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I once received a complimentary compliment that I wrote down and filed in a compliment file as a complement to my collection of complementary compliments.

The problem was the plastic bushing was installed under the mounting bracket instead on top of the mounting bracket and the cable was not grounding to the mounting bracket. The cable mounts to the bottom of the mounting bracket. Now, maybe I didn't need to order that 2-30 MHz Bird slug now, OH well, at least I have one now.

Ah Hah - Just shy of 3 watts with just about 1.12 or so:1 on Ch. 1, 1.15 or so:1 on Ch. 20, and almost but less than 1.2:1 on Ch. 40. I think my problem is solved now and I am a happy Jeeper. Both my Telewave and my DOSY are pretty close and good enough for hobby work. And this check was with the engine idling with 13.21 VDC at the battery.

Good discussions…. For myself, I got started in radio with CB. I had to talk to truckers at my job and the best way to do it was with CB, so I asked one of my CB-using coworkers to set up a “base station” for me. He walked me through some of the basics of radio and it sparked my interest. It wasn’t long before I started researching CB, and, in the process, I discovered a fascinating, powerful alternative called GMRS. I realized that GMRS could help me communicate with my family in several cellular dead zones we travel through (though not perfectly, cf. line-of-sight), and after I started talking on repeaters to extend my communication range (and also to chat with like-minded old-schoolers that use my local repeaters), I was permanently hooked. Now, I’m studying for my Technician license for ham radio and will be taking the test in a week and a half. But even so, I’ll probably use GMRS more than anything else.

My suggestions besides getting a quality duplexer like a Celwave or EMR Corp. duplexer, is scrap the idea of using two mobile radios that were not designed for a continuous duty cycle and a multi-radio environment and get a real repeater and save your money, time, and energy.

Unfortunately, based on the wattage mentioned, I don't think the duplexer is doing much, if anything. A typical 'notch only' 6 cavity duplexer (3 transmit and 3 receive) will experience 3dB or more signal attenuation, cutting your signal in half. However, when properly tuned, even losing half the signal is still a significant improvement over the desense of using two close proximity antennas with no duplexer at all. Do you have a VNA available to you? Or a friend with one?

That would be "compliments" compliments of the spelling police. Sorry, I couldn't resist....

You said first time with this radio so my first thought is a mistake I have made before. I usually keep all my program cables plugged into the computer and I have forgotten to select the correct cable in the drop down menu.

When I am the only Jeep (usually with a shotgunner) out on an easy Fire Road where it's flat and wide not likely to get into trouble, I do the same, scan all main and interstitial 462 MHz channels with the radio set to Tx on Ch.16 and I have my CB also on Ch. 16. Most of the Jeep Club's I run with use Ch. 16 with a specific DPL code for Trail Comm. However, when I wheel with them I run my radio in the monitor mode for CSQ on the receive side.

Nice

It is becoming the norm for off-roading, but when I'm out I scan/listen to all channels.

Wow, I didn't realize that my comment sparks a grammar war now too (lol)

Ah, I found my plastic bushing doo-hickey was reinstalled wrong by the Dealer that installed my Heavy-Duty Mopar Spare Tire carrier Mount for the Rear Tail Gate. I reinstalled it properly and after I get done with my morning Traffic and Weather Reporting Duties for my GMRS Repeater Club, I'll recheck my VSWR. I wish I had a 27 MHz slug for my Bird. Maybe I'll buy one just to compare.

So I can hang out with the Kool People!

They actually included their license in the header, so great deduction there. People aren’t required to join to ask questions. After such a warm welcome maybe they are less inclined to join. What a load of crap given for someone seeking help, why would they even come back. Gee isn’t that why Randy decided not to get a ham license. Not everyone is operating at the same level, understanding or perhaps even ability. Randy once said there is no such thing as a Sad GMRS but clearly he is wrong. We agree.

You are correct - and this specific problem is probably worse with GMRS than 'coordinated' Part 90 systems. However, the Linking issue can make the problem much worse over a much larger area. This exact issue would be part of the reason why people should read the "You just got your license, now you want to put up a repeater?" sticky - and then understand why overlapping coverage is usually less than ideal, and should be avoided. Still, there's a difference between me putting up a machine that I know might be lacking in coverage and still making best attempts to monitor before transmitting (up to and including monitoring the output freq. at my repeater site, in order to disable my repeater when a co-channel user is on the air), and me putting up a linked machine that by default says I don't care about your conversation, mine is somehow more important. If there are linked networks that are monitoring somehow, I'd still be interested to hear about it.

I believe there are two repeaters near Bishop now, a 600 and a 625. If my memory serves me right, the 600 uses the travel tone in/out and the 625 uses 114.8 Hz in with CSQ out.

Hereabouts on group runs we've been using both CH. 7 and 16. But also, as you do, scan all the channels plus the repeaters within range.

Nokones is correct. None of those reach to the East side of the sierras. There was one repeater outside of Bishop that I requested and received access to and then a couple of weeks later the owner posted an update letting everyone know that the repeater had been stolen. He is in the process of replacing it now. Other than that one there re a couple of machines in Ridgecrest that reach a little bit of 395. I have not used them but the two El Paso Peak repeaters look like they 395. There isn't much north of Lone Pine except for the Bishop machine.

I didn't realize the bushing was incorrectly installed until I was poking around and checking grounds. The bushing in between the cable grounding point the bracket was an obvious clue.

The industry standard handheld in UHF is 4 watts. Thats been the standard UHF LMR radio for as long as I have been in the field. All more power from a handheld does is drain the battery quicker.

The 25H Slug ordered from Bird and now onto checking to see if I have any improvement with my VSWR using a cheapo CB VSWR meter that wasn't really all hat cheap. Oh, I just remembered, I have a Telewave 44 I can compare with.

I use a Radioddity DB20-G. As others have noted, it’s the same radio as the AnyTone 779UV; and Retevis makes a virtual clone. I’ve never tested its power output but I’ve heard some say it’s slightly over 20W and others that it lingers at around 12W. All I know is that, for my own purposes (family travel communication and repeater conversations), it gets the job done very well. Unfortunately, due to its Chinese origins, quality is hit and miss. I have bought three of these units…one works like a charm and has never given me any problems; the other two both had the same issue of sporadic received audio muting: when listening to the NOAA channels, even with a strong signal, the audio mutes itself sporadically for no reason, causing the listener to miss parts of the transmission. I am still in communication with the Radioddity Customer Service team to resolve this issue. The programming software for the DB20-G is cumbersome and no where near as intuitive as CHIRP; but it’s not unbearable. The strengths of my working DB20-G make it my favorite GMRS radio (though I’ll note you can also make it a dual band ham radio through a simple unlocking process, as I have done). However, the jury is still out on the model itself…if Radioddity can resolve my audio issue, I can recommend it even more highly.

I'll be taking everyone's suggestions and get a dedicated repeater. Any suggestions are appreciated. Yes I watch NotaRubicon on YT, he also mentioned that the Wouxuns worked but he wanted something better. I'm gonna give up on my budget build and splurge on something manufactured for this purpose. Probably gonna end up taking your advice. Got any suggestions for a repeater?

I have to agree that using a dedicated repeater with a quality duplexer is the way to go. Our club is using a Bridgecom repeater setup for GMRS and we went with a separate duplexer that one of our members tuned using the proper equipment. Mobile radios just can't handle the high duty cycle like a repeater can. Plus here is the defense issues with having antennas and radios close together. Using a cheap duplexer and cheap/wrong type of coax cable will make the problem worse. @OffRoaderX tried using two Wouxun KG-1000G radios and he went to a dedicated repeater since he was having issues when using two mobile radios. He can definitely give you insight on this.

Nothing special, I was going to make a comment about the local DC area GMRS, but since I hadn't been on much after Roland passed, i just decided not to comment.

Also, check the plastic inserts in the duplexer ports to see if they are burned out. This is a common problem with the cheap duplexers.

It'll never happen because those sites sit below the Sierra Crest Line. On the average those sites are at the 4-5 thousand foot level AMSL on the westside of the Crest Line and the Crest Line averages about 9-10 thousand Plus feet AMSL, and US 395 is on the Eastside of the Crest Line.

Sorry 38 vs 45 wont see any noticable difference. Folks get wound up over a 50 watt radio but dont account for losses in the duplexer and other factors. In the LMR world test gear and equipment is a 10% variable. Yes our gear is really good and normally wont be that far off but I have seen many 110 watt base radios only show 95 on a power meter and still pass all operational tests for the unit.

I run the midland mobiles in my parents vehicles as they are KISS and plug into the lighter jack.

@WSAH786 I know you said you didn't want ham license but if you miss the conversations from days of CB I am going to recommend it. I am not going to say "The test is easy or whatever" but i think you may enjoy the end result of a General Ham License more than you are currently getting out of GMRS and there is no longer a morse code requirement for the ham test. You can use ham radio however you want within the law and a lot of people have little impromptu group chats like you are describing. I say all of this as someone who uses GMRS much more than my Ham license mainly due to my family being covered under my GMRS license.

If you're running it in GMRS mode, all you need to do is select the correct repeater channel and set the Transmit tone for the repeater and hit the PTT button. Where are you getting hung up?

All of this helps, thanks.

There is a local guy selling his extra Anytone AT-779UV for $75 complete with programming cable, software and willing to pre-prgram a code plug to your specs. PM me if interested.

I worked for the company that owned the ship that an episode of Colombo was going to shoot, he was in that episode. I was on board the ship in port in San Francisco

I think they were defunded back in 2020 after the GMRS Matters rallies.

Well you got me there. Meanwhile the poor guy that made the initial post has as all of this to wade through which I felt was unfortunate when reading this thread. For whatever reason I do. Anyway I hope OP isn’t discouraged and gives us more info so we can actually help. Cheers.

I will add, the OEM software is superior for modifying all the radio settings, at least for what I alter/update.

In my case, originally, strictly and only to provide mobile and marine mobile (not maritime) to base communications in far northern MN where we had no cellphone service. Wife has never had any interest in amateur radio , so figured GMRS was the way to go. Thought about FRS, but then figured it wouldn't give us the range we'd need out on the lake. While Cell service has improved, it's still not 100% all over the lake. Later on, got to using it more back in town as have a few friends who, also being hams, are involved in one of the better GMRS repeaters in my area. As well as using it around our slightly larger than most city lots to talk to my wife and son when there or out mobile. Although I don't seek them out, if I hear a callsign being thrown out on one of the repeaters or GMRS simplex channels, I will reply and engage in conversation, even if it's just a short "radio check" type contact.

Or he registered after making the post, but that wasn’t my point. At no point did I say “help us help you” was what was rude. I was commenting on people being rude to OP for not having given more information to begin with and then saying they deserved to be ridiculed. I completely agree that asking for more information is valid and you will see I liked the post that did this.

The OP did register an account. He just didn't use it to ask the question. Nevertheless, just asking for more information to add clarity to the question is a reasonable response. No need to make it rude. "Help us to help you" is not an attempt to be rude, it's trying to draw the OP into understanding why we're asking for more information.

He's a Ham, and was likely programming it in Amateur or Normal (IE: unlocked) mode. That's fair. You can see my post above about how I have mine set up and why. But if you're new to GMRS and not comfortable manually programming in all the rules, you can leave it be and run it the way the GMRS 'programming' wants it to be and not run into any issues. Then once you've got a better grasp for it, if you want to expand its capabilities some, you always have that option. Just know that changing modes WILL blow away your entire configuration, so be prepared for that.

I was initially thinking about a portable system that could be set up post hurricane. Then someone mentioned it could also be used daily by our maintenance personnel, so a permanent clubhouse install may be in the offing.

No it doesn’t, unless you’re one of those who feels better about himself when ridiculing others.

I should probably add that you cannot do this in the Wouxun software. I use RT Systems, but you can use CHIRP if looking for a free option.

Good for you, I won't bother you anyway - the $$ argument goes nowhere with me. (and that's you're, complements of the grammar police)

Again, I ask. if you need permission to use a listed open repeater why not list it as a permission only repeater? To me that would have been better and that's what I would've done.

For anyone advocating for the use of AllStar or similar Linked repeaters, I've got just one question that sidesteps all the issues regarding networking and "wireline" definitions: How are you monitoring all those remote links for local non-linked traffic prior to keying up all repeaters in your network? What are you doing to avoid stepping on active local conversations that are not happening on your linked network, but are already taking place on non-linked repeaters? Monitoring for traffic prior to transmitting is one of those bedrock assumptions in the shared service frequencies - at least in any conversation I've had with FCC types. If your linked network routinely tramples on someone else's active conversation, I don't think the FCC would care if you're using microwave, Internet, or the Public Switched Telephone Network for wireline links.

The NotARubicon Institute Research Staff is digging deeper and there IS something to this story - and the results may shock you... Stay tooned for the upcoming video.