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That's really interesting... No ground plane and it's best out-of-band, add one in and it vastly improves. I went and did the MXTA13, cause, why not? I used a RigExpert Stick Pro, and had the antenna centered on the roof of a 2007 Chevy Silverado. From 400 MHz up to 500 MHz (wanted a really large image of what it was doing) it stays under 1.67:1. First band is 70cm, second narrowed band is 64cm, red line is center of GMRS. 462.600 MHz - 1.40:1 467.600 MHz - 1.39:1 Also, just wanted to say, I took the plunge into getting the Stick Pro because of your demonstrations with the AA-650. It's a fantastic tool to have!

You got me curious so I tested one with my AA-650: No groundplane: Min SWR 1.16:1 @ 484Mhz, SWR @462.575 = 3.0:1 With Groundplane: Min SWR 1.49:1 @466Mhz, SWR @462.575 = 1.9:1

Sure do. Two cans and some string. Privacy tones guaranteed!

I’m very happy with the Ghost antenna mounted in roof at rear.

Thank you, everyone, for your responses. I really appreciate that everyone is so helpful

Let me know when you want to test and I can probably monitor the repeater to see if I can hear you.

Keep in mind, you still might not be able to hit the repeater from your current location.

I make mine at home. Delish and cheap!

Midland is the Starbucks of the radio world

Y'all are a ton of help, thanks so much! I'm going to test my setup later today.

There is no TONE SCAN button on the Midland MXT400 so...... I found thru experimentation that I can SCAN CTCSS/DCS tones on the MXT400. The procedure is easy to do actually: 1. Select the frequency of the repeater then: 2. Push the TS/DCS button once and then: 3. Hold down the TS/DCS button until a scan starts I believe it will scan until the MXT 400 determines the proper code. While in the SCAN Mode, I turned the frequency selection knob and see that it changes/reversed the order of the actual scan too, cool!

I would inspect it VERY THOROUGHLY AND CAREFULLY first. Depending on materials a cheap galvanized steel tower may have rusted through sections that can fail in a wind gust. Aluminum would be better. Other things to look for are cracks in the main vertical supports. Look at the welds where the zig-zag stiffing members attach to the main side supports. Another is at the top where the mast mounts to the tower. Cheap towers are nice. But not when they fail, falling on the utility wires, house, garage or your ride. Maybe even you.

You referred to it as an antenna, but the rest of your question seems to indicate it might be a tower. I’ll answer it as if it is an antenna. My answer would be different for a tower. A picture of the antenna might help, but the things that come to mind first are as follows: First I would put an antenna analyzer on it to see if it’s resonant anywhere close to the GMRS range of frequencies. Channels 2-13 were VHF (30-300 MHz), not UHF (300-3000 MHz). The UHF channels may have been covered by antenna also, but most TV antennas were targeted at VHF. Second, TV antennas were designed to be 75 ohm. Most two way radio antennas are 50 ohm. That’s not a bad problem, but may require some ingenuity. Third, the structure of this antenna might be usable as a tower to raise a GMRS antenna. That might be a useful thing! Good luck!

@back4more70 you are on a roll! Keep it up!

I see nothing in the FCC regulations that force one to change frequency. Use of their repeater, OTOH, may not be allowed. Note that the FCC considers those grandfathered licenses to still be GMRS -- not some business (LMR) exclusive band. Making use of their repeater, OTOH, may require asking permission (and likely not getting it). The primary facet is that the only modification to the license allowed is with regards to contact information. They are otherwise stuck with the frequency (pair if repeater), antenna height, location, power, etc. as when originally licensed. The City of Grand Rapids runs a repeater on .575, 50W transmitter with 200W ERP on a 290 foot tower (or maybe building roof). On a "good" day, that repeater can break squelch all the way out to Lowell (it's supposed to have a 35 mile radius). The 1997 PRSG Repeater Guide listed 141.3 146.2 as available for EMERGENCY/TRAVEL use only (any other usage had to get prior permission from the city -- and likely a different CTCSS tone). What does the city use it for? Especially since the whole state has converted to a massive trunked digital system? Well, while undergoing chemo sessions, I get good signal of the staff running the city parking lots having troubles with gates not going up/down, payment machines not accepting cards, etc.

Do you make your own radios?

YES, assuming the repeater uses DCS, the “input tone” for the repeater is T-DCS on your radio, the tone that you must transmit. For the receive side you must either program the right receive tone or code OR tell your radio to not require a tone or code. That can be helpful when first starting. In that case your radio reproduces everything received on that frequency.

Glad you were able to figure it out. Programming repeaters is certainly one of the most common newbie questions so you’re ahead of the game having got there.

Sorry, I was able to find the settings through the RepeaterBook piece on Chirp. Newbie mistake.

I do the same at home. Also use a CCR at work to monitor the channels and the local mall’s security staff.

I would be looking at drilling the rock and then using epoxy anchors to fasten plates to the rock face and then bolting the tower to that. We aren't talking about 'JB Weld' here either. THere are high performance epoxy products on the market for doing this sort of thing and they work well. But closely following the directions for the use of the chemical anchors is very important. But remember that light poles next to the highway may well be using this method for connecting to the concrete wall they are sitting on.

Same here. Sometimes I even remember to turn the volume up.

Since this happens to be a common topic because people do illegally use digital voice on GMRS, here are some things that might help if anyone wants to really get into decoding digital voice - Nooelec SDR dongle $34 SDR console (free software) DSD plus ($25? for the software) Hook this into you computer, slap an antenna on your SDR (preferably an outdoor antenna) and start sweeping through the frequencies. When you come upon a digital signal, DSD plus will automatically start decoding what it is and will tell you exactly what they are running as far as time slots or if it is encrypted. The only thing it seems to have an issue with is Yaesu Fusion (something that seems to get used in areas where it isn't supposed to be used). After that, you should get a good idea who it is, especially if its a Ham. 9 times out of 10, Hams will do something dumb like this and not change their Ham Radio digital ID on the radio. DSD plus will pick it up.

In my area, everyone seems to want to look like they "overland" but never even leave the pavement. I have even noticed the CB radio crowd mount two antennas, one on each side of their lifted Jeep or truck, but not even have a radio connected, as it looks cool. I show up with my old Blazer and a Phantom Antennex antenna, and they wonder if I even have any radio gear installed (helps with some of the hiking trail parking lot thieves too). Advertising cool gear in your rig may look cool, but does it work....some times yes, and sometimes no. I am amazed at Midlands marketing though, they are filling a niche for sure. But for those that know what I use, I'm just the "Motorolian Empire Warlord"....another person's words. (That does sound cool, I must admit). Whatever you use, make sure it works well, and is installed well (grounded, adequate power, less bends in low loss coax, good antenna), and you will be far ahead of many that just buy off of websites and plug things in.

Car I used to have, with an Antennex Phantom UHF antenna on the trunk, right next to a whisker VHF antenna. Less C pillar in the way, but still a metal ground plane, and managed to get about 12 miles range or so, depending on terrain. If you get that antenna up on your roof, picture looked like a possible camping awning up there, above that, you should get pretty good range out of that Midland antenna. A previous poster has a YouTube video comparing that Midland antenna with another similar style....the Midland is not bad for what it is. Just get it higher, and less obstructed.

That’s what I did.

SWR meter: a measuring instrument most often used to ruin the tuning of good antennas. NanoVNA: an inexpensive electronic device that is used miscalibrated to obtain the results that are misunderstood.

Forgot to mention..Thanks for reminding me... Always beware of the "some people" that try their best overcomplicate everything.

Yeah, and it’d be relatively simple if they were simplex only. They could make it even easier if they used those DTR 900 MHz units if they want no license for simplex only, I’m sure any number of dealers would be willing to sell a pallet of those to them. Lots of good options out there really