflection it's basically no better than a 1/2 wave. And for an HT antenna you have crap for a ground plane. https://www.w8ji.com/VHF mobile vertical.htm

Based on your comment, I took a look at this “5/8 rubber duck” on the Smiley website. It seems a contradiction in terms: an antenna is either cut to 5/8ths length or is electronically made into a “rubber duck” with coils; but it seems to me it can’t be both! A true 5/8 should out perform a 1/2 wave or rubber dick.

Back to the original topic: according to comments on the Facetime Baofeng Owners Group, the DM-32 is limited to 50,000 Digital IDs, hence making it impossible to download the complete Digital ID library into memory. That plus it’s inability to use OpenGD77 firmware (or separately emulate its benefits) severely hampers the usefulness of the DM-32. I suspect that Baofeng does not want this model at its lower price point, to cannibalize sales of their more expensive models. To the OP: enjoy VHF/UHF and when you can get into HF, 10 meter band openings while we can enjoy the current sunspot cycle, but keep an open mind on the 24/7/365 availability of QSOs with DMR, of which low cost models with OpenGD77 continue to exist.

Under "Repeater Data Settings" Keypad Lock. Turn it off. Randy. You should take it back and give it to me. I could use the spare just in case. At least I know how to use it.

Pretty much any and all federal regulations were written by lawyers for lawyers. None are easy for the average person to understand. And as we see with FCC regulations and NFA/GCA regulations, some portions can and do conflict with each other. I don't blame you for wanting clarification if the line A issue might affect you or not. I also would not take what is posted on any forum as 100% correct without first verifying the information. I dealt with enough conflicting and/or confusing regulations back when I had my FFL. And it has not gotten any easier when dealing with the NFA and GCA.

You might want to look at the Diamond SRH320A. Not exactly cheap. SRH320A Triband HT Antenna.pdf

Right! I just don't like basing my understanding of the rules from a consensus of experienced users saying the rule is not longer on their license. If I was to go this alone (without this forum) how would I come to understand all this? marcspaz did a great job explaining in above post. If § 95.309 wasn't there, I would be satisfied with concluding Line A is not a GMRS thing anymore, but it's there and a GMRS user should not have to research treaties and international agreements to get yet another indirect answer to a poorly written rule.

ISN radios are not designed for voice, nor emergency operations. They are normally used for OT device control and monitoring. Usually the power is low, the ranges isn't very far per watt, and in general are typically programmed for some specific industry business. What are you trying to accomplish?

I just want to get comments on these radios if they're dependable during emergency use

Awesome link, thanks. Looks like LMR-400 would work well. At 220MHz and 20ft@10W I'd only get a 26% power loss so I'd still be putting out over 7W of power.

You will not see any loss or gain on 2m using 25 feet of RG8X. You will see a loss of 1-2 watts ERP (output at the antenna) using 25 feet of RG58. You would be okay with either coax as long as you stay at 35 feet or less. This was figured using an antenna with only 1 dB of gain. The more gain the antenna has the higher the ERP will be. The https://kv5r.com/ham-radio/coax-loss-calculator/ is an excellent source to figure out line loss with the different types of coax. Using any type of portable J pole or similar antenna up high will help extend your range when using a hand held radio. I have built a 2m j pole using faraday cloth and getting it up at 20-25 feet above the ground made a vast improvement. I can get into the local 2m repeater that's 22.5 miles away with a 5 watt HT but there is some noise on my transmission. I was told that I sounded like I was on my base radio when using the same HT connected to the faraday j pole.

Straight forward and/or simple to understand along with the federal government in the same sentence makes as much sense as military and intelligence used in the same sentence. This topic comes up regularly and the answers are always the same each time. I know my original official copy of my GMRS license issued in October 2023 had the line A restriction on it while a newer copy downloaded a few months ago does not have the line a restriction. I have driven myself batty trying to read, understand, and explain NFA and GCA regulations to people. I will let other members here explain the FCC regulations. PS: NFA and GCA makes as much sense as FCC regs do.

Somehow posted the PPOTA reply twice.

The best is still John Kruk of Yaesu's PPOTA. Porta Potties OTA. He has cups and T-Shirts etc. that he hands out to in person visitors at Ham Fests.

Being inside a bowl is no place for a repeater. My house is near the river so I'm pretty low down. My shop is in one of the higher parts of the town which believe me isn't high at all. About 100' higher than my house. And the coverage is nothing to talk about. Keeps me in touch with the wife within town mostly. It will be going higher, but still it's not 500+ feet up which is what you need to start getting decent coverage in my area. To many hills and valleys along with loads of trees full of leaves to suck up the signal.

This ^^^ I would add also that a lot of people assume Amazon will be the cheapest but many things like radios, cable, antennas, and other things you’ll find are less from places like DX Engineering, Ham Radio Outlet, Gigaparts… it’s definitely worth shopping around and comparing from reputable places. Make sure you factor shipping cost though but sometimes you’ll find what you want is cheaper at one place over two or three others for whatever reason and it doesn’t always seem to be the same place that’s cheaper… just my two cents, that I saved lol.

It works!

Personally I wouldn’t use either one of those. I would buy a better known brand such as ABR, M&P, DX Engineering, Times-Microwave, Belden, etc. The way to make certain you’re getting a quality product is to buy from a vendor you trust to provide quality products. If you buy an unknown cable from an unknown vendor on Amazon you’re completely responsible for assessing the quality.

https://www.amazon.com/MOOKEERF-KMR400-PL259-Male-Cable/dp/B094D3DFG3 There's also a KMR400 cable too.

LOL, test questions, yep, I know. A lot of stuff I learned in Tech School at DeVry is coming in handy now. Also, that's one reason I'm sticking at 2M, it's the lowest my radio will do and there's quite a few repeaters here for 2M. I'll need to see just how far from the tripod I'll actually be and see how close I can cut the distance.

Thanks guys, I try the suggestions and follow back

Losses through any coax go up as the frequency goes up. RG-58 is terrible for UHF. RG8x is better than RG58 but still poor compared to something like LMR400. Each person must calculate what the actual losses will be and decide whether they can afford that amount of losses. What’s worse, the losses are expressed in decibels which can be confusing until you become familiar. A loss of 3 decibels means you lost 50%. A loss of 6 decibels means you lost 75%. Every coax company has charts that show us how much loss they have at a particular frequency, usually for 100 feet or 100 meters. Be careful not to compare the two. A meter is more than three feet. Losses increase with length as well but that’s a linear relationship: twice as long equals twice the losses if the frequency is the same. Most of us find a calculator online to calculate the losses at the exact frequency and length of the type of cable you’re looking at. Just google “coax loss calculator“ and you’ll find one. This is the most common one: https://kv5r.com/ham-radio/coax-loss-calculator/