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I searched through the archives and found this thread: Does anyone have any experience with using the Rugged Radios Suction Cup Antenna Mount? Suction Cup Antenna Mount – Rugged Radios This picture is almost identical to the set up I would like to run.

So far real world results comparing the wideband tune and the single channel tune aren't vastly different. My neighborhood is a mix of hit or miss when I'm walking around with my Tidradio H3. I have certain "stations" I stand at and do my repeater testing specifically so I can do comparisons. Time of day and day to day make a difference in my area. I am in LOS but have at least 1.6km of heavy treed areas in the way. My repeater antenna is only up 13m at its center radiating point which puts it in the thick of the leaves. That night when I put it in I did notice the transmission from the repeater seemed a bit more smooth, meaning the background hiss was much more mellow and it seemed like better quieting. It is by no means anywhere near full quieting. I have my base station and I use a digital recording app to record my tests. And just like any night it will vary. I have tests that are LOS and testing areas that are not. Most of the tests last night were comparable to the last couple of tests except for my last station in front of my house. That one usually is nice and it cut out this time. I had other tests that are usually not so good come in better than usual. So like I said it varies. Today when my wife called me on the radio from the home base (50 watt, CA712EFC, 13m high) it came in much better than usual. That was one time and only about a minute of conversation. That too can vary from time to time. So far I can say that the single channel tuned is doing at least as good as the wide band tuned. Was hoping for better, but given my circumstances it's understandable that the 5 watt has a tought time getting through the trees. On the original duplexer I couldn't make it at all, I could trip the repeater but almost never get audio through. The wide band replacement usually gave me acceptable audio and the single channel tuned duplexer does about the same. I still need to do some farther out testing which I haven't done in a while. The goal is to reach my family one town down and that's going to take more height.

I'll just say that there are many flavors of the SGQ 450D duplexers out there and this particular one came directly from Btech and who ever they use to manufacture them. The original one that came with the repeater had the same numbers but it definitely wasn't made in the same place. The replacement they sent me and the one I purchased are the same. Thanks again for all your hard work tuning these for me Marc

This is a great hijack of a thread

Does seem odd. And not to quibble but asking people in the testing phase if they can hit it isn't going to be dragging the eff sea seas out to the site to employ hit men. Technically it's against regulation. But I'm sure every single one of us here has done a technicality that went against the regulation.

I've sent them back and I'm going to try the UV-17r Pro GPS. CHIRP does support it.

A guy on YouTube did a different radio with similar software and it wasn't anything he input, it was some preset codes. All that aside, the radio wouldn't work with the software for programming so I've returned them and I'm going to give the UV-17r Pro GPS radio a try. It's CHIRP compatible.

This is the kind of detailed real world data that's useful.

That’s only true if the only people who use it are operating under the owners license. If any other license holders use it then it must identify. Obviously that’s not the case here because MrSig has asked if others can check and see if they can access his repeater. But I don’t understand why anyone would go to the expense to add a Repeater ID to their repeater but not have it actually ID their repeater.

I Would Have To Disagree. Think His Story Has A Crack In It..........

Okay folks... Leo sent me a new SGQ-450D duplexer. We gave this one a tune-up and it's looking good. I am very impressed. First, I swept it while it was factory tuned. It looked really good and if it was mine, I probably would have left it alone. On the transmit side, we had a good notch removing the receive frequency at almost -80dB. On the receive side, the notch looked even better at -85dB. Leo asked me to see what I could squeeze out of it, and I have to say, I am impressed with how well it tuned. On the receive side, we got the transmit frequency notch out -95.5dB. On the transmit side, I was able to notch out the receive frequency -95.5dB. Very well balanced. I recorded a quick video of the sweep showing notching as deep as -100.2dB, which is fantastic. The video demos the benefit of a hi-res VNA (mine goes to 1024 points), the sweep results, and the SWR at power. On the receive side, I was at 35 watts, but when I switched frequency to demo the transmit side, I forget to turn the power down. That SWR reading was at 50 watts, even though I said 35 watts. I really hope this helps someone on the fence about buying a B-Tech repeater or the SGQ-450D duplexer. @LeoG, can you share your opinion on the real-world results?

plug in the coordinates on Google Earth and check in Street View. (no all are available)

If it's a private repeater you don't need it.

Gotcha. Thanks for clarifying.

30 foot tower & this is my main gate. Good luck getting in....

Yup,, much different breaking a law, vs. a 'rule'

Nope!

The butt-prints smell fresh so your story checks out.

It's okay, man. I already know where you live. I sat on you front porch naked for two hours this morning before sunrise. If you don't believe me, check out the crusty butt prints near the top step.

And for follow up. I created two .csv files for anyone who wants to do the radio check I laid out. I have both the UV 5G plus and a TD-H3 so I built a test code plug that you can load into chirp to use. Obviously as they are the CSV files, you can use them for any radio as I note you have the TDH8. Set the UV5G to have channel 1 on the top line and channel 2 on the bottom line. Transmit on the TD and you should see the top line receive work. A/B the UV5G to the bottom line and transmit. The TD should then light up. If this works...the radio is fine. As noted elsewhere. You do not need the tone squelch on receive for a repeater, you just need it's input or TONE frequency. I did this test with the Tone Squelch enabled. repeater check td.csv repeater check uv.csv

Actually, no, the rule is that GMRS communications may not be placed onto a network. That extrapolated into not linking repeaters.

As @Jaay already mentioned above... a topo map can give you the elevation if you know the location or general location. If you know something about the locaiton and the repeater is on a mountain top or something (as apposed to a building or tower) you can use this line of sight tool to see where you would get good line on a repeater. https://www.scadacore.com/tools/rf-path/rf-line-of-sight/ But yeah, like some have already said, if they don't tell you the elevation or don't want to... there is no reason they have to.

I know that FCC clarified that you can't link repeaters. But what about a simplex node with AllStar? Is that ambiguous?

I posted on another thread about how to test your radio for this exact scenario. link below. As you have two radio's you can do a very simple test to make sure that you are able to transmit/receive correctly. This is a good way to get to know the radios and the software and have a controlled test bed to work from. In effect, you are independently checking the two halves of the repeater equation. Now, if this test passes, then you can bet your bottom dollar that the tone for the repeater is wrong, or, you are just not reaching it. Although the latter, in your case is not the issue if your sitting so close you can feel the radio waves (joking of course) Radio Check for Repeaters

Maybe try to set a password via the radio setup menu, then hook it up to the programming software. Then use the password you created on the radio. 7.3.7 Power-on Password Allows the radio to set a power-on password to protect device security and settings. Press >> Radio Settings >> Password. Prompts “Input password”. Enter 1-8 digits (0-9), ******** will be displayed. Press the # key to display your entry. Press the key to save and return to the previous menu. To cancel the power-on password Press the key >> Radio Settings >> Password. Prompts “Input password ********”. Press the key to delete until all are deleted. Press to save and return to the previous menu. When the power-on password feature is enabled, the radio will prompt “Input Password” when turning on the radio, and only after entering the correct password will the radio turn on properly. The power-on password can be read and modified by CPS software.