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I'm afraid that I am not familiar enough with that topic to make a video about it..

According to the FCCs, if you are using a GMRS radio, no matter what channel you are on, the answer is YES.. In the real world, and knowing that nobody listening cares, the FCCs dont care, and nobody will know what kind of radio you are using, the answer is NO.

Thank God you have zero authority over who can or cannot use GMRS. There are many people who use it for many different reasons. Neither you nor I have the authority to say they don’t belong.

The butt-prints smell fresh so your story checks out.

I dont publish the actual/*exact* elevation of my repeater antenna because its connected to my house and knowing its exact elevation would make it easier for all the mentally-ill people that send me threats to locate it.

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

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?

With me, and I'm not sure how guilty I may be, but if I do it's habit. A habit, because it's required on my work radio. It's only natural that some of those habits follow me. In my case, I'm usually checking for warrants. CCSD -Britt

The issues are the constitutionality of deportation without due process, presumption of guilt (again failure to abide by the constitutional requirements of due process), wholesale “roundups” at locations based on “Hispanic presence”, etc. I would go further except I wish to respect the forum rules against debating politics. And don’t get me wrong; I wish to see actual criminals and criminal behavior punished after due process. But none of those issues imply that a person who disagrees with you and your beliefs is stupid. In fact many of them are pretty intelligent.

@OffRoaderX went far beyond sharing an opinion. I genuinely cannot imagine why anyone would be annoyed by use of the phonetic alphabet unless it's because "some people" think it's a symptom of trying to be a ham in a GMRS community. I think part of the reason hams use the phonetic alphabet so much is that amateur radio is international. It can be pretty hard to understand someone whose first language is not the same as your own, especially the pronunciation of some letters. Just think of how much "B" and "V" sound alike in Spanish. GMRS users almost never talk to someone in another country, so being understood is not as much of a challenge (unless you're in California). Furthermore, shorter wavelengths have higher frequencies, which typically improves clarity in voice signals. Even the difference between 70cm and 2m can sometimes be discernible. If you're playing around on 80 meters, you're going to repeat yourself quite a bit. GMRS, being at the higher end of the spectrum, rarely suffers from poor quality of voice signals. For the most part, if you can punch the signal through, you'll be understood. Simply put, GMRS users don't use the phonetic alphabet because we don't need to. It's easier for me to say "WRTC" than "Whiskey Romeo Tango Charlie", but sometimes I'm going to use the phonetic anyway. I have 33 years of using the phonetic alphabet in uniformed service and I also participate in amateur radio. It happens. I just don't understand why anyone gets their undies in a wad over it.

WOW!!! Looks like some people could use a Snickers Bar about now. We can't blame it on people being cooped up in the house due to cold weather either. We aren't sticklers on the use of call signs on our repeater. You can either give your call sign at the beginning of your first transmission or at the end of your first transmission. I know the rules only state every 15 minutes and at the end of the conversation. But it's a curtesy to give it in the first transmission since we have a lot of people with the same names or they sound similar on the radio. It makes it easier to know who we are talking to. The only time we say anything about someone NOT using a call sign is if they are kerchunking the repeater. It' not hard to just say "your call sign testing". And if they want to give their call sign at the end of every transmission, we won't say much about that either. This is especially true if there are a few of us on the repeater talking as a group.. To each their own.

No. Absolutely not. The inventor (Motorola) named the technology Private Line, aka privacy codes. It was done to provide the operators privacy, meaning a lack of interruption from unwanted signals. Its the same concept as a privacy sign at a home or a hotel... privacy and it's literal term means to be left alone. A lot of people misunderstand the definition of privacy, confusing it with secrecy.

My RV Friends are just now getting out of Bear Creek Texas, untouched by the floods because they were camped high enough.. They say the devastation is unmanageable and the amount of rain they got in short period was beyond belief.. They've been staying in touch with the world via their GMRS radios, which they say were very busy by both rescue groups and people in general. There cell service has been spotty and just now coming back, they even had a hard time senidng text, which i thought worked off satellites now.. I would have been on the trip with them but had last minute issues with my VGT Exhaust break and still in the shop for a $4,500 repair.. (3weeks latter)... Thank god they are all safe..

Terri, Again I want to express my appreciation for your calm and thoughtful comments and informative posts in response to curmudgeonliness. Happy Independence Day!

Ok, I've got Zoom set up and I've taken the Practice Test a couple more times, Scored 32/35 and 34/35. I think I'm ready. Just need to set up a time to take the test remotely.

You know, every radio is illegal, if you use it wrong enough...

I agree that it is courteous to ask for permission to use open repeaters. But it's definitely not required. As the custodian of our GMRS repeater that is open, I always try to approve requests to use our repeater when I receive them. If they are courteous enough to ask then I will be courteous enough to grant permission quickly.

I'm glad I can help! Definitely my pleasure. We do still use 73 to send someone Best Wishes... it's much appreciated, and 73 to you too, my friend. Looking forward to following along with your most recent radio journey!

They either mean what they say when they label it open or it’s not really open. I would use it without seeking permission but if you get a chance contact the owner to say thanks.

Yes. get them at least 50 feet apart and try again.

To limit range. FRS is intended to be used for short distances using handheld radios and no licenses. As soon as a high gain antenna is installed the range for two watts is basically the same as GMRS radios.

I sign on and off with my callsign and use it frequently throughout the conversation. I don't know why people refuse to believe my callsign is BR549.

A guy on one of the FB Groups for GMRS/FRS/MURS/CB posted: "I'm thinking off throwing out a call on my MURS Radio to see if anyone is around to talk, what do y'all think?" Besides the obvious reply about it being pretty much used for businesses for short distance comms. etc., my question back was, "what will you do for a callsign, given there are none for MURS; 'This is Cleanup on Aisle 9 monitoring, anyone around?' "

"Well, you see, little Timmy, sometimes a man buys a radio so he can meet other men and exchange signal reports and talk about antennas." "What about talking to friends and family?" "Yeah yeah, they do that too, but first, let's talk about mag mounts and ground planes..."

That is correct. There are several other threads that started with someone pontificating about how others use GMRS incorrectly. None of them settled anything. This is one place where GMRS is similar to ham radio; someone thinks their way is “the only right way” even though the regulations don’t support that.

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

Why does it bother you?

Went on a road trip and my 6 year old rode with grandma. I gave him one of my radios and we kept the other. Thought it'd be a fun way to try to talk. In the 20-ish hours of driving: Kid turned off his radio "to save battery" Kid turned off his radio because he wanted to watch Minecraft videos on the iPad Kid dropped the radio and couldn't reach it Kid couldn't hear his radio over his headphones while watching a movie on the iPad Kid said "hi dad, I love you" and a construction worker on the same frequency responded "what?" and my kid went "what?" and the construction worker went "what?" and my kid panicked turned off the radio when he realized he wasn't talking to dad We talked about how big windmills actually are when we passed a blade being transported All in all, a fun experiment. He enjoyed using "dad's radios" and getting to use walkie-talkies somewhere other than the backyard (when it was turned on). Also, sorry, random Illinois DOT guy.

Getting back to the original post, it’s truly unimportant whether it was an original Baofeng box, an oversized shipping box, or something else entirely.. What’s important is that the OP must contact the vendor to get the antenna that was advertised.

Happy Independence Day!

I want to thank everyone for their help! I have not been on here for quite a while! I have stage four brain cancer and it has really taken a toll on me! I am feeling better for now thanks to the treatment! I still have difficulty with simple things, I am not sure I am putting my thanks in the correct place??? But everyone on here has very helpful with my questions and I see I have been on here for a year! Doesn’t seem like it!!! anyway my thanks to everyone!

RG400 is silver plated conductors, double shield and Teflon dielectric. It's what Motorola specifically uses for all their commercial radio jumpers up to 800 Mhz. If you are not familiar with putting connectors on cables, it's a better move to just buy premade jumpers that are pretested and verified to be good. The bit of extra money is worth the piece of mind you get in knowing they will work and are assembled correctly. For 50 or 100 watts, its fine, the losses are not that significant in the 24 inches of cable that going to a different cable would really make a difference in system performance. And the cable is flexible enough that you don't have to fight it like you would LMR400 or any other .429 diameter RG8 class cable. If you REALLY can't be convinced that it's the right stuff however and want that extra diameter, the go with RG393 jumpers. Same construction as RG400 / RG142 (142 is a solid center conductor) but it's the .429 diameter. Your looking at about 15 bucks a FOOT for 393 if it brand name like Belden. And if you ARE going to build your own cables, buy brand name connectors and not the crap on Amazon. There are good connectors on Amazon, but there is some really cheap stuff too that for a repeater, I just wouldn't bother. Remember that repeaters are a fixed station. Meaning once you install it at a location, it's just gonna be there. They don't get moved around like from place to place. Better 'stuff' being used to build it means less screwing with it and less problems down the road.

My understanding is that if the radio itself is branded as BTECH, it is contract manufactured for them to their specs (by someone other than Baofeng). If the radio itself is branded as Baofeng (regardless of whether the box only says BTECH), it is a customized model from Baofeng which is usually (always?) exclusive to BTECH. For example, the UV-82HP is a BTECH exclusive, although there are generic tri-power UV-82s. My work on the BF-F8HP Pro (a BTECH exclusive) shows that BTECH is listening to customer feedback (many requests from Facebook, here, and other places) and it has been incorporated into the two firmware updates released so far, with more to come). It is also quite ahead of other analog Baofeng handhelds in terms of features, bug fixes, and programming software (Disclaimer: I write the Windows CPS programming software for the BF-F8HP Pro and co-manage firmware development, as well as dabbling in documentation. However, nothing I post should be considered an official statement of BTECH.) Speaking of the BF-F8HP Pro, if you use coupon code "CPS" at checkout you'll get 20% off (on that model only, and only on the BTECH website, not on Amazon). I should point out that the BF-F8HP Pro is not type approved for GMRS use, but since the equipment reviews rules were relaxed a while ago to allow discussions of non-GMRS equipment due to the overlap between the GMRS and ham communities, mentioning it here should be OK.

For our rocket launches I am the LCO (launch control officer) who announces the launch, counts down, and then presses the launch button. The LCO is required to be able to command the attention of the spectators. I’m also the guy who has his mobile GMRS station setup there with a battery so I can talk to the the rocketeers who have walked out on the range to recover their previously launched rockets. It would be great if I could use the GMRS station as a PA.

More like less than 0.0000000001% chance - and its not a belief, its a fact that anyone can look up on the FCC website, which lists every enforcement the FCC has done for the last ~15 years. NO - It does not appear that the FCC monitors GMRS YES - Disgruntled and very "sad" hams do report violators to the FCC, but the FCC does not appear to care based on the record of enforcements PROBABLY a lot of clubs monitoring, but see the points above because it doesn't matter

I don't understand what the confusion is. 95.335(a) clearly says that an exception must be listed in the applicable subpart and Subpart E for GMRS does not have any exceptions listed. How is this a debate?

In that event you won't be worried about the FCC rules, you'll be too busy running from the zombies to care.

Listing a repeater as "open" is typically taken to mean no permission is required. However, politeness is never out of style, and there's no harm in contacting the owner to say thanks.

Nope, nope, nope not going to even look

It’s sad that it’s always so much easier to simply condemn people as stupid rather than trying to understand the actual issues…

I Would Have To Disagree. Think His Story Has A Crack In It..........

I wish it was that boring around here. We have the most uncouth people on the radio around here. One lady got on the repeater (not simplex) to tell her husband to go break-up the kids from fighting because she was taking a crap and couldn't get off the commode.

Im often mistaken for an adult because of my age.

This doesn’t sound “utilitarian”. In fact it sounds pretty social. § 95.1731 Permissible GMRS uses. The operator of a GMRS station may use that station for two-way plain language voice communications with other GMRS stations and with FRS units concerning personal or business activities.

That TV does not sound like it's smart.

I'm sorry, but you're wrong... and that's okay. You can either accept that some words have more than one meaning depending on context and in this context the word is used correctly, or you don't. That doesn't mean the rest of us are illiterate.

I think of it like a private party across the street or a private pool at a hotel, sure you can see and hear what’s happening but if you don’t have an invitation or the code for the gate you’re not part of it.

Even with an InReach, you need to evaluate the situation and decide if it's the best solution in any given situation. [Trigger warning - really graphic gory stuff follows.] In 2019 I fell while hiking on a mountain in the Mojave Desert in California. To be specific, I was standing on a rock that decided to disintegrate. I lost my balance, windmilled wildly for a few seconds, realized the situation wasn't salvageable and that I was falling into a jumble of large boulders. I instinctively put my right hand (I'm nominally right-handed) on my neck to guard my spine. After I landed, I took stock of where I was and the condition I was in. I had fully broken both bones (radius and ulna) in my right forearm, with the bones sticking out. My knuckles were pretty scraped up and I wasn't sure if I'd broken anything there, either. I was not losing blood (although there was a lot of bleeding) and I could both feel my fingers and move them, so there was no risk of bleeding out and no apparent nerve / muscle damage. If you remember the Harry Potter movie where Harry breaks his arm and the crackpot wizard 'fixes' it by removing all the bones in his arm, that's about it, but with more blood and protruding bones. I got some of my army surplus emergency clotting powder (the yellowish stuff) out of my pack and dumped it on the spots where I was leaking blood. I snapped one of my hiking poles (I wasn't going to be able to use both of them, anyway) to create a makeshift splint and used one of those giant Target plastic bags (that they used to give out when shopping, and which I carried to port out any trash I made or found), poked a hole across the bottom to put my arm in, and put the handles over my head. FWIW, in the late 1970's I was on the volunteer first aid squad in the town I grew up in, and have also had more recent survival training). With the immediate emergency taken care of, I drank some water and took a pain pill from my pack and sat down on a less defective rock to take stock of the situation. I was WAY up on the side of a mountain, hours from the nearest hospital (as part of my pre-hike planning, I always take note of where the nearest urgent care / hospital / regional trauma center is). I had an InReach (and the SAR 50 plan that covers up to $50K in rescue costs) with me. However, I was in the middle of nowhere (Inyo County is twice the size of the state of Connecticut and has 18,500 people living it, none near me). I figured if I pushed the button, LifeFlight would send a helicopter from Pahrump, NV (the closest medical facility), land down on the flatlands near where the Jeep was parked, look up the mountain and go "NFW" and call out mutual aid from San Bernardino Mountain Rescue. Which, aside from being in another county and several hours away, I know those guys well and it would have been pretty embarrassing. They would have to carry a litter from the helicopter up the mountain to me, strap me into it, and have the helicopter fly up over me and drop a line down to hook onto the litter. So I decided to self-rescue. An hour and an half to get down the mountain to the Jeep, an hour across open desert and dirt roads, and another hour on paved roads to get to Pahrump. So, 3.5 hours total. I decided I could do that in less time than being rescued via the InReach, so that's what I did. With a fair amount of screaming in pain as I drove over bumpy areas. I was proven right about 6 months later when someone had a similar accident nearby, but closer to the nearest place where people lived (calling it a town would be vastly overstating things) and it took over 9 hours for LifeFlight and SB mutual aid to get that person to the same hospital I drove to. The moral of the story is that you need to be self-sufficient in the wilderness, and also be able to evaluate your situation and make the best decision possible based on the information you have and your training. If you're alone and unconscious or pinned and unable to move, nothing will save you. If you enlarge the attached picture, you can see red captions for "Where I Fell" and "Jeep" to get a feel for the situation I was in.

I hope you lick this thing. You are very brave.