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This ^^^!!!

Though I think this information is accurate, I have distrust for a source that is known to have deliberately fabricated sources in the past to make an answer be what it wanted people to believe when real data had other results.

As Marc said the advantage is in the eyes of the beholder. If I just want to talk to my non-ham friends without getting all excited about the technology I’ll use GMRS. But if I want to learn about radio technology with fewer limitations, I’ll use ham radio.

First, depending on how much real estate you have in your vehicle or home, I always recommend having it all.l I have HF, Ham VHF/UHF, and GMRS in my home and in my Jeep. Don't think of it as better or worse. Just different. What differences serve a purpose for you at any given moment is the right answer.

Park Ridge covers down to Bakersfield (at least) for base stations. It is at 7500' so a good mobile will probably make it also. I have HT coverage at 50+ miles, but not full quieting with 5W. Full quieting with vertical at 20'. Joaquin ridge is up and I suspect will cover there. It used to be linked to some other repeaters back east, but I think there were jamming issues and the link was shut down. Auberry may be stretching it to Delano. Not familiar with the repeater specifics, but that area is probably only 2-3000' peaks in the foothills. There is a private system on Mt. Bullion (Mariposa), that might reach that far, but I have not had any response to access requests. Haven't heard much activity on Joaquin or Auberry the last few weeks. Mariposa and Park ridge have the most activity.

I just read the words on the instruction sheet and did what they said.. SWR was 1.01:1 on the first try. I mounted mine on a 10foot mast side-mounted to the chimney.

My professional career was SCADA for more than two decades. I programmed it, I designed small and large systems, and I sold systems to municipalities and government entities. I eventually ended up supervising 13 SCADA engineers who maintained the Energy Management System (the master) for an electric transmission system carrying 2550 megawatts of power. While @KBSherwood could do what he wishes with SCADA and a license for LMR radios, that would be unnecessarily expensive and complex in my opinion. There are myriad hobby level or even home automation devices, including license free wireless communications, that can be used to accomplish this, as well as by doing what he has expressed an interest in.

That’s found herein: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/chapter-I/subchapter-D/part-95/subpart-E § 95.1751 GMRS station identification. Each GMRS station must be identified by transmission of its FCC-assigned call sign at the end of transmissions and at periodic intervals during transmissions except as provided in paragraph (c) of this section. A unit number may be included after the call sign in the identification. (a) The GMRS station call sign must be transmitted: (1) Following a single transmission or a series of transmissions; and, (2) After 15 minutes and at least once every 15 minutes thereafter during a series of transmissions lasting more than 15 minutes. (b) The call sign must be transmitted using voice in the English language or international Morse code telegraphy using an audible tone. (c) Any GMRS repeater station is not required to transmit station identification if: (1) It retransmits only communications from GMRS stations operating under authority of the individual license under which it operates; and, (2) The GMRS stations whose communications are retransmitted are properly identified in accordance with this section.

If the application is to do alerting to the radio, there are a couple methods to doing this that are straight forward and commonly used in public safety communications. First being Quick Call 2 in Motorola speak or two tone alerting. This is a method that two tones are transmitted over the air that the radios are pecifically looking for and can be programmed to react to. Think old school fire paging. Low tone, high tone, tweedle tweedle tweedle, and then some voice announcement. The radio when programmed correctly for this sort of alerting can remain silent until the tone group is received or be actively monitoring a channel and alert to the incoming message. The voice announcement would be computer generated, either through a text to speech engine where the alert notification is stripped of the pertinent information and run through the speech engine or conversely could be canned messages, pre-recorded WAV or MP3 files that are played over the air. Their selection of the message would be a function of the alerting engine. Issues with this are simple. The frequency of the tones are specific. They must be generated within about 2 Hz of the programmed values in the radios. And QCII tones are delineated to the tenth (0.X) of a hertz. So accuracy is a must. Interfaces can be constructed with a simple CM108 based sound card that will handle the audio generation and PTT function as well. Search CM108 All Star interface for more information. DTMF codes are also a possibility but may cause issues on repeaters that are owned by others since DTMF signalling can be used for repeater controller function changes over the air. If your DTMF tones turn off their repeater, they may well ban you from their machine all together. But Motorola and other commercial two way radios that are typically used for public safety will also recognize this type of alerting. MDC1200. MDC1200 is of course used for radio unit IDing, but it can also be used for Status messaging. The status programming in all radios that are receiving the messages must all match. Then once you have the status messages figured out you put them in radios that have displays. The display on the radio will show the preprogrammed text message on the screen. This method does NOT send texts. It has a set of 10 or so status messages that are set by the 10 or so MDC1200 data packets. You would need to program your software application to create those MDC1200 datagrams and feed them into the radio for transmission. Remember that you HAVE to identify your transmissions. So in addition to any voice or datagram announcement you have to have the transmitter ID. This can be done via a recording being played, a speech engine or Morse Code at 20 WPM. And remember that if toy are doing this across someone else's repeater, you need to get their permission. Don't simply do it and expect them to be happy with it. I have a local repeater that mirrors the coverage of my linked repeater. It's for local traffic only and I PERSONALLY wouldn't take issue with this on my machine, but if you're not in the Central Ohio area on my repeater, you need to seek out the owner of your local repeater and get their blessing. Moreover, I would offer them the programming information if they would like it so they can set their equipment to receive the alerts as well. Any of this is going to require radios that support the signalling methods talked about here. Your cheap import radios and standard part95 stuff will not work with any of this other than the straight voice announcement. Bear that in mind. CDM1250 and CDM1500 mobiles support these functions. THe 1250 and 1550 HT series portables do are well. The XPR series that are FULL DISPLAY support these functions will also work. If you want to spend more money the XTL radios do this as well.

Midland and Baofeng use different numerical values to indicate their CTCSS tones. As long as you use the same tone frequencies instead of expecting “Tone 6” to be the same in one as in the other they’ll have no problems. Look in their different manuals and match the actual frequencies.

I agree with the expensive statement if he were to use off the shelf SCADA gear. It's not even cheap on ebay used. But, since you know the stuff well, you know that it's data packets that are almost spreadsheet simple. It's a 'sensor X value Y' sort of thing. And could be easily written into a combination Raspberry Pi / Arduino setup with both digital and analog I/O being monitored by the Arduino and fed to the Raspberry Pi via serial or USB then converted to the data packets via a conversion app and broadcast. The Pi could then also be programmed to receive packets off air and react to certain values or I/O inputs from the remotes. Including launching status messages via MDC. I did something sort of similar once with a CDM radio and some base logic. A CDM can be commanded to change channels via the rear accessory pins. It's 4 input pins and can select 16 channels. If you build a logic output to control those pins. Programming the radio channels to send individual MDC1200 status packets for each channel then changing the channels and keying the radio it lets you send 16 different messages. The commercial LMR license wouldn't be a requirement on this either. GMRS allows for some basic 'digital' signalling on the service. I don't know how much SCADA type data he would need to be moving around. But if he's writing the software to do this, it would be easier to use a known working solution and copy that instead of reinventing the wheel by writing his own system from scratch.

The problem is, an advantage or disadvantage is a matter of perception based on what you want to accomplish. I can point out differences that push me in one direction or another. This is just really high view... and just the stuff I use. I am very sure there is more. In Ham bands: Max power is 1,500 Watts. There is a frequency space equivalent of 1,200 channels. Any mode of digital voice. Any mode of digital data (no encryption). Automatic Packet Reporting System (APRS) global positioning, messaging and more. 50w portable/mobile repeaters for under $300. Crossband repeat support. One radio will cover some of MF, all of HF, 6 meter VHF, 2 meter VHF, 70 cm UHF, all modes, at 100w for $1,000. Much more repeater coverage, including on HF and state-wide networks in many states. A much wider selection of hardware, including the option to build your own gear. Experimentation is encouraged. In GMRS: Much quieter / less users. Repeaters are available. Ease of licensing. Shared Licensing. Extremely affordable radios (as little as $9 each) Not at all. I have several handheld radios for redundancy (EmComm), but all of them cover everything from air traffic, MURS, VHF Business band, Marine, Amater 2m VHF, Amateur 70cm UHF, Business band UHF, GMRS/FRS and more. As I mentioned, in populated areas, with the option of the equivalent 1,200 channels compared to GMRS' only having 22 channels, you can always find a clear frequency to talk, send data, or whatever you plan on doing. And did I mention 1,500 watts on Ham for the opportunity to talk way further than you ever could with GMRS? HF gives you the option of communicating from 0 to 12,450 miles with just a few watts. If people go in the habit of it, there would be almost no practical reason to use anything but HF, beyond the data speed advantages of VHF and UHF on digital applications. You can do CW on GMRS. It is an authorized mode. I don't know anyone who does it because its considered a weak signal application. I did list a few more advantages above. I'm not sure what you consider a large antenna, but I have a 4 foot tunable HF antenna and I have talked to people in every state in the US as well as 102 other countries. Granted, a 7 inch antenna is definitely shorter than 4 feet, but 4 feet is hardly a hateful size. All of my radio friends are on GMRS, but that doesn't mean anything. An overwhelming majority of my radio friends are also into amateur radio because GMRS just can't offer everything that we want to do. We all do a lot of digital data and voice (such as email and computer networking over RF), EmComm support requiring much more power and portable repeaters, as well as the ability to talk long distance (like outside of the area if affected by natural disaster) without relying on anything but someone else with a radio on the other end... and much more. Honestly, I have a nice HF base station, massive amp and antenna. Same for UHF and VHF. I hardly ever turn them on. Most of my HF, VHF and UHF use is from the mobile. However, having the base station is nice if I do need to do EmComm or just don't feel like sitting in my truck to run a radio. I guess, the bottom line is, don't feel like you are missing something if you don't have a base station. You're not. One of the biggest things I love about Ham radio is, I can make my handheld seem like its a lot stronger that 5 or 8 watts. I have a mobile repeater installed in my Jeep. I don't need to have a ton of power in my handheld, because my portable/mobile repeater will transmit my handheld signal at whatever power I want, up to 1,500 watts. So, my HT never has to talk any further than wherever I parked my Jeep. As far as mobile power goes, 50w is kind of the standard, but it's not the limit. I have a collection of radios with all different output levels... 35w, 50w, 65w, 85w, 120w. I also have 200w and 300w amps... and 1,500w amps are available. There is no limit to digital. You can do voice, data like emails, video, file transfer, GPS, messaging, even things like chat consoles... you are limited by nothing but your imagination. The big draw about digital in general is, many digital services are called "weak signal services". Basically, what this means is, if you are on a frequency that zero voice can be heard... the digital connection can still be made on the exact same frequency and power level. So, in an emergency or extreme boredom, you are going to get you communications accomplished. I hope this help provide some insight.

Applies to MURS, FRS, GMRS, HF, UHF, VHF, ...

The ducting is happening in the morning and in the evening as temperatures swing greatly in a short period of time. 10m is on fire basically from around 9am to around 6pm

You have any NXDN radios?

Ham radios don’t have a certification specific for Part 97, the Amateur Radio Service. What you do see is the typical Part 15, which is to ensure the radio can’t receive cell phone frequencies. As others mentioned you can’t have a radio that has GMRS, and certified for Part 95, and Ham frequencies in it at the same time I don’t agree with that opinion. The reason is the Ham 70cm band is NOT an exclusive allocation for Ham Radio. In fact Hams are officially secondary users while various government users are primary where a license is required and the radios require certification. Rereading the GMRS rules regarding radio certification an argument can be made having 70cm band frequencies in the radio along with GMRS doesn’t necessarily mean the rules are violated IMHO.

The following HTs are Ham Radios that have the technical ability to receive and transmit on GMRS: 1) Legacy Baofeng UV-5R; more recent ones are locked out of transmitting on GMRS, but some will transmit on GMRS only and are labelled as such. 2) TYT-88UV - a code must be entered into the keypad to open transmission on GMRS 3) Baofeng UV13Pro There are other Ham HTs from the legacy manufacturers, such as Kenwood, Yaesu, etc., that have a "MARS/CAPS" mod available that may allow GMRS transmission after that mod is applied.

FCC rules is the answer. Receiving almost anywhere you want is fine (the old analog cell bands being an exception), but transmit is the kicker. For gmrs, the radio needs part 95e certification, which disallows the ability to transmit on any non-certified services (aka ham). Dual certified radios were a thing, but more common under old rules (when gmrs was under 95a); there are still a few older models floating around (mostly Kenwood and Motorola) certified for 90 (LMR/public safety) & 95a, but they'll be uhf only, and mostly require taking a gamble on used equipment.

I recommend you measure per the instructions for your target frequency, my target was 462MHz. Cut just beyond your measurement mark, leaving a little extra, ~1/16". I was concerned I might snip off more than desired. Then use a file to remove the remainder to your mark. My SWR is 1.0 to 1.4 depending on the frequency and wattage, good enough for me.

There's a couple listed near Auberry, but you have to have the "show stale repeaters" toggle turned on (this is the case for the Park Ridge machines as well, which are both listed as open. Auberry 575 is listed as open, while Sierra 2 is listed as permission required. Both listings have the same frequency and tone, though, so I'm not sure if it changed hands and an old listing wasn't removed or what. I also found a new listing for the Joaquin Ridge machine with the "stale" option turned on.

Welcome! Ham and GMRS are separate radio services and are not supposed to be combined in one radio. Wouxun (pronounced "Ocean") makes excellent radios and are considered by many to be the best dedicated GMRS radios on the market. The one you mentioned should be fine for the ham side (however there are many other good options for ham radios) but you will still need GMRS for use with the family. Your GMRS license will cover your family. Don't expect them to all become ham's as they would all need a license. I recommend spending more time researching before making to many purchase decisions. There is a lot to learn. Good luck.

That did it! Thanks!

Park Ridge 700 is said to have the better range. Park Ridge 675 is the secondary machine. There used to be one on Joaquin Ridge near Coalinga that was called Central1, which I've been able to reach from Tulare on a handheld, but I don't see it listed anymore. I think I saw something previously about it being a "legacy repeater" as the owner had passed away and that they were trying to put things in place to keep it running, but it looks like they were not successful.

FNG here. Sorry to make this my first post, but I think I have a rather interesting perspective on this topic. I started off in CB, then decided to jump into GMRS. I've had a GMRS license for over a year now. Yes, Randy was an influence in it, and I am one of the 162,000 subscribers to his channel, but there's things about GMRS I wish I knew more about and would've appreciated more info on via popular internet like Randy's YouTube channel. I'm still learning, and discovered things in this forum I didn't know I didn't know about. That's a different convo. How to get younger people involved in radio communications might have the answer in HAM that I'm not seeing much in GMRS -- contesting. Kids love to play games, and they love digital electronics. If there's a way to demonstrate a form of contesting while utilizing remote control like a tablet, they'd be in it. Start off by demonstrating in schools. A fox hunt, or something like POTA where they communicate with other kids at schools in their town (high school level?), etc might be exciting enough. Utilizing simplex, GMRS is dead. Many of you may not like hearing it, but that's been my experience. I recently moved from San Diego, CA to Pensacola, FL. I have both GMRS and CB in my truck. Utilizing scan on both, I didn't hear a single convo on my GMRS radio. There was the occasional noise on CB, and I engaged in 1 convo in East Texas. That was only because the people rag chewing for several miles specifically mentioned my vehicle as I was passing them, so I broke in and conversed. My younger son was impressed. My older son, a teenager, didn't care, which surprised me because he's into computers and electronics. Moving to Pensacola, FL has been beneficial to me. The Five Flags Ham Radio Club teaches a course at Pensacola State College to train people to be Hams, even though they don't get paid. The course fee is under $30 for a whole semester, which goes completely to the college, and the explain and demonstrate the how and why of Ham radio. These are older guys who have been in Ham Radio for decades, and a couple of the instructors are electrical engineers. Through them I've found out the little Q+A Ham Radio book has several wrong answers, which is causing people to fail the Technician test because they studied/memorized the wrong answers. I can list specific questions if people want. The larger spiral bound handbook has the correct answers in the back of the book. These instructors do not like "sad hams", and question their claim of superiority when they're typing 50wpm CW instead of doing it by hand (citing "an accent" that can be heard when CW is done by hand on a paddle). Their excitement for Ham Radio is infectious, with over a dozen students in the class. It's a shame they don't share they same passion for GMRS. These instructors are the life blood of Escambia County, Florida's ARES program, and done are even involved in Search & Rescue. One of the things they constantly preech is they do the course do they can get people ready to replace them. Btw, one of the things that irritates me about the Ham Technician test is the amount of questions I'm studying in titration to the number of questions they'll be on the test. There's over 420 questions, but only 35 of them will randomly be on the test. Kids don't want that. That's too much studying for something people think should be fun. It's not fun if you're working. At that point it's work, so they won't enjoy it. GMRS had an advantage over Ham on that. Another issue is the process of getting the license. Government websites are not quick to navigate through. And, the license costs money. They don't want to pay their student loan debt. What makes anybody think the kids will want to pay for it? If you've read this far, thank you, and I'm sorry. Cliff note version: the process for getting a GMRS license is contrary to what kids want to do.

In my humble opinion, it's not an issue of ham vs GMRS. Or what ham has over GMRS. There are advantages to both. GMRS doesn't require a test, just your $35 and a promise to obey the FCC rules. And the license covers family members, up to a point. But the frequencies are limited, and channelized. Ham radio requires a test, the same $35, and only covers one person. There are many more frequencies available with UHF ham radio. Both ham and GMRS can operate simplex or through repeaters. You'll probably find more repeaters on ham radio. I use both, since I have ham radio friends who communicate with me, and I use GMRS to communicate with my non-ham wife through a repeater if I'm out somewhere with no cell coverage. My suggestion is to use both and don't fall into the "one is better than the other" trap. Also, there are a few mobile ham transceivers out there that do HF, VHF and UHF. They're not cheap, and you may end up rolling the dice in the used market to find them. The Icom IC-706MkIIG, IC-7000 and IC-7100, the Yaesu FT-857, and others.

Don't be ridiculous.. It's a LOT overpriced.

Thought on this some more. Couple more considerations with regards to the battery chargers. A 48 volt plant is actually -48 volt supply. Meaning the positive side of the end of the battery string is connected to the ground or 'return' in battery plant speak. So again, if the output of the battery charger / power supply HAS to be isolated. So again, you need to be aware of what you are doing and what you are working with if you are going to mess with this. But again, 48 volt battery plants have serious current producing abilities and doing something incorrectly when it comes to this level of energy can have disastrous results.

Hopefully I understand the problem correctly! I apologize if I didn’t. I would get a Digirig and connect it between the USB port on a raspberry pi controller and a “master” radio to send tones, alarm sounds, synthesized speech or whatever under program control. They have cables for many different radios. The cables connect to the microphone and speakers to serve up sounds. The DigiRig is tiny. I would have the master radio send DTMF tones to the “slaves” to control various outputs. That’s where you could use the DTMF output board, but now that I’m thinking of it you probably could do something smarter with a raspberry pi board. Those outputs could be used to turn on or off alarms or other simple devices. You could probably cobble up a way to do multiple bit outputs but very few of them. As far as controlling high current devices you use the low current outputs as interposing relays or pilot relays to control higher current relays. You definitely don’t want to turn off the slave radios because once you do that you have completely severed connections with no way to re-establish them. You might be able to send a specific command to lock or unlock the Sounds like a fun project. I hope I’ve helped.

I'll have to look at what they're called, but TCARC has a couple on park ridge that may be in range

Congratulations and welcome: On the Map, I see the BKFD650 Repeater in Bakersfield (private probably the Fire Department) and the 501 Repeater (462.550) in Lindsay, CA, but requires permission. You can go to its listing and ask for permission if it is close enough to you. And there are 5 more in Tulare; close enough? https://mygmrs.com/map/7560

Oh, BTW. If you decide to try independant supplies. You need to verify that the ground is ISOLATED. Meaning the battery side output is NOT connected tot he ground pin on he power cord. If it's connected on two or more of the chargers, the 12 volt power in the batteries will back flow from the adjacent battery back through the power cord, into the building ground and then into the ground of a battery effectively creating a dead short. With a set of even partly charged batteries, you will cause a fire at that point and things will get out of hand quickly.

Amen. I just haven't used it all that much since..... ummmm 30 years ago.

Thanks R... I agree with you. However, I recently joined a repeater club in my area and on my first transmission on the repeater (radio check), I was very quickly and firmly informed to turn that roger beep OFF when using the repeater. I know your feelings regarding this topic (I watched your YT video on why the Roger Beep is important). However, being a brand new member of the club, I thought it best to just go ahead and comply rather than p.o. the entire club membership from the outset. The comment from the NCO was to just use roger beeps on simplex. But there is no way to do that without having roger beeps toggled to ON, radio wide. Anyway, thanks again and thanks for all of the GREAT and informative YT videos!!

For anyone who wishes to know what questions are on the technician tests, there are 35 questions drawn from a pool of slightly more than 400 questions. Each category has a certain number of questions on the test. The current pool is valid through 2026. Here is a link to the pool: http://ncvec.org/downloads/Technician Pool and Syllabus 2022-2026 Public Release Errata March 7 2022.pdf I did almost all my studying using the following free website (and an app they make which I gladly paid $5 for): Http://www.hamstudy.org

@nokones Im pretty sure I can help you get through the Technician test and I think I can probably teach you a little bit of algebra along the way. Let my offer percolate. If you change your mind and just want to go over some things I’m happy to try. My daughter and her family live in Phoenix; sometime when we are there I can probably pry myself apart from the grandkids to give you some in-person help, if you want, but absolutely no pressure. Everyone learns differently and math and electronics is a stumbling block for many. Regardless, best wishes!

This entire thread is probably driving both potential GMRS and potential hams away from radio. Why would they want to partake when a bunch of guys from both services bicker all the time?

You know, for someone that proclaims that NO ONE cares what I say, you sure do seem to care a lot.

99.99% of hams i have met in person were very pleasant and are not sad-hams. It's when you go online that the sad-hams thrive, and thats where the young people go to learn, and often the first thing they run into is a sad-ham. That is what happened to me - I went online and had the audacity to ask questions about the test or electrical theory or something that I didnt understand, and it was quickly made clear to me that people asking such questions were not welcome in this exclusive club. Not just once, but multiple times, in multiple places. I see it here every day, and have even seen it a few times already in this thread. HUNDREDS of my viewers have also commented on my videos that the exact same thing happened to them, so the impact of sad-hams cannot be denied.. I am actually thankful because when the sad-hams turned me off from ham I found GMRS and realized that I dont want/need a "hobby", I just needed a better way to communicate on the trail - and GMRS does that perfectly for me. The sad part is that most sad-hams dont realize that they are the ones giving a bad name to their hobby, and also giving me more material to make fun of.

162,000 people disagree with you, but I'm sure you're probably right because you seem to be a real "expert".

Now try actually reading what I wrote: The amateur hobby is killing off POTENTIAL NEW members - if you don't believe this to be true then either your head is buried in the sand or you are part of the problem. I dont give a sh!t one way or another, they already killed me off as a potential member long ago, i just think it's humorous when sad-hams try to pretend this is not an issue.

...Thats why they're called Sad Hams.. Killing their own hobby, one potential new member at a time...

Two big ones Eliminate the elitist attitude too many of the old hams have regarding those with a Tech Class License. There are Hams out there that won't even respond to a call that is a Tech Class. WTF? Same goes for Morse Code. There are those out there that remark, often, you're not a "Real Ham" unless you can pound out CW at 50 WPM. Sad.

Do away with the written test for the Technician Class license. Memorizing answers to test serves no real purpose for an entry level license. No one is going to remember what the answers were and cares. So, why have a test. It's a waste of time.