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Someone should make one of these for 6m.

I've often wondered the same thing.

It is interesting to me that so many people in the GMRS community, if one can call it that, have such strong opinions about something so silly. Is it because CB bois use it and GMRS people are much serious "radio operators?" What's the aversion? I really don't get it.

Let me know which one gets the most reactions.

I'll have to look those 2 up, thanks.

I have used OpenGD77 and OpenUV380 many times without any problem finding the right com port. Have you loaded the correct driver for the cable? When you plug in the cable, watch in Device Manager to see which com port is created.

I am having problems Upgrading my DMR 1701 to Open GD 77. It will not find a COM PORT for uploading. Please advise if anyone has ever had this issue and how to remedy it. If anyone has a good download for it. Thank you.

Regulations wise? So long as they're not doing anything else wrong, no problem. As far as the owners of the network are concerned? You'd have to read into it / talk to them about it. I've seen all sorts of weird rules for 'mah repeatah!!!!' Nope. Generally, the 'rebroadcasting to the network' part doesn't happen on your radio's end, but on the linked repeater end.

Regulations permit your child to use your GMRS radio including talking on the repeater. Anything other than that would be the personal preferences of the repeater owner. If the repeater is linked to other repeaters you’re stuck hearing the link traffic.

The Diamond SRH999 and SRH940 both include 6 meters.

Yep, same

Like said the minute (insignificant) drop in wattage wouldn't be noticed on the receiving end but I would be curious to if it is lower than 12.9 on transmit. 3's Greg

I hope everything went well and you heal quickly. Don't rush physical therapy or try to use your shoulder too soon. I'm running a Comet GP-9 dual band antenna and its base is at 22 feet above the ground mounted on some 1 5/8" fence posts that are anchored to the house. Our club's repeaters are 22.5 miles away with the antennas up on a tall radio station tower. I'm running a Comet CA-712EFC with the base at 20 feet above ground with my Wouxun KG-1000G. With this setup I can easily get into the 2m repeater with my Icom IC-2730 set on low power (5 watts). And the other people can't tell if I'm running 5 watts or 50 watts when using the 2730 and the GP-9. Using a hand held around the yard is a different story since I am low to the ground and using the short HT antenna. I have to use a minimum of 20 watts to get a good readable signal into the 70cm and GMRS repeaters. I can sometimes get into the GMRS repeater with a HT out in the yard if I am facing the direction of the tower but it's not a strong signal. I can't get into the 70cm repeater at all with a HT. The 2m and 70cm repeaters use the same antennas which are at 900 feet and the GMRS antennas are at 400-450 feet. Cross band repeat works well around the yard for me. Another good use is if you are traveling with a group and there is only on mobile radio but several hand held radios.

Oh, yeah, I can get days on a 3,800 mAh battery if it's mostly on standby. With regular use, about 3 x 8 hr days. Or, I guess 24 hrs straight through, if you have enough stamina for that.

Well I suppose it was two questions, first being how big of a deal it is if my kid is talking back and forth with me on this repeater network and second would be if there's a way to limit my transmissions to just the local repeater and not get and receive everything from the rest of the network. I have both send and receive ctcss codes to that local repeater but that doesn't seem to limit anything.

I don't know how the airwaves are where you live, but here it's unnecessary to have "privacy" (they aren't) codes engaged on all channels. There's not enough traffic to keep me from communicating with friends and family, and with a DCS tone engaged, you won't be able to hear anyone else on the channel. The UV-5r has plenty of memory slots. I have the GMRS/FRS channels "bare" and another set of just the GMRS channels with codes engaged. If I'm talking to family, they'll have gotten the radios from me, so we can communicate on the coded frequencies if we feel the need. FRS channels 8-14 are restricted to 0.5 watt. The UV-5r is nominally 1 watt on low power, although a lot of times it's less. I recommend you set the power on 8-14 on low and then try to avoid using them unless you really have to. Most likely, nobody will notice 1 watt vs 0.5 watt, but it's the polite thing to do.

I've been trying for months to get an antenna mast up outdoors, but it's one thing after another. Most recently I had shoulder surgery and won't be able to lift anything heavy for several months. Right now, I'm using a mag mount on a pizza plate, so crossbanding won't give me much more than I get from my HT. If I had a good antenna on a 40' mast, I might find a use for crossbanding.

I was responding to the points being made about repeaters being expensive and bulky. In some circumstances, you might get better distance even without the repeater. I've done that a couple of times on ham just to get the feel of it, but so far, I haven't had circumstances where I felt the need. I hadn't thought of that, but if there were lowband GMRS channels, I'm sure someone would start making radios capable of crossband repeat.

The main issue I see is finding a 6M antenna for an HT. There's plenty of HT size 27MHz CB antennas to be had but nothing for 6M/50MHz that I can find.

But I have a new radio that let's me select different sounds for the beep! You know I've got to try it out.

No good buddy beeps unless you want to find yourself with no one to talk to. Sent from my SM-S911U1 using Tapatalk

NEWS in the GMRS world: Source: National Communications Magazine Article: Petition from GMRS operators in the D.C. area for the use of unused low band frequencies. A group has filed a petition with the FCC for unused low-band channels in the 30-50MHz bands. National Capitol Communications also known as Mid Atlantic REACT in Washington DC. Michael C. Trahos GMRS call sign KAB7046 and ham operator KB4PGC. Asking reason: The need for longer-range, publicly accessible communions tool in case of severe natural disasters. The frequency targeted: Old cordless telephone channels 46 to 49MHz. According to NCC's analysis, 10 channel pairs 16-25 have no active FCC license and could be repurposed for GMRS repeater operations supporting both simplex and duplex communication up to 100 watts. Low powered baby monitors and walkie talkie channels 49.83 to 49.89 MHz. NCC proposes allocating these five channels for unlicensed 2-watt FRS use. Abandoned VHF paging freqs. 35 and 43 MHz. Previously they were used by commercial paging services. NCC recommends reallocating seven of these freqs. To GMRS, with the potential for 300-watt repeater operations and a 8-MHz separation for enhanced range. The petition argues that these VHF low band channels offer propagation characteristics that far exceed the range of today's UHF FRS and GMRS radios.

Yes the 6m band can be fickle at times and it's not called the "Magic Band" for nothing. All of my experiences with the VHF Low band outside of 6m has been while in the military. I've used man portable and vehicle mounted radios and I was never impressed with the range. This is especially true with something like the PRC-77 that only puts out 4 watts. Most of the time we had to use some type of relay system. We didn't have repeaters so we would have two radios setup at high elevation on two different frequencies to pass traffic. I agree that a 50 watt mobile setup with cross band repeat is a viable option. I use cross band repeat quite often even at home. While I can get into the local 2m repeater with an HT when outside, using cross band repeat is a whole lot better.

Welcome, but what question are you asking? (even your tl;dr didn't make it clear)