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I recommend that you add @Socalgmrs to your “ignore list”. Life gets better. Personally I prefer to have a link to the CFR page on the internet rather than capturing a point in time with PDFs: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/chapter-I/subchapter-D/part-95

I just spoke with a large radio importer/reseller based here in the U.S. (i cant say who) - He said his tariff fees are based on the wholesale price (not 'calculated value' at the port of entry, as I thought/read about) - because the new fees would nearly double the retail price, and he knows he cant sell any at those prices, he has halted all new radio shipments.. i dont like it but I am willing to feel a little short-term pain for longer-term trade equity...

There is nothing wrong with wanting a portable GMRS setup that will put out 20-50 watts. I like using 10 AH or 12AH lipo4 batteries for 20 watt or less radios. Most 10 AH lipo4 are the same size as the batteries in computer battery backup systems. The lipo4 batteries are quite a bit lighter. I like the Redodo brand of lipo4 batteries when it comes to 50 AH or 100 AH batteries. A group 24 lipo4 batterie will be half the weight of a standard group 24 lead acid deep cycle battery. And just ignore Negative Nancy with his negative waves.

And there ya go with the negativity yet again. @WRVK513 If you want an actual Part 95 certified radio then yes the firmware will be locked. And this goes for pretty much all Part 95 certified consumer grade radios. We know plenty of people use non certified amateur band radios that have been unlocked/Mars modded on GMRS, but those radios are not Part 95 certified. And if you don't want a locked down radio then look else where.

I just received my new KG1000G+ UPS TODAY!!

That's because it's a mobile radio and can't transmit at a low enough power output to be legal on 8-14. That's pretty much standard on mobile GMRS radios.

The advertisement for the GP-9NC shows it as a GMRS antenna and covers 460-470MHz. The GP-9 and GP-9N (no C at the end) are ham only. The letter "C" is Comet's designation for the commercial band (kinda where GMRS resides) - not ham. The letter "N" means it has a "Type N" connector and the straight GP-9 is ham only with a SO-239 connector. When I got mine, the bag it came in said it was GP-9N and they put on a tiny sticker with the letter "C" at the end of it. My guess is they didn't want to print up new packaging to add a letter. I don't remember what paperwork it came with though (ham or GMRS) but I didn't have to tune it.

Nor should anybody post the details about your repeater here for you. If you become a member you can do it yourself. That also enables the mechanism people can use to contact you with questions or to notify you of problems.

Ya, that can be annoying and nice at the same time. But you have to do it in the right order. If you put the tone in the RX it'll automatically put it in the TX, but you still need to go there and press the blue button to enter it. At that point if you have a split tone you can enter it, but you must put the RX tone in 1st. It you put the TX tone in 1st and then the RX it'll change the TX tone. That was just part of the learning curve on the radio.

I prefer to activate car alarms with a 1000 watt transistorized spurious RF master blaster on 11 meters. I kid I kid it’s just a joke chill

I listed my original first edition Baofeng UV-82 on eBay for $350 since it's now a pre-tarrif classic..

https://absolute-emc.com/calculator/convert/dBm

Yes I have rucked plenty. I was both airborne and air assault qualified, assigned to airborne units. And when my assigned weapon was not the M60, then I would get assigned to carry the PRC-77 radio. So yes I know a thing or two about rucking extra weight. Now go strap on a 75-80 pound ruck sack, carry the M60 machine gun with 1000-1500 rounds of ammunition along with your main and backup parachute before you say anything else about how I supposedly don't know anything about carrying weight. I was also a combat engineer so I carried even more stuff than the average infantryman. And I have done so in combat on a few occasions. Let's break down the weight infantryman ruck -70 pounds combat engineer ruck - 75-80 pounds Main and reserve parachutes - 53 pounds. M60 machine gun unloaded - 23 pounds 500 rounds of spare ammo - 35 pounds Those weights didn't even include any explosives or mines I also had to carry. You showed your rear again by assuming that I don't have any experience rucking heavy weights. And we all know what assume actually means.

It was a nice thing for him to do. He didn’t lecture anyone; he just tried to make it easier for us. You’ve been grumbling about things lately. Are you becoming infected with the socalgmrs bug?

I would add that moving things around like this out of the normal progression is going to make things problematic when you try to communicate with someone who has their radio set up correctly. You are really better off being able to know when someone says go to channel 12 with a tone of xyz that you are doing the same thing.

95.1763 (d) 467 MHz interstitial channels. Only hand-held portable units may transmit on these 7 channels. The channel center frequencies are: 467.5625, 467.5875, 467.6125, 467.6375, 467.6625, 467.6875, and 467.7125 MHz.

47 was my radio call sign in my last law enforcement job. I have a fondness for it.

Realizing this is a 3 year old thread and things have changed in those years. And this is only my opinion...... These forums seem loaded with people who seem willing to, and are encouraged to, return and exchange budget radios at the drop of a hat when the radio doesn't appear to work well. Yet, in my opinion. With Midland they appear willing to "soldier on" with a radio clearly not performing to advertised standards. Despite the company having a true customer service department and a defective product claim process. And, instead prefer to limit their actions to airing their disappointment in the forums. Which I actually appreciate a lot, as it helps me form my own opinions of products and manufacturers. I guess in the end, I just don't understand what seems to me a strange unwillingness to allow a company to solve their problem for fairly expensive products.

Again, you live in an area that allows that. Most people will never see those kinds of ranges. Your range of 200+ miles in very unrealistic for the majority of people.

The GP-9 (PL259) doesn't say it covers GMRS in the paperwork either. But the SWR is 1.8 or less across all GMRS channels, 2m and 70cm. Others have tested their GP-9 antennas and the SWR was above 2.0 on GMRS. So each antenna does need to be checked.

Why? New gmrs users literally just told the fcc they have read and totally understand all the rules for gmrs. It makes you confirm this BEFORE you pay your fee. Any one that didn’t read the rules when they said they did committed fraud. This is the ultimate in spoof feeding. If some one want to know the rules THEY need to learn to find it them selves. Geesh

Which is a poor attitude to take. There are some significant differences between GMRS and Ham Radio. It's not just technical, more operational rules based. Its fine to conduct various business activities on GMRS, whereas on Ham its strictly forbidden, as one major example. Then the ability for an entire family to operate under one license is another. With Ham everyone must have their own individual license, no sharing allowed. And if one doesn't even want to apply for a GMRS license there is always the license free FRS radios, that communicate just fine with GMRS when adjust for the difference in bandwidth between the two services. Ham radio has nothing like this. Its examples of the kind above that people make a choice where Ham radio doesn't fit their usage requirements, thus getting a Ham license would be a waste of time, and something likely to never be used. Nothing to do with being a "quitter". On the topic of license free operation one should consider the average consumer has several choices, they can operate on HF (CB 11M), VHF (MURS) and on UHF (FRS). When thought about this way it's more like Ham Radio Lite without the license requirements.

Thanks, everyone. I appreciate it!

A friend would scramble everyone's TVs on the block when he would fire up his CB and amp in his truck when we were in high school. The neighbors loved him for that I live in a small rural town of 1100 people ( I think they counted chickens and cows to get to 1100) with several of us having our amateur licenses. We try not to use any amps when working HF so we don't overload everyone else's radios. One is 500 yards away from me and two are 300 yards away. I had to get on one of them when he decided to run a 165 watt VHF amp during a net. He was overloading my Icom dual band radio all across the 2m band.

There is a class of hams, old and young, who feel the need to feel superior in some way because they had to pass a test. Since the exams are all multiple choice now, with all the possible questions published with the correct answers, it’s no big deal. Spend some time memorizing the questions and answers is not impressive, which is what many end up doing. In years past one had to draw schematics etc. and answer questions with no published answer guide. Im not diminishing what people who have passed the various ham exams accomplished. I’m encouraged by those who want to go beyond simply memorizing the questions and answers, but want to know the underlying theory. We get those people here on this forum. We should do everything we can to make them feel welcomed and politely answers the questions they have. Snarky attitudes should have no place here.

It's the only way he can get attention.. He clearly has no friends and i'm sure his family all ignores him, and he obviously never had any genuine respect at his job. But here, he has figured out how to get people to notice him. It is horribly sad, but, he's retarded, soo.....

So far the folks getting into our neighborhood network just use the appropriate call sign and first name. That way no one has to memorize all the call sign. We pretty much know who Sal is even if we have three.

Make sure if using “Unit number ___” that you’re wearing a shoulder mic, a black basket weave belt complete with flashlight, knife, and keys. Also helpful if you drive an ex-cop car, as this helps complete the picture. [emoji16]

What about all of those junky/crappy radios (Midlands, TidRadios, Retevis, Wouxun, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc) that were "junk" - and you "threw straight into the trash can" ? Are you staying that instead of taking advantage of the warranties on ALL of those radios that you seem to know so much about and have told us you purchased, and "threw straight into the trash", you never even once considered getting a replacement instead?

Hi all, I wanted to mention that there is a new Kentucky GMRS Club. It’s based in Louisville but open to anyone in the state and surrounding areas. Hope to see some of you there. -Bryan

Yes

I just got my Gmrs license a few weeks ago. Trying to decide what radio would be best for a base station and for a mobile unit?

That is what I thought.. But this guy is there, on the front lines - this is his (big) business/profession, and that's what he's telling me. Right or wrong, he's stopped importing - and i guarantee many on this forum are going to notice.

@amaff beat me to it. He is correct in that it is illegal for mobiles to transmit on channels 8-14 since the only go down to 5 watts and those channels are limited to 0.5 watts max.

Interesting that a new guy joins and immediately feels the need to give us the rules. [emoji849]

[Edited March 19th, 2025] Introduction: My name is C. Ryan, (KE0SKN). I am a member of Kasson Skywarn & Dodge County Minnesota ARES group. In April of 2024, Our group repeater was hit by lighting. The total damages were $2,000.00 to the repeater and base antenna system. We are looking for funding to replace the repeater. We are not approved for any local government assistance for replacing the repeater. The main reason is that the repeater is privately owned. The repeater system we are looking at is the Retevis RT97L 25W Repeater Kit with FRP Antenna and Coaxial Cable. This system will get us back on the air for our area, till we can save up for a better system. If you can help, we have a GoFundMe page with the link below. Again Thank You. Group: Kasson Skywarn / Dodge County ARES | Minnesota Website: https://www.kassonskywarn.x10.mx/ FB: https://www.facebook.com/groups/dcares/ GoFundMe: https://gofund.me/007b7312 Email: KC0CLC@arrl.net Pres: Marvin - KC0CLC

Yes this is to get us in the air for local skywarn ops. Trying to get a 50 watt unit saved up. But there other parts needed as well. So this a small win.

Well, it's here.... After using a bunch of feature-rich radios I wasn't expecting much out of it, but this was pretty disappointing. The only feature difference above the MXT400 is the split tone and (maybe) the weather resistance. The biggest disappointment so far is they advertise this unit as 50w and its not. I bench-tested it with two different watt meters and it maxed out at 38 watts on the 462 MHz channels and 32 watts on the 467 MHz frequencies. I'm going to play with it for a few days and see if there are any other disappointments. I'll let you all know what I think after I give it a fair shot.

You'll need to look for these on Amazon. It should fix the problem with your radio.

My non output H3 would transmit for about 1/3 mile to my other H3. But it wouldn't connect to a repeater. So very likely there is output even if it's just from the oscillator in the front end and not the main power output. The radios are sensitive enough to pick up very weak signals. Just not throw them far enough for a repeater to pick them up. But ya, check your tones. With the H3 you can wirelessly clone one radio to the other. So if one works and the cloned one doesn't there is an output issue.

He is that weird cousin that everyone shuns at all family reunions. I'm seriously thinking he was dropped on his head too many times as a baby. And if that isn't the case then when brains were being passed out, he thought they were passing out trains and said no thanks he would take the bus. And he is the poster child for the type of people that would most definitely get multiple blanket parties in the military.

I stand corrected. I went in to profile to edit said “Unit Number” and it said this underneath.

Is GRMS different from GMRS school?

Another open repeater now is Vance 600 (467.575) with a a PL tone different than the usual tone. New location and placed at about 300 ft up it almost reaches Summerville.

So maybe our used UV-5Rs will be worth more. Maybe we can use a UV-5R or TD-H3 etc. as a basic unit of trade.

It's working now (state +freq, and state+type).

IF you 'fried' your radio, it was not because it was connected to a Ghost antenna, unless that antenna or your wiring is defective/shorted. My guess is you've messed up a setting, which is statistically far, FAR more likely than any damage to the radio.

I agree completely.

I am opposite of @SteveShannon, I use the Wouxun KG-1000G as the extra power helps me. Part of that is because of where I live and the local terrain. Plus I like having a removable head unit both in my vehicle and at home. I can install the main unit out of the way and have the smaller head unit elsewhere. I would have considered the DB20G for my SxS if it would have been IP rated. But since it is not, I went with the Wouxun KG-XS20G since it meets my needs better. There are a lot of different radios out there. Most people that have the DB20-G are happy with them and they are inexpensive. Most people that own Wouxun radios have not had issues either. But the Wouxun radios do cost more. Again, more details will help us recommend a radio for you. You won't go wrong with the DB20-G or either of the Wouxun mobile radios.

My parents are both in their 70's. They dont go on jeep events but wanted a radio to talk on my repeaters. The Midland is perfect for that. Why would I buy a crazy complicated CCR to put in there vehicels that they would totally baffled about. I mean I still can't get my father to swtich from his flip phone and holy crap when someone sends him a text and the "darn thing beeps at me". You also dont realize the amount of farmers that use midland. I've installed a dozen repeaters (LMR) for farms that are using Midlands in all the tractors and equipment on the farm. They are simple and last. If your using GMRS as HAM lite then your right there are better choices. But for simple communications they serve a purpose and will sell more than all the other vendors combined this year and next year.