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A colleague mentioned something recently that was quite interesting - to be utilized in the event of an emergency. If a person has a radio that is usually used with a GMRS repeater and the repeater goes down during bad weather or a natural disaster, how would that person be able to use that radio in an emergency if it is only programmed for the repeater? The repeater owner or a designated alternate could have a MOBILE radio programmed just like the repeater, so it could be used to receive a repeater-only mobile. The pseudo-repeater mobile radio would be programmed to receive on the 467 frequency and transmit on the 462 frequency. That way, the person who would be attempting to hit the repeater that failed, would still be able to communicate with someone in an emergency. Has anyone done this in your own applications? [ This would probably fall under 47CFR95.143 ] .

de-sense issues are caused by putting on connectors improperly, poor tuning of duplexers and poor weatherproofing of antennas. make sure you read the paper work that comes w/antenna, most have drain holes on the bottom. if you cover them up guess what happens.unless you get a bad piece of cable(it happens) or your running too long for for its abilities there should be no problem running 400 cable 50'. at 50 ' your line loss will be ~1.25dB or roughly 20%. the 820 is rated at 25W w/duplexer loss of 1.5 db and a line loss of ~1.25 to the cable your looking at ~13W into the antenna. these are just #'s off the top of my head you mileage may vary. JE

Oh yes, I do not ground my antenna, as I do not want to attract lightning. I know others will disagree, however in 20 some odd years I have yet to be hit. Although I have had lightning come in on the telco and did thousands of dollars of damage to my "10baseT" network, to give you an idea of how long ago that was.

There is a nice, detailed thread on this topic located in the Forum link below. If you have any questions after looking over those posts, please feel free to post in that thread and we'll help out as we can... http://forums.mygmrs.com/topic/60-proper-antenna-grounding/

Howdy Kris and welcome to the MyGMRS forums, As PastorG stated LMR400 is pretty good stuff and for a price point, well below 1/2" hardline cost. and only a fraction of db. difference in loss at 40feet.. I consider LMR400 use a minimum. No point spending all that money on top of the line equipment only to skimp on feedline. Also a properly tuned duplexer unless you plan to use two properly spaced, separate antennas. I also live in Florida and the flat topography is awesome, I run an Old Uniden 25watt repeater with 60' of LMR400 on a 50' pole currently only raised to 40' with a comet antenna factory tuned to 465. I use an RFS duplexer and I cover a 20 mile radius. I expect 25 miles when raised to 50'. Good luck and keep us posted. Jim...

Hello, Kris and welcome to the Forum. One of the least expensive and good quality feed lines for that distance would be LMR400. You can also use Andrew Heliax Hardline, but there isn't much of a difference at 40 feet for cable losses. This is one link below to LMR400 through Amazon.com's supplier... http://www.amazon.com/LMR-400-Ultra-Cable-Connector-Black/dp/B0013REMTE/ref=sr_1_13/191-9435265-3190724?ie=UTF8&qid=1378928960&sr=8-13&keywords=lmr400+cable I have also used RG213 successfully at 50 feet or less and that is about the same cost as LMR400 in many cases. [ Lets give our new member some tips on cable and setup - Thank you. ]

Thanks, William - Valuable info. For those persons who do not have the luxury of a single button to select reverse, it might be prudent to have reverse GMRS repeaters programmed into your commercial mobiles and portables for your most popular local systems just in case a repeater goes down and someone needs assistance - who would normally use the repeater.

P-G, In the amateur world we call it going to reverse and most amateur radios have a button just to do that,even the Wouxun mobile...William