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Last summer i did extensive testing in heavily forested areas with some mild hills. The KG-935G at 5.5w and a Nagoya 771G antenna was by far the best setup for penetrating heavy foliage. I found we could get 1.25mi-1.5mi reliably (or farther in some conditions or if you don't mind some hearing every other word). I also tried some Boeganf uv5r (rated 5, puts out 3.8-4w) and a Retivis 4w and a KG-905G (5w) and a MURS radio and a Yeasue FT-65R ham (4w) . I had high hopes for MURS in the lower frequency, but MURS sucked. 1/2mi at most in the forest. The Retivus and ham radio (in a UHF range ahhem near a GMRS frequency) got near a mile and then was unreliable past that. The 905 was reliable to 1.25mi but never got to the 1.5mi mark without some interferance . All were tried with their included rubber ducks and again with a 771G (except the MURS). The 771G added about .1-.25mi of reliability in the forest. Alot of people will say a 2w radio will do the same as a 5w radio, and out in the open or atop a mountain to someone in a valley that's likely true. For for penetrating heavy foliage while your standing under canopy.... my testing has shown that wattage is a factor. The 935g by far sounds the best and gets the best range and the 771G antenna is a great investment for heavy foliage use.

I would tune it to 465 MHZ, which means cutting it to the following lengths. L1 needs to be trimmed to 15 3/8 inches L2 needs to be trimmed to 9 13/16 inches However, do not try and trim down to the specified length at once. (Trust me I know, I screwed this up once), Cut a little bit off at a time toward the desired length. After cutting L1 and L2 a little bit each time, re-attach them and measure the SWR again, and then cut again, etc. You will slowly see the SWR starting to come down. The reason for doing this is to not accidentally cut it too short, in which case there is nothing you can do. Side Note: You can get a really good SWR, DO NOT try to get a perfect 1 SWR. Is it possible? Yes. Is it easy? No. Most people consider any SWR lower than 2 as a " good" SWR. Me personally, I try to get it close to 1.5. Also having said this, do not do it immediately! Some one else in this forum may have a better way than I know of. There is a wealth of knowledge here!

Hi @73blazer thanks so much for sharing this information! I really appreciate your help. I'm guessing we will need to plan to have our distance top out at about 1.25 miles when planning multi squad trips. I'm so happy I joined this forum and I hope to make a positive contribution. Nice to meet you.

It depends.. on many factors... BUT: If you will be installing it on your roof, a large fiberglass type "base" antenna like the Tram1486 is probably a better choice as it will perform better and does not require a ground-plane. If you just want to put it in the window, then the MXTA26 is probably a better choice as it is smaller and will fit in the window better than a 5-8Ft long fiberglass type base antenna and you can slap a pie-pan under it for the groundplane.

Hey I'm all for the Indy 600 moving to Greenwood....but pretty sure that isn't happening. Somehow someone has added a Indy 600 repeater system to the map..

Hi everyone, first I just want to thank you for welcoming me to the site and for your help with my various questions. I thought I'd share our GMRS experience from today. My little group which I've recently started, called "Trails Adventure Team", made our first mission into a local trail system to clean up trash and report trail conditions. We hiked to the summit of Edmund Hill here in Northborough, Massachusetts, and then split up on two different trails on the way back down. While separated, we tested our new waterproof Baofeng GMRS-9R radios with our newly issued callsigns. Although Edmund Hill Woods isn't large enough to do a proper GMRS range test, we did find that transmissions were loud and clear in the forest at about 0.25 miles apart. In a few weeks we're going up to Mount Pisgah which is a significantly larger area and with more varied terrain. We are planning to conduct more tests then, using both wideband and narrowband modes (since we will be using the latter whenever unlicensed FRS users are in the mix, and we want to know how both perform) and will try to test reception at a distance of 0.5 miles or greater. We also used QGIS and QField to record some GPS data points on the trails (see attached image), although a few of them were inaccurately placed; I think I need to buy a tablet with a more precise GPS than my low-end mobile phone. Does anyone else use GMRS in woodland areas? What kind of range are you capable of getting with a 5 watt handheld? (Although, I've heard these GMRS-9R don't actually reach the 5 watts advertised.)

HI @WRWI380, although I do not know how to use repeaters, I do have one general suggestion. It might be helpful if you made a new question in the "Technical Discussion" forum at the top level, with a link to the video or videos you are having trouble following, and a description of what goes wrong when you try to follow the video. As for the repeater problem, it could be that the people you were listening in on, were using a CTCSS/DCSS code that you weren't transmitting, thus they wouldn't be able to hear you. I hope you can find someone knowledgeable on the board who can help answer your questions about repeaters. Although I'm not terribly knowledgable myself, I would be happy to answer other GMRS questions that don't involve repeaters.

Hello Gentlemen, I'm a brand new GMRS user introducing myself from the Inner Banks of North Carolina. Also a Ham operator and just realized there is a GMRS repeater right here in town, so I decided to get my GMRS ticket as well. WRTS213 ~ Waterfront Radio Tranmitting Station 213 (The only way I can remember a 7-character call sign) Thanks for having me in your community. Anthony www.kd3y.com

Ok, thanks for the insight, guys! I'm new to all this and appreciate the help!

Thanks brother. I thought that it could be tuned by adjusting the screws and lowering or raising the elements L1 and L2

This is the correct answer. If you have a long enough cable between the receiver and the transmitter, you may be able to get away with it, but having said that, if you are using a short cable to connect the two, due to most radios having very poor shielding, your transmitter will most likely drown out your receiver, and you will get very poor results.

Technically and very generically, yes. You would connect both radios to the same antenna through the duplexer and to each other through a repeater controller. The repeater controller doesn’t care as long as it gets the signals it needs. But you may discover that you have wasted your money. You might find that your receiver desenses or becomes deaf to RF whenever the transmitter is transmitting.

Mygmrs.com and forums.mygmrs.com are two separate websites with two different log ins. If you log in to forums.mygmrs.com and then go back to the maps on mygmrs.com, you are still not logged in to mygmrs.com. It gets confusing the way it is set up. In order to see the tones, you will have to have an account and log in to "mygmrs.com" NOT forums.mygmrs.com.

If your repeater has a input tone, you need to be transmitting that tone in order to "wake up" (open squelch on) the repeater and use it. If your repeater has an output tone, what that does for you is if you set your radio up to require that tone, your radio will not wake up unless it hears that tone coming from the repeater. setting your radio up to require the tone is optional, but if there is another repeater using the same frequency anywhere even slightly near to your repeater, you might here static or bits of conversation coming in from far away. I personally find that annoying, and if the repeater offers an output tone, I definitely take advantage of it.

If you have true FRS radios in the mix, their power on the 15-22 channels (usually only newer frs radios have those) is 2w, that will reduce their transmission range in heavy forest, coupled with their usually crappy antennas, the transmission range may be reduced significantly with an FRS. FRS radios are narrowband on all channels so yes, your GMRS radio should be set to narrow on those channels if communicating with them because there is some quality issues with narrow to wide etc.

I have only tried narrowband one time for fun and it was slightly worse but not too bad, where I tried IIRC I was about 1.1-1.2mi away in the woods I didn't try it on all radios and it wasn't included in my testing, I just always used wideband. Mostly because from what I read about it, it's not gonna make much difference unless your in a radio congested area and where we use them, there is literally nothing else and the more frequencies (wideband) to carry my signal the better chance it has. In case you didn't know because GMRS channels 8-14 are shared with FRS (among others) and required by part 95e (gmrs) radios to be narrow band.They also can only transmit 0.5w on those channels. I always use the GMRS channels 15-22 in wideband.

I'll second the recommendation for the Tram1486. I used my MXTA26 temporarily mounted to a porch railing, with decent results while awaiting coax...and decent weather. Once the ice was off the roof, up went the new Tram. The higher elevation provided vastly improved reception. Keep in mind that the Tram will likely require some tuning for GMRS frequencies. The antenna comes with very good tuning instructions that require you to take the antenna apart, carefully measure and trim each section accordingly, and then reassemble the antenna to test SWR. Please trim incrementally, working your way to the measurement with the lowest SWR by trimming a small amount at a time and then reassembling and testing SWR. If you trim too much...it takes forever to grow back ? I stopped trimming after three cuts when my antenna measured 1.16:1 SWR on the workbench. On the roof, with new coax, it measured a high of 1.04:1. I am certain that OffRoaderX has some excellent videos showing how to tune an antenna and measure SWR with the Fars-O-Meter 2000 for reference.

Sure, go ahead. I'd like to give you Excel, ODF, and CSV formats as well so that you can modify or convert it. GMRS and FRS radio regulations matrix - Main operational regulations.csv GMRS and FRS radio regulations matrix.ods GMRS and FRS radio regulations matrix (3).xlsx

This is super-useful! Do you mind if folks distribute it? I'm trying to set up a local group too....

Thank you. I dunno I just like having all the operational regulations on one easy to read (sort of) page.

You’ve obviously gone to a lot of effort. I commend you for that. Personally, though, I just refer to the actual regulations here: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/chapter-I/subchapter-D/part-95 Or for just GMRS: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/chapter-I/subchapter-D/part-95#subpart-E

Well that felt odd, I reported myself ?! I mean I must be stopped, oh wait that’s not why I did it. Here’s hoping that it helps. ?

I was not aware of that, I will now. Thanks @Sshannon.

Have you clicked on “report” to report your post so Rich sees the information? I don’t think he notices when he’s tagged.

Especially if they are posting access codes.

It is getting ridiculous how often this happens.

That looks like the same radio that's sold as the btech 50x2, and a cousin (different firmware) to the gmrs 50x1 and 50v2...I know my 50x1 didn't hold up well (currently stabilizes at 25 watts or so on high) and another member had worse luck with the x1 and multiple x2's. Since the Kenwood's are A, a solid brand with a good reputation, and b, designed for that range for LMR sector (which uses that frequency range natively), I'd expect them to run pretty close to the advertised power if you get a solid example (risks of used gear and all).

I knew nothing about it other than that it was the highest power advertised crap imported radio directly ordered from China. Just a couple posts later I pointed out that I wasn’t recommending it. My post was intended to be a humorous response to an unrealistic question. I’m sorry you ordered it.

This happens a lot when a new user request access to a repeater and they try to add it to their favorites but they add it to their own.

Yes, called DQT in Kenwood-speak. Digital quiet talk. It also supports advanced feature Operator Selected Tone, if you program it correctly.

If it is a stable, close knit group, like a family or hunting buddies, they may have their radios set up for dense areas and for woods. And they don't want to hear any other chatter. Set up once, use forever, assign a button for a "home" channel. It is very fool-proof setup, also safe and practical to give to 5yo. It is how my family radios are set up. If the question is about advantages of DCS vs CTCSS, bigger pool of codes to chose from comes to mind. I can't think of other advantages.

No, you don’t have to have a tone set for RX, you should still hear the entire frequency. The tone acts as a filter and without it it’s wide open.

Welcome to GMRS! The input should go on the TX side. Thats the tone that the repeater hears, telling it to open. The output should go on the RX side. If there's no output tone listed on that repeater, leave it blank on the RX side of your radio.

So, just for grins and giggles, I took some readings on one of my antennas... MFJ Analyzer 145.520 = 1.0:1 147.000 = 1.3:1 Nano VNA 145.520 = 1.2:1 147.000 = 1.2:1 Surecom High Power 145.520 = 1.1:1 / 46.07wFwd / 0.131wRev 147.000 = 1.08:1 / 41.22wFwd / 0.061wRev Low Power 145.520 = 1:1 / 5.1wFwd / 0wRev 147.000 = 1:1 / 4.67wFwd / 0wRev If you look at the readings, they are all close enough. The truth is, they may all be correct. It takes different cables and connectors to test with these devices and those numbers will change based on the changing of hardware. Shoot, realistically, just disconnecting and reconnecting the same gear twice could give you these kinds of variations. If we look at the Surecom reading 145.520 = 1.1:1 / 46.07wFwd / 0.131wRev... the reverse power is 0.285% of the forward power. So, if we switch over to 5w of output, I am not shocked the meter is reading a 1:1 SWR, because 0.285% of 5w is too low for the meter to read. Its about 0.014w. the scale on the device doesn't have enough place holders displayed to show the SWR... so it rounds to zero (or 1:1). I still think that TDukes needs to either calibrate the Nano VNA, the Surecom, or both. But for what we do as GMRS users, I think the device is working as intended and is "close enough" to know our stuff isn't going to break. The need to fine tune that last drop of power (maybe 40 miliwatts at 5w scale "if" his VNA is correct) is pointless except as an exercise.

RG58 made by beldon is 6.5 db loss at 100' on UHF..... If you got cheap cable you could have 4-5db of loss just before the antenna. Thats over half your power.

Assuming the meter is working correctly, and installed in circuit correctly then there is a problem with your antenna system (feed-line, adapters and antenna). Now begins the process of elimination. You may wish to try your measurements again using the shortest possible cable length and different adapters as you have them available to see if results change. I am not a fan of cut-by-chart trimming of antennas. When an antenna is known to be long for its intended purpose, I prefer to trim a little and measure, then repeat as necessary so as to sneak up on the target value. Doing so helps you know where you are getting close (because SWR gets better with each snip) but also when you have gone too far (because SWR starts to rise). Be aware that at high frequencies, minute length changes can cause big changes. It is possible that you may already snipped it too much, but also that you have not snipped it enough. Further, If you are testing using repeater input frequencies (467 MHz range) and the antenna is actually tuned for 462 MHz range, then the 467 numbers will appear higher than the 462 numbers. Snipping of course should only be done on a basic antenna, or one that is, by design, intended for sniping and/or you have advanced knowledge antenna designs. I don’t own your specific antenna, so I cannot cannot from experience comment if it is designed for cutting or not. For what is is worth, there no such thing as an SWR of less than 1. The first number is always 1 or greater, and the second number is always 1. Collectively they would appear as follows: 1.5:1, 1:1, 1.15:1, 4.7:1, etc. So .8:1, 0.5:1, 1.25:2 are all examples of invalid SWR values. Hope there is a little nugget of assistance in there. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

MyGMRS requires a username and password to log in to see repeater information. To obtain a username and password you must submit your callsign and fill out the registration page. Your callsign will be confirmed through the FCC database (this may take a few days if you just received your callsign) and your account will become active. This process was done to reduce the number of unlicensed operators as well as malicious operations upon repeaters that were listed. Note that your MyGMRS account is not the same as the MyGMRS forums (To my knowledge) so you will need to register on both sides to use both the forums and the main site.