Leaderboard

I'll bet a hundred million dollars cash that there are probably hundreds of ways you could have answered this person that wouldn't alienate them from further interactions with mygmrs.com.

Why are you so combative? Are you trying to be a S.A.D. GMRSer?

My wife and I attended a Memorial Day ceremony at the Indian Cemetery at the Wassama Round House in Ahwahnee, CA this morning. There is one WW1 veteran buried there. There was a rifle salute and the playing of Taps. It was a good reminder...

Same here. Ours was down here in Fullerton.

Why the need to be rude and obnoxious? That is not a way to get someone to register for this awesome site.

Since I need a place to store all this stuff I put it into a box. Harbor Freight to the rescue and got one of their Apache boxes. Really wanted the orange... But figured this would be much better to keep it out of view instead of screaming here I am. Storage/camping/bug out box, call it what you will - it keeps things organized.

Great way to welcome potential new members.

it is impossible for anyone to answer that question with the scant details you have provided, but here are some things to consider: You might just be too far away to hit the repeater or there may be something (mountain, forrest, etc) blocking the signal The repeater might be offline You might have the wrong tone You might have the wrong frequency You might have the right tone and/or frequency but may have programmed them wrong Probably 1,000,000 other things i'm not thinking of

Welcome and feel free to ignore "some people". You will easily be able to spot people who are the helpful and those that want to be first to respond despite having nothing helpful to add.

Welcome to the forums. You’ll fit right in. There is an ignore list. 381 is on it for a few people. I could be too.

Also, ignore @WRYS709. Not only does this person not speak for the rest of us, this person definitely does not speak for mygmrs. Welcome to the site.

Yes, you should be able to. First, select one of the eight preprogrammed repeater channels. They’ll be labeled something like RP15 through RP22 or numbered 23-30. They already have the necessary offset built in for transmitting to and receiving from a receiver. So then all you have to do is set the transmit tone (or digital code). It’s part of the repeater information and will usually be called something like “input tone.” Don’t let the various manufacturers confuse you with the different names they give tones. CTCSS, CTS, and PL are all exactly the same. Same thing with digital: DCS, DTCSS, and DPL are all the same, but they are sometimes given an N (Normal) or I (Inverted) suffix. If neither letter appears it’s the same as N. Let us know how it goes.

Mostly just screwing around. There is no repeater in my local area and it's not like it's a lot of money to put out to have some fun. Hoping I can convince some of my friends and neighbors to join in on the fun. It's kinda hilly over here and I live by the river so I'm already in a low spot. I'd like to be able to communicate with the wife from the shop which is about 2 miles away and then with my buddy in his wood shop which is 2 miles away in the opposite direction and he will be about 10' above sea level. I know all about the restrictions of line of sight which is part of the challenge to overcome in my area. It's more of a toy for me at this point. And at anytime when I finally get my antenna up if I find the repeater doesn't work out I can put in a 50w base station.

With only 8 pairs, it can get crowded in some areas. It sounds like you are on the right track with the steps you have taken. Nothing is fool proof, but if you are really concerned, along with the monitoring you are doing, I would recommend publishing your repeater info. This way, if you end up causing interference with a previously existing repeater, the legacy repeater owner will have some way of contacting you. For what its worth, there are several repeaters around me on the same frequencies and overlapping coverage. The repeater owners have talked amongst themselves and agreed to leave every machine up, have their regular users operate with a custom tone, and all run 141.3 for travelers and emergencies. It has been working out very well for several years, with very limited interference. Just about everyone has been pretty happy with the coverage and availability.

Simple way is to leave a radio on the input frequency that you have chosen then let it run for 12hours. Same on the output. If nothing heard. Of course with low to no squelch and no tones. Then you should be good to go, assured that you probably aren't interfering, but it is hard to say with so many private repeaters. Just remeber enabling tones just has it so the repeater won't open unless the the tone matches. Sent from my SM-S901U using Tapatalk

A few other questions: What make and model of antenna and radio, how is the antenna mounted, (you say it's a mag mount on a metal pole, perhaps a photograph to show us how), what kind of coax (RG-58, RG-8X, RG-8, LMR-400, that kind of thing.)

Considering that the very first 6 words of his post were "To start out with I'm new to GMRS" I am going to guess he has no idea what you are saying.. But thats just a guess. The moral of the story: Know your audience..

With no tones programmed, can you hear the repeaters? Set your handheld on one repeater output frequency with a cheap vox / voice activated recorder attached, and come back in a few hours. Did anyone identify using a GMRS call sign? Hearing activity is the first step.

Try a full-reset of the radio and if that does not help, contact the Tiddy-man and tell him to send you one that works or give back your money.

I get that. Around here marijuana is legal. Although, it was never legalized federally. Which happens to have a seat in a city that legalized it...lol Same crap happens with guns here in Montgomery County, MD. Things that were straight up deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, in NY are put into law in the county i live in. But then again I am use to the people here calling in because there was an assault rifle on the hood of a jeep. No amount of explaining that it was a jack was going to make it pass the air around her head. Felt bad for the guy as had to pull the jack off his hood to defuse the situation. Sent from my SM-S901U using Tapatalk

Awesome, glad that's all it was

Your response seems unusually harsh, especially considering you have asked such a novice question. Maybe I'm misreading it. That said, there is an overwhelming amount of new people that come here convinced they need a repeater, when the know nothing about radio and have only had a license for a few weeks to a few months. Given how long some of us have been around and seeing the trend of unnecessary repeater build ideas that never come to light, it's not an unreasonable question to ask why someone new thinks they "need" a repeater. Especially if there are some already in the area or possibly another solution. Also, not everyone can afford putting a repeater up, not realizing putting a quality and reliable repeater on the air cost anywhere between $15,000-$20,000 when you include the mast and antenna system. On the high-end I have a friend who spent over $1.8m to get a 300' tower built to install his repeater system. Even on the low side, if you have access to free tower space, you're going to spend $5,000-$7,000. If there is another option available and someone can help me find a better or alternative solution that doesn't cost me a fortune, I would want the feedback. If someone just wants to understand "why", I wouldn't be mad that they asked.

It's something called a "joke," a "joke." But thanks for the kind welcome to my first post -- makes me really want to jump into the forums!

I've driven across Texas more than once and can attest that time in Texas is measured in days, if not months!

This is the one that I think will be the solution. I'm on my way to try it right now. Thanks again, Amaff. That was it. Before I had been adjusting the Step Size down in the channel list. The menu item #6 isn't even visible if you're not in VFO mode. My Step Size had been set to 25KHz. I have set it to 5KHz now.

I do have a GMRS call sign WSDB540 It will not let me finish my set up because I don't have a Ham call sign.

I think they woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.

Well there are some people who can only think in big, commercial ways. If you are putting up a repeater it has to be on a 60' pole up on top of some mountain. And while I'd love to do that I'm not in mountainous territory and I don't really want to spend lots of money putting up that type of equipment for something that may end up just being a dead end hobby. I got the 2 talkies for my birthday. I asked for them. Normally I ask for tools for my woodshop and my family kinda frowns on that because they think I work too much (I do). So this time around I decided to just get something that I can play with and tinker around. I'm not trying to be this big community member and solve everyones repeater problems. I'm doing it so I can communicate with my family and friends and just have something different to do that doesn't involve wood working.

Welcome, Leo. Nice review. I suspect you’ll find that you seldom use it as a base station and instead just use your handheld radios to talk through it to other radios. That’s an ideal use for a personal repeater. Let us know which location you decide on and how it works. And feel free to disregard wrxp381’s negative comments. Most of us do.

I'm around 35 miles south of you - far enough to not get quite the same GMRS traffic as you but close enough to have a feel for the area. 725 would but a decent channel for your area but make sure you are NOT using 141.3 as a tone. I sit between two of the area 725 repeaters, the Bartow repeater - Polk Co's strongest repeater up 400ft around 35 miles east of me (and 60 miles south of you) and the Seminole repeater up around 60ft last I heard around 35 miles west of me (the one 45 miles south of you, since the antenna isn't up very high it's probably why you can't hit it). The two repeaters are 60 miles from each other and both run 141.3 as a tone. Normally the two repeaters don't interfere with each other unless someone like me forgets to turn off high power that sits between the two and key both up at the same time. Bartow hits me full scale, Seminole is just above the noise floor (height is might!) so if I run low power I "usually" don't key the Seminole repeater and cause interference. The same can be said of Bartow, if somebody in Manatee Co is using the Seminole repeater they also key the Bartow repeater with noise and everybody get upset on that repeater thinking somebody is causing intentional interference. This happens a few times a month and usually with just a handful of users that sit in-between the two repeaters. If there is a decent band opening, the Perry 725 repeater (also on the same tone and up 400ft) can also be added to the mix and is a really strong repeater. If the repeaters were on a different tones it probably would not be a issue. Also, the Tampa 575 repeater (the strongest repeater in the Tampa area) has an alternate input of 467.725 with a DCS tone but I don't think that will give you any problems as long as you are not using a DCS tone of 546.

While I prefer Motorola repeaters the Kenwood TKR850 is a solid 2RU repeater. It can run of a 12V battery if needed as the main source is 12V. If I was lookiing I'd go for a MTR 2000/3000 myself. They are a solid 100% continuous duty repeaters but folks complain becasue of software.

Handheld: Alinco DJ-G46. Brand new GMRS radio they just released. Really nice little radio. Not as full featured as some, but what it does it does well.

While I don't know that I fully agree, I think the bigger issue is people with unmonitored repeaters. Guys will put up a repeater as a right of passage in both communities. They get a couple radios and lash them together with some sort of repeater controller and a duplexer and hang an antenna on their house. Then they find out about linking and add a node controller. At some point they find a decent location for it and pop the antenna up a 100 feet or so and then forget about it. They don't monitor it, or bother with it at all. Or they start linking it to every other repeater they can find will allow it. This can be good or bad. A group of linked repeaters just becomes a larger community. And therefore gives access to more people overall. This can be a good thing. The repeater community, if they behave and use proper etiquette on the repeater system, all goes good. But with the added community, you add folks that can destroy that community. And your odds of finding that person or persons increase with every repeater you add to the group. Then if you don't monitor the traffic on the repeater you are allowing it to go south. Just my personal opinion.

Yes, but the repeater can only have one conversation on the air at the same time.

Radios such as professional series Motorola and Kenwood are programmed only by proprietary software would meet your requirement. These radios do not have any FPP capabilities.

Looks to be Menu 6 on the radio:

I think you have done everything you could. And kudos to you for being considerate.

Two Icom 2730a units w/MARS mod, one mobile, and one base w/comet GP-3. I'm pretty utilitarian. may get a handheld, we'll see, haven't though much of it. Waiting for a new release Anytone DMR this summer really, But will need a GMRS one as well I suppose haha.... Not sure.

Hey there! I'm in Parma, and are you aware if the Lakewood 600 repeater is down? Seems I can't hit it. one site says the Lakewood 600 input tone is 88.5, another says 131.8 tried both. Not hitting the repeater though. I'm not using output tone though, I'm sure I'd see the carrier from keying the repeater. I'll guess something isn't correct on my end. Although I hit the Brecksville/Richfield repeater 5x5 perfect. Any thoughts? Technically, I'm not hearing any repeater other than that. Lottsa children playing on simplex locally I have an Icom2730 Mars mod, so programming is maybe more intricate, lol... not sure what I could be missing. Thanks!

My marine VHF radio can take a while to connect. In fact, after about 15 minutes it will issue a warning if it has not connected. This is done for safety reasons as it can automatically send a distress signal with ship name and coordinates if it hits the water.

If it only happens when it has been turned off, then moved some distance before being turned back on, it's acquiring a new almanac, data which shows it where to look for satellites.

My entire take on this "Type Approved" deal is that a person should buy the radio of THEIR choice(Type Approved or Not), program it with the channels they want to use and enjoy talking to family and friends while they're out shooting, off roading, hiking or whatever. As long as you're not setting up drug deals or talking about bringing the next load of illegals across our wide open Southern Border then people just need to worry about themselves and not worry about what others do.

You still have to follow the repeater owner’s rules. Even if she says you must have a Roger beep.

As you can see, some people don’t enjoy hearing Roger beeps. On simplex it only bothers the person you’re talking to. On a repeater everyone tuned to the repeater hears it. On top of that, some repeaters have a beep signifying that a transmission is over so now there’s two beep patterns. Some people let up on the PTT temporarily to avoid triggering the TOT on a repeater. That triggers another Roger beep but not necessarily the repeater beep because they sometimes have a delay built in. There could be more reasons that a repeater owner would have. I don’t know what they are.