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I'm not getting anything either. But I'm in Connecticut.

You will need to use two antennae, one for the 70cm freqs and one for GMRS. You should mount each antenna on the side of each cowl nead the "A" Pillar using the Rugged Radios mounting brackets and NMO mounts. Don't use thd cheap stuff get the Laird Mount and Cable from a reputable Radio Electronics Dealer. As for the GMRS antenna since it appears you are only concerned with GMRS for the trail, you should get thd Midland MXTA25 or the MXTA26. Attached is a picture of my Highband VHF antenna on the side near the cowl and "A" Pillar. Also attached is a Laird Lip Mount NMO mount I use for my UHF DMR freqs. The Phantom antenna is a Laird. Just make sure that the mounts have chassis ground continuity without the coax cable connected to the radio.

They have arrived

If you are licensed amateur there are lists showing which countries the US has reciprocal agreements with regarding operating privileges. There is an official notice along with your license you need to carry with you also. You may need to get an Icelandic call sign also while operating in their country.

This ^

I would say that the radio took a dump. The radio should not be 200 degrees unless you kept it keyed for an extremely long time.

New radio, new questions. I’ve set up a new BTech radio in my truck to use as mobile comm. Today I wanted to see what kind of output I would get on a larger base antenna. I connected it to the Surcomm with the appropriate adapter. At first, I tried it on channel 16 and it was registering close to 19 W. Then I went to channel 23 to see how frequency would affect output. It briefly showed the output still approximately 19W. But then it went blank. There was no reading. When I went back to 16, no measurements. I then hooked the meter to an HT that I had and it seemed to work fine. Went back to the mobile and I could not get the meter to read the output or SWR from the mobile unit. I do want to say that the BTech was extremely hot (Close to 200°F) but I did check it with the truck running, with the truck off and with radio connected to a power bank with no readings. I changed the adapter cord as well. I took the mobile unit out, put a fan on it to try and cool it to see if that made a difference and it did not. I am able to communicate with an HT on channel 16, so I know it is outputting something, but it does not read on the meter. Any thoughts on if it’s the meter, the radio, or something else?

You'll have issues trying to accomplish this with a single antenna that is limited to 18" (or so). You can use the location for a GMRS antenna, but the 2m/70cm antenna for the Kenwood will be much taller. Reason being is that you don't really have a good ground plane. With GMRS you can get away with using a 1/2λ (wave) antenna. It won't require a ground plane to be efficient, and they easily meet your height requirement (about 10-11" tall). For the 2m/70cm antenna to get one that's 18" it's going to need a ground plane. A model like the Comet SBB2NMO will actually cover* the 2m/70cm and GMRS (both simplex and repeater inputs), but it is a 1/4λ for 2m, and 5/8λ for 70cm. Both of which need a good ground plane. For the 2m/70cm if you went taller (40") you could get something like the Comet SBB5 or Diamond NR770HBNMO (basically the same antenna), which for 2m is 1/2λ and for 70cm it is 5/8λ over 5/8λ, so no ground plane required. However it is 40" tall (with a fold-over mount). *This is speaking from personal experience, as I have both the Diamond and the Comet SBB2NMO. The Comet is on the trunk of a car, close to the edge where it meets the rear window, but I am directional to the sides and rear of the car. It is fine for population dense areas with lots of repeaters, though its performance is compromised going towards the front of the car (no ground plane). When traveling (road trips) I swap in the Diamond and being directional is no longer a factor.

I noticed a lot depends on the software I'm using. In CHIRP I enter 462 and it automatically adds the +5 offset to correct the TX to 467. With the Baofeng Factory software I have to manually enter the 467 TX and 462 RX. Even with everything correct I'm not getting any returns from anyone so maybe no one is monitoring the Repeaters.

This is the part that everyone wants an answer to, because it makes zero sense.

For citizens using radios in a foreign country, you should contact the United States Embassy and ask them that question. In some countries, Personal and Business Radio Services freqs may not be used for the same radio services in the other countries. The Amateur Radio freqs might be a different story. I'm not as smart as a Amateur Radio Operator, so I don't how that works in other countries regarding HAM freqs. For governments visiting and using radios in foreign countries, I had to contact the United States Embassy Regional Security Officer (RSO) in that respective country and get a channel assignment from the ITAC800 Channel pool.

how do you know or what makes you think what you are hearing on ch 4 is a repeater?

That is not unusual for Pandaland radios to sound like a popcorn popper. Real non-Pandaland radios don't have that problem.

At the moment, I can only hit 550 Alpha and Sun City West 625. I usually have no problem hitting Shaw Butte, Towers 575 & 600, but not today. I suspect the problem child is back at it since Shaw Butte, and the two Towers repeaters are down.

In the stone age, there were GMRS business licenses. You could be receiving data being transmitted by a grandfathered business licensee.

How About Read The Part 95 Sub Part E GMRS Rules. The Link Below Will Answer Most Of Your Questions. https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/chapter-I/subchapter-D/part-95/subpart-E

Depending on the radio you have either Channels 23-30 are Repeater Channels OR RPT 15 thru RPT 22 are Repeater Channels. After GMRS 22 the next 8 Channels, no matter how they're labeled are supposed to be the Repeater Channels.

1. What do you mean it 'shows' that it's a repeater? 2. Municipalities have on occasion stepped on GMRS channels. I think we've had a couple stories of fire departments on here in the last couple years. But without, just, SO much more info, I'm not sure we can diagnose it for you. Is Channel 4 a GMRS repeater channel? No. Is there much (other than the FCC rules...) stopping someone from setting up a repeater and using it on Channel 4? Also no.

Thanks for the reply Leo. Much appreciated!

** IF ** we wanted to use a park pavilion, it looks like HoCo parks do offer pavilion reservations: https://www.howardcountymd.gov/recreation-parks/rentals The smallest one (Waterloo Park) is for 25 people and is $145 to rent/reserve. Centennial Park is pretty decent and only a few dollars more ($165) for a pavilion there. I've fished Centennial Lake quite a bit and it's not far off I-95 x MD-100 or I-70 for those that might come that way. For inside venues, our ham radio club has about one "club breakfast" a month at the local (Arundel Mills) Golden Corral buffet. They don't do anything special for us, but do let us grab a couple tables in back for our group (15-20 people). Food is regular price and no one ever gets very sick. I'm sure there are other spots like this around. As mentioned by WRJY601, we could reserve a table in a restaurant. I'm not that familiar with what's in HoCo, but I'm sure there are plenty spots around with a "banquet room" or similar that we could reserve. I guess it's really going to depend on how many attend, right now we could all hit a drive-thru in my truck... If we're going to do this outside, it's probably best to wait until September for the temperatures to get reasonable again. If inside, any time. I have business deadlines that come and go, but should be available if we don't have a compressed bid in progress. Thoughts?

Yes. Transmit into the repeater on 467 and you will get a response on 462

Or was I right all along. I had it working, now it doesn't work, not sure anymore. RX=462, TX=467, is that right?

Thanks folks

How do I download repeater lists for different states? I will be traveling soon and want to have the list in the car mostly for the tones.