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"all" the other GMRS repeater systems throughout the country are not shutting down.. Many are, but some will choose to wait until the FCC actually does/says something. This site is much more than just some linked GMRS repeaters, so, no, my guess is that there is zero reason for this site to shut down.

I can answer your questions on electronic theory if you need.

If you don't have your Ham license yet, well now might be a good time to consider get it.

Not only that, why would the site shutdown?

Rich, as I FYI, I have started an IPT here in the DC area to work on a Petition for Substantive Rulemaking, rather than simply trying to sway Policy Statements. Right now we have a team of 5 communications professionals, some also with experience in writing bills and several have direct POCs in the FCC. If you have any interest in hearing about our plans or potentially joining the IPT, please send me a PM. Anyone who has looked at previous FCC proposed changes relating to PRS/GMRS, has seen how much consideration is given to MyGMRS and its members. I believe you would be a great addition to the IPT.

Im not going to lie... sometimes I'm the "some people" identified in your closing statement. BUT... in my defense, as soon as everyone realizes I am always right, we will all get along much better.

Good luck with getting your ham license. If you aren’t already aware check out Hamstudy.org they have just updated their app yesterday. I found it very helpful and it’s even better now.

Signed and posted comment... I believe that the ability to link repeaters over an internet connection is crucial to the success of public safety networks. There are a tremendous amount of GMRS repeater owners who allow volunteer response groups such as REACT, ARES and RACES that support the federal, state and local government in emergency response, as part of logistic divisions and moving critical information. Terrain often is the largest obstacle, reducing radio coverage. The ability to link multiple repeaters (network and RF) would greatly increase the coverage area for the emergency volunteer groups, helping preserve life and property during a mass-casualty crisis.

Anyone here know anything about linking 2 repeaters together? I think it would be an awesome idea, and I just thought of it. Any info out there? (Sarcasm 100% intended).

@PuddlePirate, I have this mobile rig, and don't let it overwhelm you, it's a great radio (transceiver). Couple of quick suggestions, once you've become familiar with the amateur radio terms and what they do... First, grab the RT System software for it, and the programming cable. It'll help with the programming of the radio (memories, limits, settings, etc.), and it is way better than the Yaesu proprietary software. Additionally, if you do get other rigs that RTS supports, it will make it easier to port your memory channels between them. Second, read the manuals (Owner Manual, Advanced Manual) a few times. There is a lot to digest, and it can get overwhelming fairly quickly. Since it sounds like you'll be primarily using it for analog, take note in the Owners Manual of page 28. Particularly where it shows the different modes (analog, digital narrow, digital wide, etc.). Using the DX button on the top of the face lets you switch between them. You can also tap the upper right corner of the screen to change the modes. It doesn't take much to accidentally switch to the wrong mode and make it difficult to communicate. Short version, if there is a line over the letters, it's in automatic mode (AMS). That will allow the radio to automatically switch the to mode it is receiving. *the DW and VW modes require a settings change in the full menu (#14) to enable "wide" mode. Each memory channel can be individually programmed to the mode you want to use. Additionally, if you happen to program in the wrong one, and then change it on the radio, it will automatically save it to the memory for you. Just be sure to "read" from the radio before making changes in the programming software, that way your latest settings will be captured. Doesn't hurt to make versions of the codeplug (save files) so you can go back if a mistake is made.

Recently, the FCC has clarified its interpretation of the GMRS rules regarding repeater linking by stating that linked repeaters are against the rules. For years, the Part 95 rules have been unclear about whether repeater linking falls under Remote Control, Interconnection, or something else entirely. FCC Clarification (Click the Operations tab) A GMRS user asked the Commission for clarification several years ago and received a response that it was indeed allowed. This letter had been posted online. Given that decision and the nebulous state of the Part 95 rules, we have operated under the assumption that this was permitted. While this clarification is not binding and does not update the actual Part 95 rules, it shows that the FCC is against repeater linking and at least intends for it to be prohibited. Given this new information, it is in our best interest to begin shutting down the myGMRS Network, which allows repeater owners to link using VoIP technology over the Internet. We will shut down the myGMRS registration server in one week, on August 28th, 2024. The main myGMRS website will not be affected and will continue to serve the GMRS community as it has for nearly 20 years. Connections between repeaters or audio are not carried through our servers; only the registration server is used to keep a listing of which nodes are online at any given time. Disabling the registration server will not break the connection to existing nodes; it will only prevent new connections from occurring. Repeater owners who continue using VoIP or other means to link repeaters together will do so at their own risk. myGMRS is committed to operating within the FCC rules and aims to maintain a positive rapport with the Commission. Should the Commission's stance change, we will reconsider whether to bring the network back at that time. If you wish to sign, there is a Change.org petition to request that the FCC allow network connections. Change.org Petition to Allow GMRS Linking

I’m using Ham Radio Prep. Next weekend, I’ll be attending an online course, as well. Fingers crossed !!

You can have it both ways. If you use an NMO modular mount either through the roof (drilled hole) or magnet mount you can use a tall antenna and just unscrew it and swap it for the short one when you carry something on the roof rack.

OK, I think a number of folks saw this coming. It sucks, but it is what it is. Answering the question of NOW WHAT?!?!?!? Couple options. First is moving linked repeaters to ham frequencies and re-establishing links. If you are interested in doing that and need guidance get a post started in the TECHNICAL Discussion part of the forum and we can work from there. The technology that is the in the background for the system is the same stuff that Ham's are using to do their linking. You are gonna need a new SD card and new software. Of course you need to be a ham and will need your repeater reprogrammed. Lets not open 30 threads on the topic. One thread and we will support each other and get it done. I am gonna check with Rich about something offline before go any farther. But there may be options for those that are hard core and have decided that they will continue to remain linked. Or to rejoin the links if their node drops off. More to come on that.

Why not just get into ham radio? There are DMR repeaters all over the world. You can even target an individual user. Nothing is private of course, but the Brandmeister network allows you to connect to a talkgroup or an individual radio. All it takes is a technician class ham radio license and a DMR radio. The TYT MD-UV380 is under a hundred dollars. I recommend loading it with Open UV380 firmware.

"I have negative traffic: This net is bad and you should feel bad."

This site isn't exactly a GMRS repeater system. Also, to be clear, the FCC hasn't actually shut down any linked repeater systems. There have been some that have been shut down by their operators out of an abundance of caution, fearing hellfire and brimstone from the FCC. Kind of an important distinction. I think so, anyway.

Be careful, some people (no "") do not care for sarcasm, humor, nor fun of any kind. I read it in another thread on this forum. It would appear forums should be limited to the dry exchange of non opinionated data. I believe this would provide a safer place for all involved and I, for one, would welcome it.

Nothing radical was discussed. More along the lines of what kind of food stuffs are good for long term storage, emergency power, go-bags etc. Nothing about guns or crazy government conspiracies.

While the only Yaesu radio I have is my FTDX-10. I can say that having the RT Systems software and programing cable sure makes things easier compared to using the Icom programming software. One of the nice things about RT Systems is they have versions of their software for both Windows and Mac. Don't be afraid of the radio or afraid to ask questions. There are enough forum members here that will be glad to help you.

I've often thought about it. I think it's a great idea. From what I've read, especially here, there seems to be not only universal support for the idea, but very clear rules set forth by the FCC concerning implementation. I say let's try it! What's the worst that can happen.

Welcome, and let me unpack a little of what I believe are your thoughts and concerns. How far apart are you and your son? You can't count on two handheld radios being able to communicate with each other for more than a half mile. Of course, there will be times when the distance will be further but, I said guaranteed being able to communicate. Just as with CB, you both will need to be on the same channel in order to talk whether or not it is a simplex channel or through a repeater on the repeater pair. Right out of the box, the two radios will be able to communicate over the simplex channels but probably not over any repeater. You will most likely need to include tones on your repeater transmit channels to access (unlock) any repeaters which may or may not be in your area. Additionally, you will need to upgrade the antennas used on your radios to improve the distance over which you can talk. Antenna improvement is a deep subject I'm not going to get into but I will state height ground is the major factor. The next item you may want will be mobile radios which can be used in your vehicles or as home base stations. There are a great number of brands available and, like CB, they all will talk to one another. My advice here is don't overspend. Home-based units will need a separate power supply, and again, don't overspend. I use power supplies from Mean Well (also Meanwell) available on Amazon for a third of the price asked for "radio" power units. Many public safety agencies also use these supplies rather than the manufacturer's units or other "radio" supplies. A home based unit also means an antenna and coax. The coax cable needed is not the same one for CB. You will need coax that meets the same specifications as Times Microwave LMR-400 or better. Buying LMR-400 quality cable from Amazon is more miss than hit. Other than that, welcome to the rabbit hole.

Good for you! I think home brewing antennas is one of the happiest aspects of ham radio and I am interested in your results for GMRS. It’s so much easier for 462 and 467 MHz than for anything in HF.

I am studying for my ham license, I’m about 30% of the way through.(having a little trouble on the electronic theory)I was hoping to have GMRS as a diversion, a fun one at that. I guess I’m happy that they’re doing it now, so I don’t spend any more money on it. 73’s everyone, thanks for the feedback ! Dave WSDD439

I dug some old RG8 out of my stash and swept it and will shortly chop it up into 1/4 wave pieces and 1/2 wave pieces and try my hand at building a collinear vertical to see how it works. I plan on schedule 40 PVC 1 inch as a radome and will try to keep the cost below 30 bucks. I have a good analyzer on hand which I bought specifically for building antennas some time ago. I will post pictures and brag in an insufferable manner if I succeed with good results. Anyone else? Thanks and if I succeed (or fail hard) I will let you know. I am planning a 5 or 9 DBD gain antenna to start. I am old cheap and nearly blind so I will keep you updated. Building your antennas is fun, and boasting about them is epic. But be forewarned...If I succeed and post the recipe many will tell you you sound great because of your location Of course your location IS important. But if you make it yourself you can boast and be completely obnoxious about it. I certainly have in the past. Updates will follow....of course.

Marc, Thank you for the well written template, and your outside efforts. I used yours as a starting point, and added some additional input as well.

I saw that one the day it was posted. Not only didn't I take it seriously, I couldn't respond because it's hard to type a response when I'm ROTFLMAO.

Shutting down the actual links is different than shutting down the repeaters themselves. Repeaters are not getting shut down because of this. It is only the links that are getting shut down. I'm not trying to offend people. But it feels like I am stuck watching the Disney Chicken Little movie on constant repeat. The FCC is actually doing something right for a change and trying to clarify the rules making them easier to understand.

Yeah, apparently I missed the original post too. Such hubris.

Damn these "Sad Hams"! Bunch of insecure little snowflakes that they are! (Not intended to offend "Good Hams"!)

What new information do you speak of? Sent from my SM-S901U using Tapatalk

That’s right, I forgot about that post… something about how we’re not supposed to have any fun. Come on now people get serious

That is part of the negative of modern digital transmission radios, well a lot modern radios. Everything is buried in menus, buried under another menu. Yaesu being one of the worst, I think Icom does better with the menus. I inadvertently pull up memories of high school calculus, when trying to adjust even simple things like squelch on the ftm400 couple that with it always is kinda done when driving and it becomes painful. Those that complain, about Uv5r programming need not look at some of the higher end radios. I have copies of the manual, on my phone, in glove box, at home and a travel back pack. I push rtsystems, at least it is fairly consistent across multiple radios, does most what everyone wants. You have a really good chance on finding a setting. Too bad they have nothing for LMR radios. Sent from my SM-S901U using Tapatalk

You may want to check your spam filter.

Howdy from Oklahoma City. I'm a retired truck driver who has used CB radio (legally, of course) for decades. My adult son and I were recently discussing alternate communications for the day when internet and cell phones go dark. My investigations led me to the world of GMRS, something about which I knew nothing until a couple of weeks ago. I sent the FCC $35, and in return they kindly gave me a call sign (WSEG265). A pair of TidRadio TD-H3 GMRS hand held units arrived from Amazon five hours ago. So, here I am, starting from scratch and trying to learn whatever I can about this strange, new world.

Today's update: TL;DW: Linked repeater networks in Texas, Arizona, North Carlina and Arkansas have shut down in the last 24 hours.

no, it does not sound like you are missing anything. Double check the tone in your Midland table, and if possible, confirm that the tone for the repeater is correct.. It is possible that the repeater/tone you are configuring is no longer online, and you are hearing a different repeater.

Fortunately the FTM-500 can easily be used as a basic analog radio. Dual receive and the dual display could be temporarily disabled to reduce a little confusion and then re-enabled as the user’s skills grow.

Now I am sure that MyGMRS.com may have a contrary opinion to what I have stated above, especially with limiting operations within boundaries of each state, however the community needs to police itself and set some guidelines. If not, then the FCC will not take a second look and will ban linking outright. The detractors are mainly from Part 97 users who are attacking GMRS linking practices vehemently. I am not saying they are right, but there are improvements that can and should be made if GMRS wants to chart its own course.

It seems this is a very low power repeater. I drove closer and it functions properly. Pretty sure I can transmit and receive at this distance in simplex. Next time I'm out of my area I will try another repeater. I have excellent results with my 2M talking on repeaters 30 miles away. GMRS and Ham are 50W mobile radios with good antennas and low SWR. Now if I can only get this Dayton, NV Jeep club to toss their CB's Thank you

@WRUU653 wow! I did miss that one! Thanks for the link.

Cool. Played with my friends icom 7300, from a user stand point it was a more pleasure experience then the ftdx. He sold both and got a ts590, set it up with a sdr and panadapter. Funny enough I think he is crazy happy with the setup. Loves ft8, 5w to europe, 10w to Australia. That is with a 46" ultimax dx snaking through his kitchen and living room that i gave him as a bday gift. Gotta keep reminding it's a random wire and incredibly inefficient. Sent from my SM-S901U using Tapatalk

I would agree with getting another antenna. If you want to stick with something short like you have Browning makes an antenna that goes up into the 470 range. Of course as they say height is might. I have had good luck with the Midland MXTA26.

I have the ft5d. It works great for me, but a blind friend has the ft3d and a touchscreen is extremely difficult for a blind user. He’s great about learning to use keyboards. A sighted vendor tried to talk him out of getting a vx-6. He thought it would be too difficult, but I sent him mine to try for a few weeks. He loved it and bought one for himself. He still has the ft3. Sometimes he’ll FaceTime me so I can steer his fingers to use the touchscreen. Lately I’ve been wondering if the ft70 would work better for him for fusion rather than the ft3.

Welcome! We have all been new at things. It’s intimidating isn’t it. Sometimes you don’t really even know what to ask. So I hope that you’ll read this before posting your question. First, no matter what you post read it all the way through, maybe twice, maybe even more, before hitting “Submit”. Posting a question that isn’t easily understood will do nobody any good. Recently we have seen several questions that were totally incoherent. Second, tell us everything about how you have configured your radio: what frequency you’re transmitting on, the tone or DCS you’re transmitting. If you need help with the radio, tell us what the model is. All the numbers and letters are needed. Don't just say "It's a boofwang" and expect us to leap into action. Tell us the repeater name, the city, and the state the repeater is in. If possible, provide a link to information about the repeater. Be careful not to disclose tones for a private repeater though (assume most are). PL and CTCSS are just different names for tones. We know not all the manufacturers use the same numbers; use frequencies in Hertz instead. Yes, we all know the tones don't protect conversations from being overheard. They can help keep you from being interrupted though. DPL and DCS mean the same as DTCSS and an N after the code stands for Normal, I means inverted; use N unless it’s called out as inverted. No, that roll of RG6 that fell off the cable TV truck isn’t really useful for GMRS. Neither are long runs of RG58 or anything else that's tiny in diameter. Plan to learn about coax losses at GMRS frequencies. No, GMRS isn’t ham radio. Don’t say CQ CQ CQ unless you like being the temporary object of possibly negative attention. Psst: It really is temporary unless you double down; then you get down votes for months. Yes, Notarubicon videos do have useful information, even if you don’t understand the Queen’s humor. No, that’s not related to homophobia. If you just got your call sign from the FCC but you’re unable to sign up here yet, give it a few days. The call sign lookup uses a periodic database dump from the FCC rather than a realtime verification. As such it can take up to a week. And if you still can’t register, double check your call sign. On more than one occasion people have mistakenly entered 1 instead of capital I, or 0 instead of O. GMRS call signs are four letters followed by three numerals. The first letter is W and will be for some time. So WAAA001 through WZZZ999. Also, look over the many posts, use the search function, keep your search terms short and find one of the 5000 other threads where someone asked the same thing before posting the 5001st question about a topic. Really, if you’re a beginner and having a problem, chances are many of us had the same problem when we were beginners and we posted the 3001st or 4001st repeat question. Finally, if any of the above stumps you, don’t even start asking about setting up your own repeater, yet. But when you’ve gotten to the point where you might know enough to ask about setting up a repeater there’s lots of helpful information here. Again, welcome.

Hello.. New here as well. WSEF841 out of SGV in LA Co. Working with an Ailunce HA1G.. Looking forward to expanding my knowledge

See what I mean @marcspaz? Some of these little fellas just make it too easy. I mean, what kind of a person would get so worked up over videos that nobody is forcing them to watch? Fish..in..bucket...

This would explain why someone gave the heads up to the man running the New York System of things to come.

And remind them as they get their door kicked in, their dog(s) shot, and their kids Spongebob Squarepants walkie talkies confiscated, that it has saved democracy.