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Every station is required to ID once every 15 minutes and at the end of the conversation whether you’re on a repeater or simplex. You are not required to identify as different units when the call sign is shared amongst family members, but you might want to. In reality very few people follow the identification rules and nobody has died as a result.

General rule of thumb is to space antennas apart by 1/2 to 1 full wave length. A full wave length for CB is 11 meters/36 feet. A half wave length is 5.5 meters/18 feet. So you would want your GMRS antenna at least 18 feet away from your CB antenna horizontally. You can put antennas closer together vertically if you have the space to go up and down.

Love how they say "Yes, people still use these"

Antenna spacing is critical when the frequencies are within the same band or one (or both) are using high power. CB is essentially HF (below 30 MHz) while GMRS is UHF (462 - 467 MHz) or 20 times higher in frequency. Your spacing should be at least a quarter-wave length of the UHF channels or 15 CM.

I had on my truck dual firesticks on each bed rail and then had my mxta26 on the roof about 2.5ft away from each firestick with no issues.

As the title states I am stumped so I am attempting to see if someone can help. I purchased an RT97S. I decided since mygmrs has all the linking items I would go ahead and link it. However this has been a nightmare. Searching this web site and forums it seems no one has ever made this work even though it is advertised on the shop and even Retevis' web site as working. I found the RT97s myGMRS img and flashed it to an a sd card, then configured and connected to the network. (Had to order a PI3b+for this image) Green dot shows on the map, and i can connect to other nodes. I purchased the URIxB from mygmrs shop as well as the 25db to db9 cable from the shop. I have also modified a hamvoip1.7 img to work on mygmrs as well. Based on a forum post, green dot shows on map and can connect to other nodes and listen. (This image is much faster booting and runs on Pi3B+ and Pi4) The repeater works as it should in stand along mode. I connect the db9 cable to the URIxB and repeater. Then from the URIxb usb to the Pi usb. When I turn on the pi I get ID and time/weather from the repeater RF. I can key the repeater from Supermon to get audio over RF to all my radios. If I link the node to another node on the network I can hear people talking over the repeaters RF. The problem is when I transmit from a HT the repeater is not sending audio to the node. I am not able to talk over the network through the repeater. The URIxB has flashing green light, and if the node is IDing the red light lights up. If i connect to active nodes and people are talking I can hear them and the red light on the URIxB lights up. When I transmit from an HT the repeater lights up but no red light and no audio makes it to the node/network. I have tried: DPL/CTCSS tones, No Tones eeprom mode 1 and 0 Simplex mode 1 and 0 Duplex mode 2 only way I get the cos to trigger is manually key in simple usb tuner option I from low to high I can attach an AURSINC simplex radio/audio and it works, but is not allowed on myGMRS so just used for testing but was able to get my green dot to turn red Has anyone ever gotten this setup to work? It seems the issue is either a setting combination i am missing, or and issue with the Cable or URIxB I bought from myGMRS shop.

I can go higher for the GMRS antenna thanks for the help.

I disagree. In any serious military action, satellite communications would probably be targeted very early like most infrastructure. They’re one of the most vulnerable assets because they can be taken out either physically (an orbital EMP, directed energy weapon, or simply a missile) or virtually by hacking. I suspect the routines to do the latter are loaded and ready to be used. Military satellites would be more protected of course.

And as we know, that is WHEN and not IF, LOL. We use GMRS here in MN when going off road at the OHV parks and/or off exploring logging and forest roads up north. Cell service is spotty out there. A lot of us use channel 7 in group runs, as well as channel 16. Also good that there's a couple repeaters with good coverage near a couple of the OHV Parks. Nothing to worry the Moab crowd about, but definately some good rock crawling to be had here, although that's not my bag as I run my daily driver. Have fun, stay safe and SEND IT!

@BigBangMachine and @WSDF270 Welcome to GMRS.

Welcome! Look for YouTube videos on the Notarubicon channel. His channel has presented more GMRS information than any other that I know of. Hopefully, some members from your area will comment also.

Yes.

Amen @WRCQ527! Well said and directly on topic.

Very true, but the policing I see going on in Ham is equivalent to self policing a town. Instead of self policing the areas where drugs and other crime are, they police the nice end of town and ticket people for crossing the street too slowly. Ham Radio is just like that. They will jump all over someone operating a Baofeng correctly, but wont get the guy who records conversations going on and then maliciously playing them back at the guys he just recorded while they are attempting to have a conversation, or how about the guys who swear up a storm right over the air. I understand the need for self policing, but it needs to be done correctly.

**Disclaimer** The following is my humble opinion, and may or may not reflect the opinions of the rest of the folks on this site. A couple of things. First, GMRS was never intended for reliable long-range communications. From the FCC website: "The General Mobile Radio Service (GMRS) is a licensed radio service that uses channels around 462 MHz and 467 MHz. The most common use of GMRS channels is for short-distance, two-way voice communications using hand-held radios, mobile radios and repeater systems." That said, some GMRS folks have tried to force GMRS to be a long-range communications tool, with varying degrees of success and questionable legality, using linked repeaters, internet connections, and such. Second, If you are truly interested in exploiting your Baofeng UV-5R to include long-range comms on the cheap, my suggestion is for you and your friend to get your amateur radio technician licenses. Amateur radio has, shall we say, figured out linked repeaters and other methods of linking radios, literally on a global scale. For examples of this, look up the Winsystem at https://www.winsystem.org/ and Echolink at https://www.echolink.org/, both of which will allow you to talk to others long-range on your UV-5Rs These are but two examples. A word of warning though. Linked systems, GMRS, amateur radio, and others, like any other comms, are not 100% reliable. You won't be able to communicate in every grid-down or SHTF situation. If somewhere between you and your friend in Texas there is a break in the link, such as a repeater going off line or the internet going down, game over. Also, some folks here have mentioned HF as a method of comms. The issue is that there is not much along the lines of decent HF gear that isn't going to cost you an arm and a leg. Interstate contacts on HF are definitely not a sure thing, and far from reliable. It all depends on conditions that change literally by the minute.

Is there a question in that ^ ? Have you read all the manuals? Asking for a friend.

I think it’s pretty obvious that we’re all a bit nerdy, but that Morse code station ID is some next level pocket protector stuff.

@Slickii yeah, it really is okay to use for ID and I think it's like 10 codes... in that there is an exception to every rule. As long as you are compliant, I wouldn't worry much about anyone else's opinions. All of my repeaters ID with Morse Code. Voice modules are expensive, so I'm not buying one. I know I joke a lot, but in all seriousness, if I had a mobile or handheld radio that could do Morse ID on a timer, I would use it.