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Verizon out in my area. The wife just went into town. We are using GMRS to stay in contact.

Good To Know & Great To Hear, That GMRS Repeater Stations Are Keeping Folks In Connection With Their Families, In Case Of Situations Or Emergencies, With Verizon Cell Comms Down. That's What This Is Supposed To Be All About - Comms When Convenient Every Day Cell Comms Go Down. I'm A Little Old School, But This Is Exactly Why My Osceola IN 600 & Niles MI 725 (Never Linked) Repeaters With A Large 85% Overlapping Coverage Area Work When It Counts..........

And remember when people laugh at you when you mention having a two-way radio for emergency communication when cell phones are so much more convenient.

https://m.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/43107 Here is the link for W4HTP, and yeah, they're on and relaying as I type this.

Mt. Mitchell 2m repeater (145.190, no tone). Spivey Mtn. (146.910, 91.5) was also doing similar yesterday. There's also a net on HF, 7232 I think but I don't have that to confirm freq. Have not heard of any coordinated GMRS activity. Note that State Emerg. Mgmt. has poo-pooed hams doing on the ground welfare checks; phone and email are allowed for what that's worth (mostly useless). Also 147.105 (91.5) on Bearwallow Mtn in Henderson Co.

Try Broadcastify W4HTP 145.350. I can't get the link, as I am at work. Hope this helps.

Yes. The repeater has an awesome antenna at an elevation that provides near perfect line of sight to your radio's minimal-value rubber ducky antenna. Your friends within 1/2 miles are not "line of sight" to your antenna; there could be trees attenuating signal, buildings, hills, and other obstacles blocking your antennas. If you can see the other antenna, you can talk. If you cannot, all bets are off. The repeater must have a high gain antenna, may be outputting near 50w into the feed line, with high quality cable, the antenna may be on a tower, and it may be up above obstacles. Probably all of these things are happening. By way of example, a 70cm ham radio (UHF, very similar to GMRS) can transmit to the ISS (250 miles away) with a Yagi antenna pointing in the right direction, and with less than 5w output. On the other hand, two 5w handhelds may not be able to communicate with each other more than a few hundred feet away. The difference is almost always line of sight first, antenna design second, power a distant third.

This is the cable that came with the radios when I bought them. For this cable the correct driver is the CH340:

I have a relative living in the Waynesville, NC area and I'm looking for GMRS repeaters in the area that might serve them. They aren't yet licensed but I'm trying to encourage them. Thanks!

With the power off, hold down the V/M key and turn the power on and let me know which version firmware is installed. Here is my earlier post solving the Windows 10 problem with the CH340 install software that now also works with Windows 11. I obtained the "Anytone 2023 USB driver.zip" software from a retailer who sells the DB20-G clone, the Anytone AT-779UV and it is linked at the bottom of my old post (it works with both my Radioddity DB20-G and my Anytone AT-779UV): Even though you have attempted to install the CH340 before, I suggest you uninstall the CH343 driver and use the linked software to install and try out the CH340 driver again. I think we are getting close...

9 out of 10 problems with Programming Software on Windows is the archaic system it uses to install drivers. On Windows 11, my Device Manager indicates that I have installed the CH340 driver and that one works. I see your previous post indicates you tried it previously, but... Somewhere on this forum, there is software to install the CH340 driver in Windows 11. I will look for it...

Watching on Device Manager, when I plug in my cable (with the other end inserted into the radio and the radio powered up) I see that Windows adds a serial port using the CH340 driver. The radio doesn’t say clone. When I choose write or read from the radio I see that it’s working. But, both of my radios were purchased about two years ago and they could be using a different chip now. A friend bought a new db20g a couple weeks ago and tomorrow maybe I can see what his has.

bad boy, bad boy, what you gonna doo....

#3 will apply

You're entirely welcome

Most of the scanner feeds and linked stuff in the area is offline either due to power (none), internet (most cell down) and other reasons. The 2M repeater above has been active. ADSB is fileld with helicopters flying stuff from Hickory and Stateville as well as NG and Military Helos. VIPER is up and active with traffic on operations.

I would just like to thank everyone in this thread for the 20 minutes of entertainment you guys just gave me.

Yep, and these are the same people bitching about not being able to contact their loved ones on 9/11. As for Verizon, I'm not surprised as I was a customer since their inception back in 2000 and I left their wireless in the dust because of poor service. It wasn't their stupidly high prices that drove me away, it was they got so unreliable as I was not getting calls or texts days on end. I went to Consumer Cellular and haven't looked back. And don't get me started on their customer support. Getting a human in under 15 minutes is like climbing the Swiss Alps, a real f'n challenge. And once you get one, you have to hope they comprehend English. Oh, and I still have FiOS, which they have yet to screw up.

That goes for all phones. 911 will always work if there is any cell service in the area.

Well, tuning my Laird/ TE Connectively B1442 Non-Groundplane antenna was very eventful and educational and I wasted a perfect and my last spare mini-UHF connector for nothing. I guess I got sorta impatient and less-than-confident with myself regarding installing the connector on the antenna coax. My VSWR reading was buried in the infinity zone and my 50-watt radio was measured with 10 watts forward with a bunch of reflected power according to my recently calibrated Bird 43 meter and slug. Humm, I may have a short or open circuit somewhere in the coax or at the mount. So, just be on the safe side, I get my Telewave In-Line RF Watt meter and check the readings again and they were the same. Also, I disconnected the antenna lead and connected a dummy load and I was transmitting 50 watts. So, thinking that I may have screwed up the installation of the mini-UHF connector on the coax, I decided to whack off the mini-UHF connector and install a PL 259 connector. The VSWR reading was no different than the mini-UHF connector at that point, I thought that I may have whacked off and wasted a perfectly installed mini-UHF connector unnecessarily. I decided to use a magmount to check the antenna and the VSWR was 8 or so but, I haven't cut the antenna yet. So, I cut the antenna based on the cut-chart for my targeted center resonance of 154 Megs which I whacked off 6 inches of the antenna element. The VSWR was 4+. Ok, at least the antenna is good and heading in the right direction and no doubt that the antenna element at full length was contributing to the infinity reading. So, I decided to start checking the antenna grounding system. My newly installed ground strap definitely had ground continuity to the mounting bolt, but not to the mounting bracket. I removed the bracket and wire-wheeled the paint off the bracket and reinstalled the bracket, and I had ground continuity at the bracket for the antenna coax mount to make a bonded ground. I reinstalled the antenna and mounting bracket to the vehicle, and I decided to start tuning the antenna with a Rig-Expert AA-650 Antenna Analyzer. I got to 1.4:1 VSWR at 154 Megs by cutting off 4 more inches of the antenna element to make a total of 10 inches that were cut-off and 4 inches less than what the cut chart specified. I decided to check the forward and reflected power with the Bird and my readings were a tad 50+ forward and what I estimate something way less than a watt reflected and the needle movement came pretting close of representing a VSWR of 1.3:1. That made me very happy. Very valuable lesson learned and I have extra mini-UHF connectors on order, but, I'll leave the PL 259 on the cable.

Cables don’t install drivers. Operating systems do based on what they read from the chip on the cable. The problem is, the operating system doesn’t always have the best driver to work with the radio. Sometimes they simply have a stub that was provided to them by the chip manufacturer. That’s why almost every radio manufacturer explicitly instructs users to download and install the driver before ever plugging in the cable.

99 out of 100 problems on the Forum about the DB20-G are “user errors!”

And that will probably be the end of propane fired anything on those grounds. Insurance companies tend to react to anything like this and tell policy holders that they will not continue their policies if they allow whatever source of a loss was to continue to be used at a facility. While there are several different 'reasons' stated for the removal of corporal punishment in schools, a bit of research will show you that the insurance companies, after paying out on a couple schools being sued, they put a stop to it by refusing to insure any school that still used that method of punishment.

I also have the Wouxun Q10H and really like it. Since the question was about GMRS radios its sister the Wouxun Q10G has both NOAA weather alerts and is rated IP-67.

I fixed it for you. Yes according to the FCC, channels 8-14 are restricted to hand held radios only. Most mobile radios will only go down to 5 watts. This can cause interference on the repeater channels if one uses 5 watts or more on channels 8-14. That being said. Some 20 watt mobile radios can definitely transmit on those channels if set to low power and narrow band. It is not suggested to do so for the reason stated above.

Since several of you are somewhat local to Uwharrie, I figured I would share this little gem with you. Its a video of the gatekeeper and v-notch of 390 / Daniel. There are some fairly funny parts; especially the last 2 minutes.

GMRS Live to shut down on Monday, Sept 30. Statement is on his webpage... https://www.gmrslive.com/

I live in North GA as well. I've expressed my opinion on here before, probably on a different of the now 10,000 threads on this matter. I hear the same conversation on all but 1 repeater channel, and if I wasn't in the valley I live in, I would most likely hear it on that one, too. It's beyond annoying. I listen to their conversations from time to time and they're pretty friendly to folks that aren't members, but I've only heard a couple non-members pop in and I imagine they'd frown on continued use without a membership. Their network stretches from part of Tennessee all the way down into parts of Florida. I admire their desire to make such a large network and the sheer work it takes to build and maintain something like that is impressive, but to do that on a spectrum that has a grand total of 8 channels for repeaters is a little bit stupid in my book.

Yup,,,,,, Outlaws don't give a $hit.. They'll steal your money and rape your sister.

A man worked in a factory and augmented his meager income by playing guitar at bars and special events on weekends. He was in a terrible industrial accident that claimed one of his arms. The factory fired him, saying they had no work for a one-armed man. Of course he could no longer play guitar, something he enjoyed doing, with one arm. The poor man decided to end it all and was standing in a chair, rigging a noose on the ceiling of his third floor apartment. Just as he was about to put the noose around his own neck, the man, facing the window on the front of his building, sees a man with no arms, walking down the sidewalk, whistling, and occasionally jumping in the air and clicking his heels. The man felt bad. Here he was, about to end it all and yet here goes a man with no arms, walking down the street, happy, and apparently content with the world. The man threw the noose to the side, jumped off of the chair he was standing on, and ran downstairs to try and catch up to the happy man with no arms. It took the man about a block to catch up to the man with no arms, who was still jumping in the air and clicking his heels at regular intervals. He asked the man with no arms to stop and he did, growling "What do you want?" "Sir, I was about to end it all a minute ago. Then I saw you walking down the street, apparently very happy, whistling and clicking your heels every few steps. How do you do it? I must know", said the one armed man. "How do I do what?", snapped the guy with no arms. "How do you remain happy with your disability, which is worse than my own?" "I'm not happy", snapped the man with no arms. "Then why are you jumping in the air and clicking your heels every few steps?, asked the one armed man. "My butt itches."

^ Quoted for posterity. The reply looks like it came from an 12 year old in 1975. Ignore button time.

Exactly! At least a sense of humor, even dry, is enjoyable. That other person is more like the obsessed person who stands on the street corner shouting at passersby and waving a sign that says “Repent, linked repeaters! The end is nigh!”

Now the poor guy has gone running for the hills, and left his radios behind. It’s like the Hatfields and McCoys sometimes.

I can read well enough to see your post are filled with typos. What part of the fcc rules escapes me? Please enlighten me. I’ve never said repeaters should be linked. I just don’t agree with your tactics. You’re an a**. I have tried to give you the benefit of the doubt, assuming you may have some personal issues. I wish you luck, however I don’t see the benefit of engaging with you anymore.

And yet this thread and its question has nothing to do with linked repeaters. Not everything does you know. Also these repeaters appear to be active. So you are just wrong. Most of all you offered no help for the person looking for info, just your obsession with linked repeaters.

Despite the lack of moderators I think the forum actually manages pretty damn well from what ive seen with very few issues. Ive been on well moderated forums and the amount of absolute idiots that had to be dealt with constantly kept them busy. So, it could be much, much worse here.

I found as a noob my self that if you are programming via CHIRP you need to select the Uv-5H then for the repeaters scroll down to those channels with the + in the column put in your repeaters in to the correct channel slot. WSCH382

at a minimum, all you need to do is put the radio on the correct corresponding repeater channel, go into the menu and find the CTC or DTC menu (depending on if it is a CTCSS tone or a DPL/DTC tone) for TRANSMIT, select the correct tone from the list, and save the change. I know you said you are not "technically inclined" but I assume you know how to read, so you might have to read the manual for the exact steps. Only worry the transmit tone for now, the receive tone is optional. That is all you need to do.

No thanks. No need to know me or where I am in my opinion. GMRS for me is a utility and not a hang out to meet folks. They have websites for that.