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Yes, ASAP!!!1 Because if you ever accidentally transmit on one of those channels with that radio you will get a $10,000 fine. Its your choice, but are you willing to take that risk? SOURCE: "some people" on this forum

Just for more infos: I live in an all Mac household and avoided doing this for years because I didnt want all the hassle. I was finally forced into trying it and installing/setting up Parallels was VERY easy - virtually automatic, and it works great. The worst part is paying for it but it really is worth it for running the manufacturers Windows-only programs.

DR;TL (the previous comments) Here is the scoop: Channels 8-14 are the so-called interstitial channels situated halfway between the Inputs of the 8 Repeater Channels: Theoretically using higher power and Wide-Band FM on these channels MAY cause interference on the Adjoining Repeater Input channels, so the FCC limits them to HTs using 0.5 watts and Narrow Band. Since you are in the highly populated SoCal area, probably ALL 8 Repeater channels are populated by some one or more repeaters in your area. So, using a 4 Watt Kenwood on Wide Band is probably not that advisable and yes, you should lock out these channels (which you have done)!

But does the official copy of your license? That’s what matters. Edited to add: I just looked up my license and under waivers and conditions it no longer mentions Line A or C.

Replace the Tone Squelch column with the frequency shown in the “input tone” on the MyGMRS page and change mode from NFM to wide and you should be good.

I'm pretty sure Kenwood would say "That's weird, we don't make GMRS radios."

What did I miss??!! I refuse to disregard until i know!

I'm thinking I want to know what was going on here......

Now on a Mac unless he is running Boot Camp, Parallels, or some other type of virtual machine running Windows. The software from Radioddity is only for Windows. @AndyOnTheRadio I have a couple of questions for you. Did you make sure the cable is plugged into the correct data port on the radio (port closest to the fan) and it is in all of the way? Did you select the correct com port in CHIRP? I'm sure you have double checked all of that but sometimes we all overlook the simple stuff when trying to trouble shoot things.

Then it is the charger (I suspect). Those little inexpensive chargers are very often terrible RF generators. Here’s a further confirmation: take the battery off of the radio and put it into the charger without the radio. Does it still create noise?

Based on the scope described in the original post I understand that this would be strictly emergency, which implies short duration. People wouldn’t be chatting on it. If it were me I’d do an APRS beacon with a canned message rather than a repeater, but it could simply be a simplex repeater.

I actually set all 22 channels to narrowband except for the named repeater channels. I have one of the function buttons set to toggle the RF power from high to low. On channels 8-14 the button just beeps and stays at low power. I use the low power mode to save battery life and to talk to FRS radios.

Butte, no repeater yet but a guy just bought. Retevis 97s

I can't imagine that 1 watt vs. 0.5 watt is going to get anyone's attention. I have my more powerful radios set up to listen only on those frequencies, but I can always change that if I want. I do have a couple of HTs that I measured at 0.7-0.8 watt on low and I leave them set to transmit, although I don't ever recall using them on those frequencies. For me, it's a matter of courtesy. People using FRS radios at 0.5 watt don't want me stepping all over them with 5 watts. I very much doubt you'd get in any trouble with any agency for using 1 watt, and it probably wouldn't be excessively disruptive to people using 0.5 watt. Short answer: do whatever you think is courteous; you are extremely unlikely to get in any actual trouble for it.

Actually, I have some Nagoya antennas that work really well. They're the ones I want to use, but they don't come with a BNC connector. There are probably some brands which do come with a BNC connector which will work fine too. I'll probably just buy a few and experiment. It's just that I've had such good results with these antennas that I'd like to keep using them.

I was prompted by @TrikeRadio's thread from July to do a review of these, because his requirement was similar to what I needed. I work with a couple of organizations that do public events, and like most people, I sometimes travel in a caravan of vehicles. For those situations, the ideal radio would be FRS-capable (more on that later), inexpensive, and as mistake-proof as possible. A few months ago, I decided upon the Arcshell AR-5 which I got in a 10-pack from Amazon for less than $12 each. It's a UHF-only radio with a claimed 0.5 watts low power and 2 watts high power, programmable through CHIRP, and with 16 channels. It has the usual Kenwood mic/headset jack and a USB-C port so you can charge the battery in the radio. The battery isn't USB-chargeable alone, but the USB charging feature is nice and it's the reason I went with these instead of some of the similar ones which were a couple of bucks cheaper. Controls are minimal; there's an on/off/volume knob, a channel selection knob, a PTT, a flashlight button and a programmable button which I disabled. I put a drop of Gorilla Glue on each antenna, not because I'm concerned that the FCC would find out or would care even if they did, but if the antenna can come off, some of them will. My friends are horse people, not radio people, and most of them care less than horse droppings about bells and whistles as long as they can communicate. With 2 watts of power and a fixed antenna, they're functionally FRS radios, although not type-accepted. First impressions were mostly positive, considering the price. They come from the factory with 16 pre-programmed channels, and when I downloaded to CHIRP, the frequencies were all over the map. Some had codes and some didn't, a couple were FRS frequencies, and some were in the business band. This is the only thing IMO that makes them less than ideal for the non-radio public -- they need to be programmed by someone who has the software, cable, and skills to do it. They come with the ubiquitous earpiece/mic which so far nobody has bothered to use. The batteries snap in firmly without any wiggle and the belt clips are surprisingly strong for bargain radios. They're light and don't feel particularly rugged, although I've passed them out twice now and nobody has broken one. A few of them have been dropped and sometimes the battery popped off, but they all worked again when the battery was replaced. So far, I haven't had one stepped on by a horse, but no radio is going to survive that, and these are $12. The batteries fully charge in about 3 hours on the cradle and about 2 hours on USB and last 8-10 hours in use. Testing on the Farz-O-Meter 2000 showed a legit 0.5 watts on low and 2.0-2.2 watts on high power. We have only used them at distances up to about a mile, although in April, I'll have a chance to see how they perform at ~2 miles. They are programmable in software for wideband or narrowband UHF FM operation. The audio is crisp and with virtually no static They have only 16 channels, not the nominal 22 of FRS or the (bogus) 60 claimed by Midland, but in practice, we only use about 3 channels anyway. Since 7 of the FRS channels are low power only, I didn't even program them in. I programmed the 15 two-watt channels and a 16th duplicate one using a different DTCS code. The full array of CTCSS and DTCS codes is available, which is nice, because at horse events there are often other people on FRS radios. They have some convenient features available in programming such as "busy channel lockout". They are even repeater-capable, although for my purposes, that doesn't matter. They have VOX, scan, and commercial FM radio capabilities, all of which I disabled. Essentially, I neutered everything except the basic FRS capabilities, but the features are there if you want to use them. The AR-5 is pretty much the definition of "cheap Chinese radio", but for my purposes, they're almost ideal. I certainly wouldn't recommend them for any scenario where life or property would be at risk if communication failed and I have no idea how long they'll last, but at $12, they're virtually disposable. They enable you to talk to other people at a distance, which is the most basic function of a radio, and sometimes that's all you need.

Yes. 2 out of the 3 would read and write with the CPS and CHIRP using the supplied cable and the BTECH cable.

Absolutely agree. Then you should call the FCC and report that you did this, so they can mark your file accordingly. Once completed, come back here and tell us how it went and what your pronouns are.

...

NOT EVEN A, "PLEASE"! I'm hurt and feel left out.

@AndyOnTheRadio BLUF: I have a unit with the same problem. See bold text below. I think Amazon has a bad batch of DB25-Gs (or they are all bad CCRs). I have experimented with three (two are on the way back to Amazon) and I do not recommend this model at this point. Unit 1: The unit continues to show a channel in the “receiving” color for a random amount of time after the incoming transmission has stopped. I was prepared for less than the advertised 25 watts, but this one quickly drops to around 14W while transmitting. Works fine with the CPS and CHIRP. Reseting the unit or flashing to default with the CPS does not make a difference. Unit 2: Power output is around what I expected (~16-17 watts), but a different bug with this one. The TX Power/Mic Volume display always shows 220-230 for the volume value. It should be 0 if you key the mic with a silent background. The actual transmit audio is fine/good reports from another station. Reseting the unit or flashing to default with the CPS does not make a difference. Unit 3: Requested as a replacement for one of the above units. Power output is around what I expected (~16-17 watts), but this one has multiple bugs. The unit has an issue communicating with the CPS and CHIRP. Attempting to write with the CPS causes the unit to crash/reboot shortly after the write starts. CHIRP cannot read the unit and shows the “short read of the block 0x0000” error. Connected to a BTECH 30A/13.8V power supply (confirmed output of 13.8v with multimeter) unit shows 12.5V when pressing number 0. Reseting the unit does not make a difference. Writing a full flash of the CPS defaults is not possible. I tried with both the included “junk” programming cable and a BTECH cable. Other things I have noticed: 1) The supplied programming cable is junk and likely uses counterfeit chips. The driver that installs automatically for Windows 11 will prevent the cable from being used. You can download an old driver, but Windows constantly replaces it (and there isn’t an easy was to stop that on consumer versions of Windows). I bought a BTECH cable that works fine. 2) The CPS defaults are different than the radio “Reset All” defaults. 3) One of the supplied t-connector to 12v outlets had a sloppy t-connector fit. If the t-connector was bumped in the right direction it could lose power. I like the concept of this radio. CHIRP compatibility was part of my deciding factor over what I think is the more popular and simple DB20. At this point I don’t have any confidence in receiving a radio that doesn’t have issues.

Derp. Forgot the RO software is windows only.

Contact the Chirp developer. For whatever reason Chirp is expecting something different than it is receiving. That’s not the kiss of death while reading, but if you turn around and write something to memory that doesn’t match you could end up with unexpected results, including possibly bricking your radio. Or just use the factory software in Parallels.

Correct on a Mac I can't run the official software. Thanks for asking me the basic questions, sometimes I mess up... basically. Yes, the data cable is in the data port closest to the fan. I am using the correct com port from Chirp. I've even done the "Help Me" in the port drop down and it leads me to USB-Serial Controller. (I've also tried all of the other options.) I have done a factory reset and still have this issue @OffRoaderX. The sequence is hitting okay to download from the radio, Chirp says "Cloning from Radio", it stops and throws the "Short read of the block 0x000" and then the DB25-G makes a clicking sound and reboots. I do not notice any spikes on the AMP levels on my power supply when this happens. I'm considering trying to find an older version of Chirp to see if this still happens. Thanks to everyone for their help!

I bought a TYT TH-9800D Plus back in August to put in my car. It was my first one and I just wanted an inexpensive mobile unit to "get my feet wet" until such time I'd upgrade. Chirp has worked great up until a few weeks ago and now I'm getting these error messages. Same radio, same programming cable, same laptop (Toshiba Dynabook, Windows 11). The only difference, as far as I know, is a newer version of Chirp. But even going back and trying an older version of Chirp, I still get the same message. This also appears to only be an issue with Chirp as the TYT and RT Systems software works fine. I just wanted to toss this out there in case anyone else has seen it and found a solution.

Ham radio rookie has some interesting designs. His latest one is using faraday clothe on a fiberglass pole as a vertical HF antenna. And his faraday cloth j pole antennas are well built and work pretty good. I have seen others make slot antennas out of old satellite dishes before but never seen one made flat like the one above. It would be interesting to see a flat and horizontal slot antenna looks like in one of the modeling programs.

Now that is pretty cool and looks like a fun project to experiment with. This is something I definitely want to build out of aluminum plate and see how well it performs on mobile GMRS. Thanks for posting.

Darn it, I'm going to miss working all next week, freezing my butt off in cold weather to fix things on job sites. "NOT!!!"

Have you seen this YouTube video about prototyping a slot antenna for ham and gmrs? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I had a Midland MXT 500 and replaced it with a Wouxun Kg-1000G. The Wouxun is a better all around radio and close to the same price as the Midland. My MXT500 was one that suffered from low output power when set to high power. I should have sent it back to Midland to fix but sold it instead.

Will it work with the Radioddity software?

And humble, too!

I'm a ole CB person (whom got a license in the day) but was told to get a GMRS radio or no more comms with my Jeepin buddies... Purchased the Midland MXT 400 (about three yrs ago or, just before the 500 came out) and it is has been a pleasure to operate (easy to understand instructions). Only gripe I have is that there are few Repeaters in my area locally and almost as few people with GMRS. GMRS was designed for a different purpose, I get it. Cell phone takes care of about all the other calls I need to make. When I switch up it will likely be with the MXT 500 or the Wouxun KG1000 so I won't have to increase the volume button.

That link I posted has both pieces, for the antenna and the radio, for both genders combinations. But I’ll point out just once that most people don’t add an adapter to the very cheap antennas Baofeng attaches to their radios. They buy the BNC adapter so they can use a better quality antenna that comes with a BNC connector.

Done.

Any CERT team should not be using the cheapest radios they can find. In that case, stick with cell phones or zello. For a club, why wine, just use FRS radios for $15/each and not worry about licensing. For GMRS, you are required to use a GMRS certified radio, not a MARS ham radio. I've bought plenty of Kenwoods for what a majority of those certified CCRs cost. There are too many places that people want to be cheap where they absolutely shouldn't. CERT is working with someone's life. Motorcycle clubs, you are riding a $45,000+ bike, and won't spend a few hundred bucks on a decent radio? I just don't get it. It's not like you won't spend money, you just won't spend it on the appropriate radio communications because there are $11.99 radios on amazon and "that's such a deal, it just has to work well enough". The options are there, you just won't hear it: 1) Stick with FRS, and have no licensing, 2) Have every member responsible for their own GMRS license or 3) get appropriate LMR licenses and radios, which in the long run doesn't actually cost more when you drag it out over a 20+ year lifecycle.

The other day a contractor was doing road work near me on a mountain road. They had the traffic down to one lane with guys holding signs at each end of the construction zone. I scanned GMRS while sitting and waiting, finding the flaggers on GMRS 16. The two men couldn't see each other or the work area and were MFing the foreman up one side and down the other. I scanned for the tone. When one flagger told the other that the last car in line was a red Honda I waited and noticed the last car was a Hyundai not a Honda. In a short break in their diatribe about the lead man I told them "The last car is a Hyundai, not Honda". Total nervous silence. As I passed the sign guy I gave him a wave with my handheld. He smiled and told the other guy what was going on.

Does that Laird have phased collinear elements to cause it to propagate more powerfully below horizontal? HF operators frequently have an issue when they mount an antenna too near to the ground (the recommended height is greater than or equal to one half wavelength) and as a result their propagation pattern is deformed to mostly skyward. That’s especially common with longer wavelengths; it’s difficult to mount a 160 meter wire antenna 266 feet above the ground.

OK

Come on folks, Oppenheimer didn't have this much difficulty building the atomic bomb. I wonder how he would have fared against a Chinese radio?

I should also mention that if you have really old XPR8300 firmware, setting up your channel in Dynamic Mixed Mode will NOT allow for CWID to go out at all via the repeater. Set up a single channel as analog only - remove/delete any DMM channel, and CWID should work. If you plan to use it for GMRS, you probably shouldn't be using mixed mode. If you truly want to use DMM, you shouldn't be using a first generation XPR8300. Those had limited feature sets and limited memory. The later XPR8400 was the improved version.

Those settings will work, but you need to have the unit set as a repeater. If you use an external controller, you're probably setting it up as a Base, and allowing for external control of the repeat function. I'd strip PL for CWID transmit.

And how come the lines aren't in order? As you go north, it's A,B,D,C instead of A,B,C,D. I mean, the real question is how can we trust they made good decisions when they got the order of the alphabet wrong?

For those looking for a good place we did Trailfest at Coalmont TN last month. Great off road park in a nice small town. It run by the town and doing a great job of building it.

I use to do light dirt/gravel roads in my Jeep. Then I climbed a pretty rutted out hill and was hooked. Now I want to go hit trails and see what the Jeep can do without being dumb and trying to hurt it. I like to be easy and be smart about trailing. I only want to fix something if I have to. I do not get wild and just break things for fun.