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It seems a little quiet, so I figured I would share a walk-thru video of a portable field setup for my radio gear. The video focuses on my Ham gear and two club events I am going to be involved in, but you can easily put something together like this for field use for any radio platform, including GMRS. In fact, the X200 antenna works great for GMRS frequencies. I've posted the SWR readings from the analyzer in another thread, a month or so back. On the low side it was 1.3:1 and the high side was 1.4:1. Not a pro video by any means, but you should get the idea. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9TkDnRDn4U

I went over to where my base station is set up. Turned on my radios and started scanning as I had a few minutes to burn. Started hearing some unusual traffic on channel 6. The station was giving out what I thought was really personal information. I was hearing: peoples names, dates of birth, health information, number of family members, car make and model with tag numbers. I listened for a little bit. Scanned for the CTCSS or DCS tone. There was no tone found. Contacted my local police department. Took my radio down to the PD and the Officer was also concerned about this type of information being transmitted over an open channel. They began to investigate this. I decided to key up with my call sign and try to contact the operators and get there purpose and company name. It turned out to the the local food bank. They were IDing people to receive food. I advised the PD I was going down to talk to them about this. They said they were sending an officer as well. I just told them that people as far away as 10 miles could here this information and that I was concerned about this type of information being sent over an open channel. They seemed a little confused on how I was listening to them. They stopped using the radios and went to cell phones. Just thought I would share this story. I guess that makes me the radio police or at least concerned enough to reach out. Thanks for reading. WRCW870

Same here. '19 Wolverine X4 with Kenwood TK880. And a Kenwood HT and Wousun HT. I'll be relegated to simplex when camping unless I'm near my local area where there are available repeaters. There are no repeaters near where I camp for extended periods. Without a repeater and someone monitoring that frequency the odds of reaching a random rescuer is slim. But simplex with fellow riders should work pretty well (I've yet to put mine to the test). Go to Map on this website to find repeaters that might be in your range. Lots of folks here with more expertise and experience than I.

Got it, thanks!

toggle on the show offline and outdated repeaters to see them all