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I went through something like that here in my area. I just got on the repeater a few times a day, at common 'commute' times, and called on the repeater for the owner. After a few days (about a week iirc) he answered. I introduced myself and we spoke for awhile. I asked if it was okay for me and my family to occasionally use the repeater. Not only did he say yes, but he was happy that someone was going to benefit from using his machine. In my experience, most owners are fairly friendly. Just be mindful that its someone else's property and you should do okay.

I came across a short (under 4 min) professionally made video showing how citizens in fire prone areas took action to have some kind of communication network. This came about because of the horrific fires in rural areas and loss of telephone and cellphones. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2uhOwng_j38 The solution was to purchase GMRS radios and apparently quite a few where sold in just one rural area. They had some help from what looks like a ham or two (but did not identify them as such), and even set up a modest repeater to get across one ridge area. The equipment shown were Midland MXT series radios. And for this application, I think this is a good choice for plug and play.

That doesn't make sense. The file itself is the application you're going to install. Perhaps you did not uncompress/extract the downloaded file? There should be a readme txt which will walk you through the setup.

Perhpas it is a minor point, but the FCC changed the Subpart from A to E when they did the 2017 rewrite of the rules. Thus, Part 95E refers to GMRS.

Hey folks, In addition to my GMRS license (WRFC318), I passed my ham technician exam yesterday, so I'm now a ham (but waiting on my official call sign). My journey is only at is very beginning, but I'm looking forward to it. GMRS remains a higher priority for me for family comms, as I'm likely to be the only one willing to go ham, but for sure I'll use ham for hobby and emergency comms. There are many ham repeaters within range here, and where I vacation often (OBX and Kaua`i). Oh, and I got my Ed Fong GMRS j-pole over the weekend, so I'm looking forward to some experiments with that in hopes I can get simplex mode between me and my wife at her office, 2.1 miles away. Fun challenges to work on. Just thought I'd share. I've really appreciated all the advice here from those of you with far (!) more experience than I. Cheers, Ken van Wyk WRFC318

A local family here will give the call sign and then “green fox this is chicken fox. Come in green fox.” The other daughters are little fox and baby fox. I like the idea of using phonetic initials, although it would not work for my brother and me. We have the same initials. In that case we might be Sierra 1 and Sierra 2. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You are indeed right. I was thinking of the old regulations (pre-2017). I stand corrected.

Berkinet had mentioned that: "GMRS power output limits are specified as power output from the radio (I.e. at the antenna connector) rather than ERP." Based upon 95.1767 GMRS transmitting power limits, here is how I understand the rules and hopefully explains my earlier comments: On the eight main/repeater 462/467 channels 15-22, GMRS stations are allowed to operate up to 50 watts output. On the seven 462 interstitial channels 1-7, GMRS mobile, hand-held portable and base stations must not exceed 5 watts ERP. On the 467 interstitial channels 8-14, only hand-held portable GMRS units may be used and they must not exceed 0.5 watts ERP. That is why channels 8-14 would not be found on legal GMRS mobile and base rigs since that type of equipment are not allowed on those channels. The hand-held units are allowed to operate on those channels under GMRS rules. Even on the seven 462 interstitial channels 1-7, many of us may be exceeding the ERP levels since we may use higher gain antennas with low loss feedlines and I suspect most transmitters are typically preset for 5 watts output. I wish the FCC had allowed GMRS stations to always use output power. Imagine how difficult this is to understand for the casual GMRS operator. This is why we tend to operate on the main channels when using GMRS equipment.

Talking about running low power... I have found that the distance coverage for usable comms is near unchanged, going from 5 watts to 40 or 50. Typically 1 s unit or less. I almost always just run 1 watt unless I am working a repeater that is more than 10 miles away or deaf.