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I was checking repeaters today to see which ones I could hit and got into a repeater net gathering. The controller was a nice guy and very welcoming. There was a few of us on and we played a game of "Appliance Operator or HAM?" where we were given a scenario and ask if it was something an Appliance Operator would do or a HAM. Anyway, that was my first contact on HAM and it was fun. Just wanted to share with ya'll.

Sweet Jesus ...

I've been assured that 200 miles is easily achievable.

I think you spelled "Part 95" wrong. Part 90 rules do NOT apply to GMRS, any more than Part 97 rules do (or vice-versa). Part 95 has its own definition section (95.303) where we find: Base station. A station at a fixed location that communicates directly with mobile stations and other base stations. Control station. A station at a fixed location that communicates with mobile stations and other control stations through repeater stations, and may also be used to control the operation of repeater stations. Mobile station. A station, intended to be used while in motion or during halts at unspecified locations, that communicates directly with base stations and other mobile stations, and with control stations and other mobile stations through repeater stations. So as defined by Part 95 (which covers GMRS), if you have a radio at home connected to a power supply and antenna on your roof and are talking simplex to either a mobile (which includes HT) radio or to another 'fixed' installation, that's considered a base station. If you are using that same radio to talk through a repeater, that's a control station. The fact that some think those definitions are "dumb", or don't make sense is not relevant, nor is what Part 90 might say since Part 90 doesn't apply to GMRS. Not sure how this relates to the horrible suffering of those who must bear the burden of hearing people use their callsigns, but whatever.

I recently had a similar issue interfering with my Osceola IN 600 machine, & it has a large footprint. We finally tracked it down - Source was a low band data packet transmission for a uhf simulcast paging system in the South Bend area. Yes - 500 watt paging systems are still in use in northern IN, but very little $$ spent on failing transmitter filtering. Owner had techs work on the transmitter / filters & the problem went away. Good Luck Finding........

You can get some pretty impressive distances if both radios are high enough. There's a GMRS repeater ~30 miles from me that I can reach with an HT, although my signal isn't the best. With the same radio and a Comet SBB7 antenna on a pizza pan about 10' off the ground, I can get through easily. With a base unit and antenna on a 34' mast, it's like being in the same room. The repeater is on a very high tower and my house is on an elevated terrain feature, so there's not much in between. Heck, I've even heard that 200 miles is easily achievable.

Hey, Peter! Great questions. BTW... if you hear us chatting, you are always welcome to join in! I appreciate the interest. We talked about it a little at our last get-together, but just touched on it. So, I'm happy to give more details. I am a volunteer radio operator with the Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES). I serve on a few teams supporting DHS/FEMA, US Marine Corps Quantico (MCCS/MCM), Loudoun County, Prince William County and the Virginia state EOC in Richmond. ARES is a nation-wide group attached to the American Radio Radio League. Our organization has formal MOUs with local, state and federal agencies across the nation. Our team provides a full spectrum of auxiliary (and on occasion, primary) communications support for the aforementioned agencies. That would include, but not limited to, voice traffic, independent email services, wireless LAN/WAN both in an affected area and relayed outside the impact zone, video, GPS and signal tracking, and much, much more. We have had great success in drills and real-world service for more decades than I have been alive, and I am happy to be apart of the organization. These relationships have afforded our teams some special privileges in the radio world. Hospitals, government agencies, and private business all appreciate the services we provide to the community, and to help us provide the best possible services, these agencies/businesses have allowed our groups to install VHF and UHF repeaters on there buildings, commercial radio towers, and on high-elevation properties. We even have repeaters and towers installed in national parks for areas known to frequently need our support. I mention all of this because it is relevant to what is happening with the proposed GMRS repeater. The Prince William County government is allowing us to install a new amateur radio VHF and UHF repeater on a county radio tower. The intent is to have the amateur radio equipment available to all licensed amateurs, while ensuring priority use for ARES supporting the county, state and federal government. Since we are going to have both a VHF and a UHF antenna, we figured we would gang a GMRS repeater on the UHF antenna, having it support both systems. I proposed the use of the GMRS repeater to the county under the same assumptions as the amateur radio repeaters... they will be open to all licensed users, with the county and other served agencies traffic taking priority during drills and emergencies, and the county EC agreed. Keep in mind, we are in the early stages of planning. We need to design the system, acquire hardware, and coordinate frequency use. What we are planning is subject to change... but the proposed details are as fallows. The availability date is currently TBD. As mentioned, we are still gathering parts and the facility is currently in the end stages of renovations. We cannot build until construction is complete. The tower is in the south-eastern part of Prince William County. The base of the tower is about 155 feet above average terrain. The arm the antennas will be on is about 300 feet above ground. We are going to use high-gain folded dipole antennas for all repeaters. We are planning on legal limit for the power output on GMRS (and 100w for the amateur repeaters). The channel is TBD, pending coordination. This will be a publicly accessible repeater, open to all licensed operators. Again, if the repeater is needed for emergency use, we will terminate public access until the emergency need is over. We hope that amateur gear will be sufficient so local families/residents can use the GMRS repeater in a local communications outage. We have not settled on a tone yet, but it will be CTCSS. We will ask local users to use whatever the primary tone we select for day-to-day use, but we will also have 141.3 for emergency/traveler use. The coverage area is theoretical at this point, but below is a projected coverage map showing 99.9% reliability. As we drop down to 70% reliability, the coverage increases dramatically.

Sitting downtown in a railway station

I think it largely depends upon the repeater. Most are maintained by an individual or group. Ascertain from the owners what the their terms of usage are. If it is a repeater listed here, contact information can be found by clicking on the repeater. The more, I suppose, unpopular answer is that you really don't need permission. Certainly civil behavior might imply that you should obtain it, but there's an equally salient argument that "mUh fReE aiRwAvEs" or something.

Yup,, i did and had a save before the radio arrived. I did load a factory file i got from one of the videos on the readio.. I think it was the guy that showed how to set up encryption.

If you are familiar with the DMR CPS, that should be enough to evaluate if the radio will be a match for you.. It's all in the programing and so far thats a good experience. I did read up on OpenGD77 and Baofengs DMR CPS surpasses options to Open GD77. IMO, $75 bucks is defiantly worth the investment for a DMR radio.. Even though i won one in Baofengs contest, i did also purchase one and have no regrets. Does the DM 32 compare well to my Hytera DMR radios?? Pretty close, enough to impress me..Front end programing on the radio itself is much easier than Hytera, but i prefer to use CPM anyway. I haven't tested out the encryption yet, planning to do this when i get back from camping. I did program and test some ditial channels in MURS and found programing pretty straight forward.. Setting up call groups, private contacts is also straight forward... Heck,, you should try to enter Baofengs monthly contest and try to win one..

It kind of seems to me like so many social GMRS users are eager to shout out their call signs on the air. Why? is it like a radio-cool thing? Or you just genuinely want to shout out your home address to goobers with mustard stains on their shorts? It’s also legal to run it off in fast CW and ASSUREDLY no GMRS users would know how to deal with it. Legal. Your license situation is between you and the FCC. You don’t need to share it with every mouth breather on the air…

Direction set to "+" correct? I had a few issues with the offset not saving and I realized that I had the direction set to "-." Not sure if it will help, but that was my (limited) experience. Best of luck to you!

Yes, I saw the need to delete channel, I tried that also.

Can’t you download the CPS even though you don’t have the radio so you can see what you think?

You need to check the reception with the Ditch Light activated to see if the LEDs will interfere with your signal.

Thanks guys. I will order the one LeoG posted.

ok just ordered the UV 5 G for my son and myself. We decided together on this radio.! Did we do the thing? Just wondering. thanks in advance: FatRat56

Hey, it chooches.

If it does what you need it to do, then, no matter what anyone else says, YES!

i just got a DM UV 32.. When i get back from camping I'm gonna check it on the Tiny Spectrum. My experience with some of the Baofeng's I've test is hilarious with with their harmonics. I've seen second and thirds just about equal to main carrier. My Hytera's are pretty clean. The DM 32 sounds good, I'm getting good reports with it.. I like the radio

95.1763 (a) & (b) are enough to make it clear you're wrong. Also 95.1749. And I'm not going to respond to anymore of these BS interpretations.

We do check ins to see how your equipment is working and to see who's participating. If you have multiple radios to check that is usually done after all the ID blocks are taken care of. Last winter I found out I was coming in pretty crappy and them more so as the check ins came down further in the calendar. Water in the line or antenna. Never figured out which. Replaced both and all is well. It's not just attendance.

Welcome!

Welcome!

The rule of thumb is that the tone is always [N]ormal unless specified as [i]nverted.

In 1970 my mom thought One Toke Over The Line by Brewer & Shipley was a church song (we didn't go to church). While I didn't partake back then, and still don't, I had to explain it to her. I really thought she was joking. She was not.

A big change in atmospheric temps like in spring and fall mornings can also cause ducting. Low cloud cover during storms is another example. I live in Mid Missouri about an hour east of Columbia and 1 1/2 hours west of St Louis. When atmospheric conditions are just right we can hear the Pacific. Mo GMRS repeater just as strong as our GMRS repeater. Both are on the same channel and use the same tones. There has also been times that I have talked on the GMRS repeater 50 miles west of me with a guy around Springfield Il. Conditions have to be just right for that to happen. And that usually happens in the spring and fall due to temperature inversions. Another example happened last week. My brother and I both have UHF Allstar nodes. We were using the same frequency and tones since we live 19 miles apart and never had an issue until then. We use no more than 5 watts when using our nodes. That day there was a heavy storm in between us which was bouncing our low power signals so that I could hear him at 1 watt and he could hear me at 5 watts. We couldn't hear each other once the storm moved out. And yes I changed the frequency my node uses after that.

More likely tropospheric ducting which is caused by an atmospheric condition and affects UHF signals.

I thought that when you buy a UTV/SidebySide it was in the purchase contract that you must turn up the over-powered stereo volume to full-blast whenever within 5000 yards of other people trying to enjoy nature.

O I get that. those days don't happen for me. Been sober for 2 years and plan to stay that way.

Many people use the Midland models that are fully water/dust proof and have the built-in intercom port/plugs in them. They also have a simple screen and simple controls (only 1 or 2 knobs) - which is useful when plowing through vegetation and animal habitats at unsafe speeds while drinking beer with the music blasting at full volume.

You could try to use ARTEMIS Offline Signal Identification to identify it. Download at ARTEMIS Download . Set a filter to 462MHz to listen to signal samples known (76 at the moment) to be available in the band, click through them and listen to the audio sample and hopefully you will find a match. Listen in particular to the samples of the obvious choices first - NXDN, DMR, P25, Motorola. Ignore obvious ones that are not relevant in the US like NMT, PAL, RTS-9TS, etc. Here's a Techminds video of how to use ARTEMIS: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_8Y_4FvoHI

With a 30 second period it sounds like it’s part of some signaling system. For a while various devices were sold that used FRS/GMRS frequencies for non personal radio purposes. Baby monitors, home weather stations, etc. Perhaps it’s something like that. Nothing prevents transmitting multiple CTCSS tones simultaneously with strings of data that include DTCSS codes, especially if those codes are being used to carry other data rather than access codes. Because they’re very short and audible CTCSS tones and DTCSS codes are extremely simple to inadvertently include in a transmission if a transmitter isn’t explicitly filtering them out. Our radios do that; they intentionally filter them out before adding specific ones in while transmitting. Someone’s home control system easily might not. Given the fact that you are able to anticipate when it’s going to be heard you should be able to track it.

Sir, I am a serious Youtuber.. I don't "do" comical videos as they are beneath me and my audience.

I don't know about "those guys", but I know that after 33 years in uniform, it feels a lot more natural to use it than not. On GMRS, I try not to use it for the sake of the butthurt crybabies who'll take offense, but sometimes it slips out anyway.

So there it is. Control, and the fact you have none. And other GMRS operators trying to move in on your woman. Maybe it is effecting things in the bedroom. Maybe I shouldn't have gone there. NAAA, your a control freak and want ALL GMRS users to conform to your interpretation of the service. That ain't happening. And worrying about guys that use phonetics for their call signs as a rule... your concerned about them? They ain't seen female reproductive parts since they were born and women don't speak to them like that unless they are getting paid to do so. That's who you are worried about. There are little blue pills for that if you aren't taking care of things yourself to the point those people are a concern. Because it is now an AOL chat room. It's being used as a social communications platform, like it or not. If you don't like it, call the FCC and turn them in. They will laugh at you same as we are. And they will do NOTHING. And telling me to take MY repeater down.... again, keep hoping, but I will tell you that ain't happening either. I invite all users and all types of traffic to my machine. If YOU don't like the content, the channel knob is right there on the front of your radio. Go elsewhere.

Just a comment not meant to toll or support any points of view. I was brought into radio protocol via the military. The lessons are hard to break even after multiple boxes of crayons. It is almost pavlovian when I grab the radio. I have washed some of the terminology out but old habits die hard. You are welcome to ignore me or point out when I trip into military mode. P.S. I will not ask for a call sign

So, really it’s not the call sign, it’s that someone is trying to chat with your wife? Maybe he’s intrigued at hearing a female voice on the radio. Try using CTCSS or DCS so he can’t easily interrupt.

So doesn’t your wife just use your call sign WSAK691?

Why do I catch this nonsense first thing in the morning and feel compelled to even bother to say something? First off WTF are you talking about? Are you referring to someone putting out there call sign on a repeater to see if others are also on the repeater? You answered that question in your own before anyone else ever could, THEY ARE BEING SOCIAL It's sort of HOW THEY CHOSE TO USE THE SERVICE. WTF do you care? You decided to post about it here so it must really effect you. Do you loose sleep at might over it? Does it plague your dreams? Is effecting your performance in the bedroom? The cure for any and all of that is tuning your radio to a channel without a repeater and turning off the scan function. Then you will NOT hear those pesky SOCIAL GMRS users calling out their ID's morning noon and night being social. And Randy, if you are looking for a topic for a video how about No being a TROLL

Why does it bother you?

They have a mental/emotional defect that makes them crave power and control - often because in their life, they have none.

It kind of seems to me like so many GMRS users are eager to police what other people do on the air. Why?

I may not sound like a knowledgeable person, but I do my best to keep up. I recently purchased a BTECH UV-PRO, which is a Part 90 equivalent to the GMRS PRO. My first thoughts so far, the radio feels good in my hands. As far as programming it, well it's different than most Amateur Radio HTs and Mobiles. Of course, with Amateur Radio Equipment doesn't really have a Part 97 type acceptance or certification, but that's a different topic. Back to programming, the UV-PRO is similar to the GMRS PRO, which I find as easy as changing the trash liner in one's trash can. The APRS function can be a little bit tricky, but that may just for me. I was able turn on and off APRS, but I still need learn more about to use the full capabilities of the radio. I have to give BTECH an A for an excellent radio that is budget friendly and can be easy to program in a pinch when necessary