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Why does every new license holder want to setup a repeater? I would like to shed a little light on some of the important things to consider if you recently got your GMRS license and now want your own repeater. First thing to consider, are there any open well placed repeaters in your area that you are able to use? I can assure you most repeater owners want people to use there repeater. Owning several repeaters I can assure you all are welcome and encouraged to use my machines. Do you have access to a location to host your repeater? If your answer is your garage roof you should reconsider. Your garage roof will give you about the same coverage as simplex. Unless you’re on top of a mountain and all your users are at the bottom you will never be happy with this setup. GMRS is not as popular as one would like to think, unless your repeater covers 20 miles or more you may find you only have 1 or 2 users in the area. Unless you already have a group of friends together you may want to consider this before spending money on a decent well positioned site to install your repeater. So you found a nice high site and the price is right, all you need to do is get the repeater installed, sounds simple right? Some thigs to consider first and foremost are the costs because they can add up quickly. Are you on a commercial tower that requires a license and bonded climber? If so this could be by far your largest expense depending on your area. I have spent $600 to $1200 on a climber; I have had quotes as high as $2500 depending on the amount of work and heights involved. Keep in mind commercial sites require certified mounts, hard line cable, cable clamps, engineered grounding solutions and commercial grade antennas. No tower owner is going to let you install a comet antenna and 200’ of braided shield coax. This brings me to my next point, the antenna. Because of the costs involved with climbers you will want to expend your budget on the antenna. Remember a $2000 repeater on a $200 antenna is going to work about as good as a $200 repeater. Whereas a $200 repeater on a $2000 antenna is going to work like a $2000 repeater. On my first repeater I was gifted use of a 150’ tower, I installed a DB-420 on the top and 160’ of 7/8 hardline. Total cost of equipment for the antenna install was $2500, with the climbers labor coming in at an additional $800. This left me with enough to purchase an old Motorola R100 repeater running at 25W. To my surprise it had 30 miles of coverage, all due to the cash spent on the antenna and waiting for a decent spot. Things happen, more so if you have an antenna 200’ in the air with a conductive cable connected to sensitive electronics. Antenna issues, feedline issues, repeater issues all cost money and I promise at some point you will have issues that need repair and require your money! It is my opinion that the GMRS community does not need another 2 to 5 miles repeater as it just becomes background noise. What use is a public listed repeater if somebody in a mobile can’t use it 5 miles away while moving or the portable coverage is only a mile? If after reading this you are still going to build a repeater for your garage more power to you, just don’t expect 20 people to show up if it only reaches a mile. As the owner of several GMRS and Commercial repeaters I can attest to the amount of money and effort go into my repeaters. I have only touched on the basics, if you add in any kind of testing services, duplexer tuning, addition of a combiner channel to an existing tower system, RF engineering, rent and insurance your costs can sky rocket. The best advice I can give any new licensee is to try and use the available systems in the area. Take the time to learn a little about what you’re doing and to assess the usability of the service before investing in a repeater for the sole reason of saying you own one.

By the grace of mine own self-worth and sarcasm and by the bounteous authority vested in me, THE QUEEN OF ALL THAT IS GMRS, I doth hereby decree, with much pomp and stupidity, that one @SteveShannon, a stout fellow of questionable repute but unquestionable GMRS knowledge, be forthwith and forevermore dubbed a member of the Most Esteemed Order of the HERD (which, perchance, standeth for “Higher End Radio Dork,) Let it be known across the static-ee airwaves of the peasantry to the lofty frequencies of the saddest of H.A.M.s that Sir StevenShannon, clad in naught but his wits and an FCCs permission slip, hath stumbled bravely and fortuitously into the fray of tomfoolery and emerged victorious—or at least not entirely trampled. With this proclamation, he is granted the sacred right to put the title "HERD" after his name, to wield a UV-5R on GMRS channels, and to confuse all who inquire as to what a “HERD” truly be. So sayeth I, THE QUEEN OF ALL THAT IS GMRS on this fifth day of March, in the year of our Lord XENU two thousand and five-and-twenty. Let the roger-beeps blare, and may the Sad H.A.M.s tremble in his presence ! So it is written, so shall it be done. Arise good Sir @SteveShannon, member of the HERD!

I use mine for off-roading.. any time I want to "make contacts" and find anonymous men to talk with, I use the Grindr app.

Forgot to mention..Thanks for reminding me... Always beware of the "some people" that try their best overcomplicate everything.

Just remember, that as predicted in the proclamation video, "some people" will always and forever spew reasons why Ch19 (any channel, actually) is not "the right choice", and will argue about it as they have for years, accomplishing nothing.. Those people are not invited to join with the rest of us normal people on Ch19.. They can go talk to themselves on some other channel.. My name is Queen Randy and I approve this message.

Hey folks. I have had a small group of people ask me about tones and GMRS/FRS basics in the past week. I figured I would take one of the conversations here and share it for people new to the service. Hopefully it will help you understand Private Lines, Privacy Tones, sub-channels, tones and squelching methods, in general. I am only covering the two most popular in GMRS and FRS, but there are many others available as you move into different radio services and technology. Before we get into what all that stuff is, lets talk about why it exists. Per NOAA and the US Census Bureau, the lower 48 states is approximately 3.1 million square miles. Also, 83% of Americans live on 10% of the total available square miles and 40% of all US citizens live on the east and west coast in counties touching oceans. Following this logic, about 500,000+ licensed and unlicensed operators (estimated by me) are sharing FRS and GMRS radio space, in roughly 310,000 square miles. So, how does 500,000 people in close proximity, sharing 22 channels, all use their radios at the same time without interfering with each other? Motorola brings you PL tones! Lets get this out of the way... regardless of what the manufacturers may tell you or how they label their products, there is no privacy. Period. Private Lines (PL), Privacy Tones, Sub-channels and any other name for the same service, does not stop people from hearing you, it stops you from hearing them. I know... seems like a day in Opposite World, but that's how it works. I suppose the first thing to do is explain what the PL tones really are, what the more common types are and what each of them do. A traditional squelch is a signal level squelch. Meaning, no audio will come out of the speaker until a strong enough signal is received. Then there are also user squelch types. With analog radios, the most common type of user squelch uses encoding called Continuous Tone-Coded Squelch System or CTCSS. This feature is defined as being used to reduce the annoyance of listening to other users on a shared two-way radio channel. So, as mentioned above, its not that you as a person speaking have any type of privacy, but rather you don't have to listen to everyone on the same frequency. Hopefully the third time is a charm. Many GMRS and FRS radios only have simple CTCSS functions called Tone Squelch, often displayed as TSQL on the screen when enabled. This means two things. One is, regardless of what you do with your squelch knob or set your RF squelch to, no audio will come out of the speaker unless the tone you selected is embedded in the signal you are receiving. The other thing it does is, when you transmit, what ever tone frequency you have programed gets transmitted with/in your signal to unlock or open the squelch of other radios configured the same way. There is another method of CTCSS called "split tone". This means that you can use one tone when you transmit and another for your receive. This comes in handy when repeater owners are trying to limit who can access the repeater, as higher cost radios typically have split tone capability, compared to poorly built and inexpensive radios that would be problematic on a repeater do not. Also, this makes it a bit more difficult to "discover" the input tone by using scanning tools. Another function of split tone CTCSS is that you can also set your radio to transmit a tone to unlock a repeater or other radio, but leave your receive tone set to null (nothing). When this mode is enabled, there is typically a display on the radio that either reads TN or TONE. That means you can bring up a repeater or unlock a radio squelch, but also hear everyone else regardless of what tones they are running, if any at all. This is actually a great feature for GMRS radios since Repeater Channels share FRS frequencies and GMRS simplex frequencies. So you can tell if the frequency is in use as well as being able to talk to others who many not be using the repeater. CTCSS is an analog squelching system. There is also a digital squelching system called Digital-Code Squelch or DCS. It has similar use cases as CTCSS, but it is sending digitally embedded numeric codes instead of a sub-audible tone. I apologize in advance, but this next portion may get a little confusing. If you have questions, just ask and myself or one of the other knowledgeable members will be able to help. All of the numbers below are simply random samples I selected for example. Last I checked, there are 38 standard tones and an additional 13 expanded tones (not available on every radio) for a total possible 51 tones and 83 DCS codes. Along with the use examples above, you can get creative with DCS, because we are dealing with binary numbers instead of a tone. You can have the numbers used in a bunch of different combinations. For example, the number 411 in binary is 00110100 00110001 00110001. The reverse of this would be 11001011 11001011 11001110. So we are swapping the meaning of a 1 and a 0. So the combinations could be as follows: Normal-Normal = Transmit sends 411 and your radio squelch only opens when it receives 411 in the standard format 00110100 00110001 00110001. Reverse-Reverse = Transmit sends 411 reversed (or bit swapped) and your radio squelch only opens when it receives 411 reversed, meaning 11001011 11001011 11001110. Normal-Reverse = Transmit sends 411 standard binary format and your radio squelch only opens when it receives 411 in a reversed binary format. Reverse-Normal = Transmit sends 411 in a reversed binary format and your radio squelch only opens when it receives 411 in a standard format. Unfortunately, I am unaware of any radio's that have a DCS option to leave your user squelch open while transmitting a DCS code. If DCS is enabled, you cannot hear anyone else unless they are using the same DCS number and binary combination. CTCSS tones can also be "reversed". CTCSS tones, since its analog, we have a phase reversal, often called "reverse burst" when it is only reversed at the end of the transmission. (Something to Google in your spare time.) On some high-end radios, squelching can get really exotic. You may be able to create your own custom tone instead of using one of the standard tones. You may also be able to combine CTCSS tones and DCS codes. For example: User-CTCSS = Transmit 2600Hz tone, squelch opens with 2600Hz tone. (random number example) T-DCS = Transmit 141.3 tone, squelch opens with 411 code. DCS-T = Transmit 411 code, squelch opens with 141.3 tone. T-rDCS = Transmit 141.3 tone, squelch opens with 411 bit swapped code. rDCS-T = Transmit 411 bit swapped code, squelch opens with 141.3 tone. Now, here is the kind of disappointing part. Some manufactures try to make their equipment sound like something its not. They will use things like there own custom number code to identify a traditional CTCSS code. For example, Midland uses code number 22 (also known as a sub-channel) to indicate the tone 141.3. This makes coordination on tone selection a bit cumbersome between some brands. It also means that if your radio doesn't display the actual CTCSS tone or DCS code, you need to keep your owner's manual handy for reference. So... I don't know if that explanation made things better or worse. LOL Anyway, some companies use verbiage like "Privacy Tones" which adds to the confusion for some people. If you are using a true full CTCSS, it just means you are limited to whom you can hear, but everyone can still hear you. The examples I provided above for DCS are not what actually gets transmitted, but rather a conceptual process to help understand at a very basic level of what occurs, simply to understand the difference. DCS adds a 134.4 bps bitstream to the transmitted audio. To move past concept to the weeds, this video does a great job.

What does “duty cycle” mean? I bring up duty cycle every time I hear somebody talking about making a repeater out of cheap Chinese mobiles and worse any type of handhelds. Duty cycle is the maximum time an amplifier may transmit within a five minute interval, expressed as a percentage, to avoid overheating. Suppose a mobile amplifier is rated at 30% duty cycle. This means that it may transmit for no longer than 1.5 minutes and must remain off for not less than 3.5 minutes. Some people forget that a repeater is transmitting for 2 or more people, duty cycle will be reached quickly if you get into conversation. More people in the conversation just amplifies the issue. Once a radio reaches it's thermal design limits it will no longer be able to adequately cool the output transistors. Even if a radio is not hot to the touch the transistors are, in part because of the inefficient transfer of heat to the units housing or internal heat sink. The longer you exceed the duty cycle the more heat builds on the transistors, surrounding electronics and heat sink effecting it's ability to remain on frequency without spurious emissions. Exceed duty cycle long enough and you will need a new transmitter or radio. I have tested a few Baofang and TYT radios on my service monitor without great results. All of the radios started deviating outside of the allotted channel bandwidth after simulated conversation at 50% duty cycle, the longer I allowed this the worse if got. Testing was done using an Aeroflex 2975 IFR recently back from the calibration lab. GMRS is a tiny sliver of spectrum surrounded by the commercial land mobile part 90 service. It is important that any repeaters that are built or re-purposed are held to the highest standards and operated as to not cause any interference inside or outside of our allocated spectrum. I wont get into the part 90/95 debate but i do stand firm that non certified import equipment has no place on GMRS.

Alright, I think this topic has run its course...

I keep my Roger Beep on - when someone complains about it, I remind them that its my radio and nobody is forcing them to listen to me.

50W is good, especially when you have a long-run of that leaky coax, to get more juice squirting from the antenna. 50W is also good to step on the other guy that is irritating everyone but only has 20W.. all else being equal.

The more I learn about the FCC's General Mobile Radio Service (GMRS), the more I am fascinated by RF in general. It touches everyone's lives every second of every day, yet few people pay much attention. How cool is it that after 42 years and 14 billion miles away, the 22-Watt radio on Voyager 1 is still sending data back to earth every day (how important is that antenna?). So why aren't more people interested in GMRS or RF in general? There's no test to get a license like amateur (ham) radio. It's $70 for a 10-year license, and is really easy to get started. So here are some theories. People don't know: GMRS exists Why GMRS exists Why they'd want to use GMRS How to envision themselves participating in GMRS What it takes to get started with GMRS What it takes to continue and improve with GMRS Technical information they should know about GMRS Etiquette when transmitting (TX) on GMRS What a GMRS "Net" is and why Most people within the GMRS community are helpful once you're in, but the community is very inviting in a go-figure-it-out-yourself way, and no one has assembled everything you need to know about GMRS all in one place. We GMRS people are putting the onus on outsiders to sift through thousands of painfully esoteric webpages with a winnowing fork, separating useful info from useless, poorly written, or incomplete info. When I first heard about GMRS on a 4x4 trip, I arrived home and Googled around and settled on a Midland MXT-275 because it seemed perfect for mounting on my truck dashboard. At the time, I had no idea that Midland doesn't manufacture a GMRS radio capable of operating on split-tone repeaters (Dear Midland, I know you're reading this: why do you squander so much potential?). Edit 6/28/2021: Midland heard our cry! They just updated the MXT-275 to include split-tone programming on repeater channels. So for example, now this radio is able to reach a repeater that receives (RX) incoming transmissions on 467.550 with a PL tone of 103.5 and repeats the transmission (TX) at 462.550 with a PL tone of 88.5. I didn't even know what "split tone" was or even what "tone" meant, or carrier or squelch or hundreds of other little things you all take for granted. Since then, I realized that if the big, bad manufacturers like Midland, Kenwood, Motorola, and iCom can't even invite the public to learn more and provide useful content for each stage of the customer journey—Awareness, Consideration, Purchase, and Loyalty—the 2-way radio industry has much deeper problems and aren't there to help guys like me. As we get involved deeper into GMRS, there's little-to-no hand-holding going on at each level of knowledge. I ending up relying on the Ham community here and there and a guy who is basically a saint at a little radio shop in Phoenix, Arizona (hope Tim over at Procomm and the others at the nonprofit AZGMRS.org don't mind me giving them a shout-out). Edit 4/14/2020: By the way, AZGMRS made this awesome list of FCC-approved GMRS radios that they recommend. If you live anywhere near Arizona and are reading this, now would be a great time to become a member. Their repeater network covers some 100 miles around Phoenix with more and more repeaters joining the network (check out their sweet coverage map). But it's still frustrating. I wish a GMRS expert—presumably a manufacturer—would just come out and say exactly what a total newbie needs at each stage of their involvement or level of need. Two-way radio manufacturers should stop wasting time trying to sell, and start marketing and branding, which means educating the public about the 5 W's (Who, What, Where, When, Why [+how, +how much]) without trying to sell to them. Most new users don't know what they need because they don't know what's possible. For example, I wish I knew that manufacturers don't typically include the best antenna on their radios right out of the box. It took me over a year to realize that the best bang for the buck for a portable base antenna to include in my go bag is N9TAX's Slimjim and that Smiley Antenna makes the best bang for the buck antennas for hand-held radios (which by the way, everyone just assumes newbies are supposed to know that hand-held walkie-talkie radios are called "HT" for "Handy-talkie" and what a "QSO" is). How would a newbie know that the cheap Nagoya 771 "upgrade" antenna for Baofengs that everyone talks about actually isn't the best bang for the buck for the GMRS frequency band of 462–467? How would a newbie know that antennas work best when tuned exactly to what they call a "center" frequency that accommodates 5 Megahertz in each direction (+5 and -5 Megahertz) at the expense of hearing other frequencies? I learned the hard way that in order to properly install an NMO antenna mount on the roof of my truck, I would need a drill bit specifically made for drilling NMO antenna mount holes, and that yes, it is worth the money to do it right the first time. I'm still in the middle of learning how a "quarter-wave" or "5/8 wave" antenna works, the difference between dB gain vs. dBi gain, mic gain, antenna gain, because again, everyone seems to just assume I already know what all this means. I still don't understand what antenna "tuning" means and why you have to "cut" an antenna to "tune" it. Can I make my own antenna right now in a pinch with a copper wire in my garage? Ok, show me! How do I measure it or test it? What is SWR? Can I measure it myself? What do I need in order to measure it? Is one SWR meter better than another for my level as a newbie? Is there something I should learn to make it worth buying the better meter that opens up a whole new world of capability? Is it worth learning all that? This graphic did a great job beginning to explain what dBd gain means for those of us who know next to nothing about it, but now I need to go find out on my own and sift through a thousand webpages to find out if dBd is something new I need to know. Speaking of dB, I know that "dB" is a decibel, but is it the same as my stereo volume? Why do I see manufacturers saying that the microphone and cable have a dB rating? What is going on here? This is madness! We can Google things all day, but which info is true and correct and the most helpful? I think that the entire industry is sitting on a Gold Mine of consumers sitting at home for weeks on end who would love to buy GMRS equipment and communicate via GMRS to friends, family, neighbors, and other GMRS users. Whoever provides the most useful, relevant, and engaging content that stops making assumptions about what people know or don't know will win. STOP ASSUMING. START EDUCATING.

Welcome! We have all been new at things. It’s intimidating isn’t it. Sometimes you don’t really even know what to ask. So I hope that you’ll read this before posting your question. First, no matter what you post read it all the way through, maybe twice, maybe even more, before hitting “Submit”. Posting a question that isn’t easily understood will do nobody any good. Recently we have seen several questions that were totally incoherent. Second, tell us everything about how you have configured your radio: what frequency you’re transmitting on, the tone or DCS you’re transmitting. If you need help with the radio, tell us what the model is. All the numbers and letters are needed. Don't just say "It's a boofwang" and expect us to leap into action. Tell us the repeater name, the city, and the state the repeater is in. If possible, provide a link to information about the repeater. Be careful not to disclose tones for a private repeater though (assume most are). PL and CTCSS are just different names for tones. We know not all the manufacturers use the same numbers; use frequencies in Hertz instead. Yes, we all know the tones don't protect conversations from being overheard. They can help keep you from being interrupted though. DPL and DCS mean the same as DTCSS and an N after the code stands for Normal, I means inverted; use N unless it’s called out as inverted. No, that roll of RG6 that fell off the cable TV truck isn’t really useful for GMRS. Neither are long runs of RG58 or anything else that's tiny in diameter. Plan to learn about coax losses at GMRS frequencies. No, GMRS isn’t ham radio. Don’t say CQ CQ CQ unless you like being the temporary object of possibly negative attention. Psst: It really is temporary unless you double down; then you get down votes for months. Yes, Notarubicon videos do have useful information, even if you don’t understand the Queen’s humor. No, that’s not related to homophobia. If you just got your call sign from the FCC but you’re unable to sign up here yet, give it a few days. The call sign lookup uses a periodic database dump from the FCC rather than a realtime verification. As such it can take up to a week. And if you still can’t register, double check your call sign. On more than one occasion people have mistakenly entered 1 instead of capital I, or 0 instead of O. GMRS call signs are four letters followed by three numerals. The first letter is W and will be for some time. So WAAA001 through WZZZ999. Also, look over the many posts, use the search function, keep your search terms short and find one of the 5000 other threads where someone asked the same thing before posting the 5001st question about a topic. Really, if you’re a beginner and having a problem, chances are many of us had the same problem when we were beginners and we posted the 3001st or 4001st repeat question. Finally, if any of the above stumps you, don’t even start asking about setting up your own repeater, yet. But when you’ve gotten to the point where you might know enough to ask about setting up a repeater there’s lots of helpful information here. Again, welcome.

I dont usually like to post videos here, but I have been so inspired by several of the "experts" in this forum complaining that we should not be using radios made in China that I put together a list of all the American Made radios AND I vow to purchase each one of these American made radios and do a full review of them in the next 30 days.. Thank you to "some people" that opened my eyes about not purchasing radios that are not made in America.

Okay, I’ll bite here. I own a repeater (Rugged 575) in Naperville, IL at 300' receive / 250’ transmit. It’s on a commercial site with other UHF and VHF radio systems as well. Not only have I spent nearly 5 figures setting this up correctly but I monitor it as if it was my baby, cuz, you know, it *IS* my baby. I built it with no financial help from anyone else. Of course there was other help I received by LOTS of other commercial repeater owners (Those of you that are reading know who you are) as I’ve come a long way in the last year and some change here. I have my repeater system set up for several different private family usage cases and I also have a tone for public which I closely monitor as well and others that are out there do use it. As a repeater owner I’m super happy to turn my radio on and hear other people using it. As a matter of fact just yesterday some other licensed GMRS users were using my repeater and I needed to use it with my wife as I was at the grocery store and I broke in and said, “hang tight guys, I need to talk to my wife for a minute. I’ll let you know when I’m done”. Anyways, I flipped to our tone, talked with her about the particulars, then went back to the public side and said “Carry on guys! Glad to hear you out there using the machine”. That being said, mine is set to “Ask permission” as well because as others have mentioned, I want to know who is using it to verify their license and location because it’s my system and it’s my responsibility to make sure it’s up to par on the commercial shared site. I have sent an email back to EVERY! SINGLE! PERSON! As well welcoming them with the tones to use it! I haven’t had the need (yet) to ever reject anyone from using my repeater but I still keep a tab on who has access to it as in my opinion, it’s my responsibility to do so. Not only that, but I have my custom verbiage I send back with every request as well stating that this is a family repeater as well and to aid to traffic on the other PL tone. Heck, I’ll paste what I send you can see where we are coming from with this: “The tone for my repeater is XXXX (left blank) (N – normal, not inverted). When you key up for the first time please identify yourself using your call sign and call for ROB. I am regulating who is using my repeater as it is being used for my family as well. I have received an exceeding amount of requests to use my repeater. Originally this was set up for family only use but seeing as the range is far better than expected, I have opened it up on an as-requested basis to any licensed GMRS operator. PLEASE NOTE: ALL TRAFFIC MUST YIELD TO MY FAMILY. The tone for public use is different than family so if you see your radio lighting up receiving on 462.575 but no audio is coming through on your radio it's because my family is talking so please do not key up until that traffic has cleared. Thanks and I hope to hear you on the air!” That being said, sometimes users don’t understand what a multi-table is either so I will say this too: When you first use a new repeater you should ALWAYS call out for a radio check IMO because you don’t know how that repeater is set up and should NEVER assume anything! I was in Iowa once and I made contact to the owner on the traveler tone (I was travelling) and he told me that it’s linked to another repeater in California! NONE of this information was posted on mygmrs.com and upon googling I couldn’t even find it either!!! It was good to know that I was keying multiple machines too and me and the owner had a nice long 30 minute conversation and he was glad I keyed up and shouted out! To sum up further as a repeater owner: *MOST*, but not *ALL* repeater owners don’t mind you using their machine I’ve found. Now I’m in the Midwest mind you, so again, no assumptions would be made for other machines that I’ve never used, but around here most repeater owners are very happy to have you on their machine and it brings a great smile to their face to know that they are serving the public with a reliable communication system and growing the hobby as well! Remember that GMRS isn’t HAM and HAM isn’t GMRS. A *LOT* of people out there want GMRS for family use under one license and that’s what I’m doing but I’ve decided to open it up to the public as well as the coverage is fairly decent. I looked at getting a business license and could have easily done it too but I like the idea of being able to chat with my family *AND* other GMRS users so here we are! Thanks!

Need an inexpensive cup holder mount for your small GMRS mobile? Try a 3" plumbers test plug. I got mine at Menards.

Hey folks, a few months back, I discussed providing a presentation on the introduction to GMRS, to just cover the basics. We held the presentation a couple of weeks ago and I wanted to share the video with everyone. Fair warning, I'm not a pro YouTuber and my collar mic dropped with a few minutes left... please be gentle. LoL This is geared towards people with little to no experience. Hopefully it helps some people. The PowerPoint presentation is available for download, here... https://marcspaz.com/gmrs/GMRS101.ppsx Thank you to those who helped with content ideas.

We have seen that the Google, Bing, Ask and other search engine spybots are camped out here reading new posts. Just a word to the wise... use your discretion in posting personal or sensative information that could possibly compromise your personal safety, security, lead to identity theft, or give non-licensed individuals a way to access your radio systems.

I got my GMRS license a few weeks ago and received my handheld radios a few days ago & started setting them up (still learning & trying to set them up lol). Well, I reached a local repeater and made my first contact. It was exciting to me so I just thought I’d share that. Thanks everyone for helping me with my newbie questions.

Although GMRS is in the name of the site, the site also caters to ham radio interests. Radio is radio. If you’re so up-tight that the inclusion of helpful information about a radio triggers you, then you probably aren’t getting much enjoyment out of anything. Learn to ignore posts about non-GMRS radios.

Sad-H.A.M.s are a myth and do not exi....... I stand corrected...

Oh.. shit. As it turns out, a AM as stupid as everyone says. It is also entire possible that I have had too much NyQuil .. Carry on.

Poppycock! I for one think that more threads with links to those videos are what society and the world needs! Think of the children!

I have a $18 WiFi electric switch connected to my repeater so I can shut it down from my phone from anywhere (with internet connection).

I have a theory that they wait until I purchase a certain radio and then wait a short time to release the new and improved "plus" model. It has happened too many times to be coincidence.

I call BULLSHIT - just another Sad-HAM disguised as a GMRS user. YOUR radio YOUR choice - if the sad-HAM control freaks dont like it, they can change the channel.. HOWEVER - as you mentioned, if the repeater owner requests that you not use a roger-beep on his repeater, then following the wishes of the equipment owner who's equipment you are using would be the polite thing to do, IMO..

I recently picked up a Baofeng AR-5RM. The kit included the radio with battery, a standard "701 clone" antenna tuned to FM (broadcast radio) / 136-174MHz / 400-520MHz, an Abbree AR-771 VHF/UHF antenna, a desktop charger, wrist strap, belt clip, and a manual which turned out to be better written than the manual for my old UV-5R radios. For those who are unfamiliar with this radio, it is pretty much identical to the UV-5G Plus, the UV-5RM Plus, and possibly other Baofeng radios. It's marketed as pushing up to 10w transmit power. The radio is quite a bit larger than the older UV-5G (UV-5R sibling). The screen is much nicer, though I've seen complaints that it's hard to read in bright sunlight. I suspect that's true, though it's still legible to me. The menus seem better laid out, but maybe that's because the display has more characters, so it's easier to understand what the menu is saying. Compared to the UV-5R's 128 memory locations, this radio has 999. Just about the first thing I did was use my old Baofeng UV-5R USB cable to program it with Chirp. This process went smoothly, and the data upload/download is about twice the speed of data transfers with the older UV-5G. Chirp is going to be Chirp -- if you know how to use it with one radio, it works just about the same for any compatible radio, with the addition or subtraction of a few field columns depending on the radio you're programming. I noticed that this radio allows up to 12 characters in the channel name field. And it offers three power levels, low, medium, and high. Through some testing I determined that these equate to about 2.5w, 5w, and 10w. Spurious emissions.... When transmitting with my older UV-5G and looking at the spectrum waterfall on my RTL-SDRv4 I would see a sharp peak at the frequency center, with two short peaks a few kilohertz away in either direction. This isn't terribly surprising, as my SDR's antenna is only six feet away when I test. But when I transmit with the AR-5RM and observe the waterfall, I don't see those secondary peaks on either side of the frequency center. I also used some software to do a wider scan with the SDR to see if there were other significant emissions across a broader portion of the UHF spectrum, and really didn't see much, in my unscientific test. Next I hooked up the Surecom SW-102 along with a dummy load, and tested power output at 2m, MURS, Marine VHF, 1.25m, 70cm, and GMRS frequencies. At low power, the output was usually in the 2.3-2.7w range, with a bit of a dip, closer to 1.9w in the 1.25m band. At medium power, there was another dip down to just over four watts at 1.25m, but in other VHF and UHF portions of the RF spectrum power was very close on either side of 5w -- sometimes a little over, other times a little under, but just barely. At full power it came in around 8.2w in the 1.25m band, but everywhere else was between 9.4w and 10.2w. It's worth noting that as a GMRS radio (for which it isn't type approved), it would be inappropriate to set it up to transmit on GMRS channels 8-14, since they're supposed to be 0.5w channels, and this radio really doesn't go below about 2.5w. For MURS (for which it is also not type approved) you're also pushing it a little, since MURS is supposed to be <2w. But 2.5w is only 25% too powerful, versus 5x more power than it should be putting out, which is the situation for GMRS 8-14. The antennas: I did sweeps with a NanoVNA within each of the ranges mentioned above; 2m, MURS, Marine VHF, 1.25m, 70cm, and GMRS. The included antennas perform fairly well. The shorter one had an SWR of <2.5:1 throughout all the ranges except 1.25m, where it was something like 3.5:1 -- not appropriate for use in that band. The longer antenna scored consistently better in all of the ranges I tested. Still not really appropriate for 1.25m. With both antennas, they tended to see a bit too much rise near the top of the Marine VHF spectrum. If this spectrum is important you would probably want an antenna better tuned to that set of frequencies. But they both did pretty good at 2m, MURS, 70cm, and GMRS. I compared a Nagoya NA-771G, and it did even better at GMRS frequencies, at the expense of slightly higher SWR in the lower parts of the 70cm band. The 771G did okay in the upper portions of the 2m band, and MURS as well, though it's not designed to be a dual band antenna. Testing with the long antenna (the Abbree 771) at 5w (medium power) I hit the Ogden repeater (43 miles away) and the Promontory repeater (64 miles away). It helps that I have line of sight to those repeaters. Over Simplex I tested at about 3 miles and 5 miles from my home at each power level using both the shorter and longer antenna. The 5-mile test was more interesting, so I'll rank the results of that test from best configuration to worst. First, though; I did manage to get through to my home, with where I had a VOX recorder set up, using each of the configurations. I'm going to mix my RA-87 (40w radio) with MXTA-26 for comparison: Best to Worst: Retevis at 40w: Full quieting, no static at all. Crisp sound. Retevis at 25w (M): Nearly full quieting, no static. Crisp sound. The noise floor was just very slightly higher. AR-5RM at High with long antenna: Obviously it's going to sound a little noisier at 10w with a 771 clone antenna than the Retevis, but still very good. Retevis at 5w (L): slightly higher noise floor than AR-5RM at 10w. AR-5RM at Medium power, long antenna: noise floor was just a little higher than before. AR-5RM at High power, short antenna: I had to listen several times to hear the difference between high/short and medium/long. But medium/long won by a hair. AR-5RM at Medium power, short antenna: Still pretty good, but high/short was a little less hiss. AR-5RM at low power, long antenna: Noise floor was quite a bit higher, and some static coming through. AR-5RM at low power, short antenna: Considerable hiss and static, but my voice was still very clear, easy to make out. I should have tested against my older UV-5G but I ran out of time. At higher powers, the difference between the long and short antenna wasn't as important. At lower powers, the antenna length mattered a lot more. Overall, though, antenna length seemed to make more difference than power level. Configuration: I don't see much point in draining the battery and singing my eyeballs by transmitting at 10w all the time. The sound quality at 5w from 5-miles away was pretty good, particularly with the longer antenna. And I was able to hit those distant repeaters at 5w. Therefore, as I configured the radio with Chirp, I set channels 1-7, 15-22, and repeater inputs to medium - 5w. I set MURS to Low, 2+w. Marine VHF/16 and the 68,71, etc working channels are set to Low (2+w). I haven't tested it with an antenna -- only with dummy load -- at 2m, 1.25m, and 70cm, and currently have it configured to not be able to transmit on any frequencies. And I've set GMRS channels 8-14 to not transmit, since its minimum power level is way too high compared to the requirement of staying below 0.5w on those channels. To configure it to not be able to transmit on a frequency that you have programmed into its memory slots, you set the "offset" to "off." At that point, when you hit PTT, nothing happens. In Chirp there are four possible offset modes: (blank) which is no offset/simplex; off which is no transmitting possible, + (positive) offset, and - (negative) offset. Air band: I've listened to air band with this radio. When you set it into the airband (108.0000 - 135.99875MHz) it automatically switches to AM, and will not transmit (tested with a dummy load). It does pick up ATC just fine. Battery life: I've never run it all the way down, so I don't know. But I do like that you can charge it either from the desktop base, OR with a USB-C plug. In the spirit of avoiding surprises: This radio, at least in the package I bought, doesn't come with a USB data cable. But it works with the same data cable used with the UV-5R or UV-5G. And within Chirp you chose the Baofeng 5RM profile (my UV-5G uses the Radiodity UV-5R profile). The green button (search): Hold the green button for a few seconds. The phone will say "Search." Now hold the PTT on another radio. In a few seconds this radio will show the frequency, and a second or so later, will show the DCS or CTCSS tone. Then it will let you save it into a memory bank. I can't remember for the life of me how to delete it (other than with Chirp) but that's in the manual, for sure. The point is that you can pair it up to another radio that is already set to a frequency and tone quickly and easily. I tend to be the one setting up my radios and handing them out to family members when we go skiing or hiking, so it's probably not a feature I'll need much. But if you find yourself bringing a radio to an event where you know others will be using GMRS or FRS to keep in touch, you can get paired up to their radios easily. I'm well aware this isn't a $50, $80, $100, or $150 two-way radio; it's a $35 (with extra antenna) multi-band two way radio; it should, by all rights, be a much worse radio. But its power levels are quite close to what's advertised, within about 5-6% of advertised across most of the bands I tested. 1.25cm is kind of the exception, being more like 10% off. But still, this radio is better than it should be. It feels pretty solid. Its sound quality is quite good. Listening to my recordings, it sounds like it transmits clearly. Scanning is pretty slow -- scanning is always slow on 2-way radios I've used. Squelch isn't perfect -- scanning 2m repeaters I keep getting hung up on one that must have another more distant one on the same frequency, too far to hear, but powerful enough to break squelch even when I have it set high. When people review equipment there's often some level of confirmation bias. I'm probably looking for reasons to like the radio, and to defend my purchasing decision. If I were looking for negatives, things not to like, I would come up with a few: It's quite a lot bigger than the UV-5G / UV-5R. It doesnt' fit into a pocket as easily. The included ABBREE 771 knockoff antenna feels cheaper than my Nagoya 771G, and the 701 knockoff is even cheaper than that. The scan button requires a long press, and an accidental short press puts you into a DTMF transmit mode that you can't seem to get out of except by hitting the "monitor" button once, which is an undocumented path. The antenna jack is SMA-M, whereas the UV-5G was SMA-F, so I had to order different adapters to be able to use an external antenna. The dust cover over the mic/speaker/data ports feels like it could wear out if you're opening and closing it a lot. Unlike the UV-5R/G you can't alter the levels associated with the squelch settings. That was a common customization people made with the UV-5R series. The USB-C charging light on the back of the battery shows a dim green when fully charged -- too dim to see in outdoor daylight. You can't set the power level low enough to meet power requirements for GMRS 8-14, but I don't really care about using those channels anyway; my mobile radios can't use 8-14 either. In the overall picture, those are minor things, for a $30-35 radio.

I have had/used every brand of GMRS radio in my Jeep(s) and almost every model of every brand, and for Part 95 "GMRS" radios, I prefer the Wouxun KG1000G. It is a better quality radio than BTech and most (maybe all) the other brands, it outputs a full 50W, and has a remote-mount removable faceplate. Several of my off-road friends use this radio and they are all happy with it. And FYI - even though its spelled Wooks-On, it's pronounced "Ocean" .

This is a very bad choice for many people because the programming software/CPS has a very steep learning curve, is often difficult if not impossible to find, often (depending on the radio/software) does not run well on newer computers, things like batteries, cables, etc, are also often difficult to find or expensive, and it will almost certainly cost a lot more. And most important: Those commercial radios are not Part 95 approved so it is illegal to use them and they will go to jail!!!!!1 I know this because I've seen this posted on this forum 100 times or more. Sometimes "cheap junk Chinese radios" are plenty good enough for normal people, despite the poor QC, but "some people" just cannot seem to grasp this simple fact and will live the rest of their lives proselytizing against inexpensive radios completely oblivious to other people's needs/desires.

Man... I don't know why everyone raves about Ghost antennas. This one has no range. Once I'm a few yards away from the other radio, I can't hear them and they can't hear me. Weird part is, the cable is fine and the SWR is spot-on, 1:1. Picture for attention. [/TROLL]

I've had 3 different repeaters over the last two years: DIY 2 KG-1000Gs Retevis RT97 Vertex VXR-7000 All using the same ~$120 Tram 1486 base antenna and 75 feet of LMR400 coax The two KG-1000Gs was the most expensive (~$875) and had the most power - but it was also the most unwieldy and issue-prone The RT97 was a much more compact package, and was the least expensive (~$400), but only output about 4-5watts after the duplexer and has a limited duty-cycle The Vertex VXR-7000 (what I currently use) is by far the best solution. I paid $500 for mine (used), it puts out ~25 watts after the duplexer and it can be used 24/7 (100% duty cycle) - But because of its age its a bit of a pain to program/get set up. My recommendation, based on my experience, would be to try and get a good used commercial repeater (like the VXR-7000) OR an RT97. Next month another company will be releasing a new GMRS repeater very similar to the RT97 but easier to configure - but i'm not allowed to talk about that yet.. So you might want to wait and see if that one works better for your needs.

Its a nifty little radio, but unless everyone else in your party also has one, most of that nifty'ness doesnt matter. As for basic use and fars, it's pretty much the same as any other radio.

I agree.. I have put one up, and am [partially] responsible for getting a 2nd one up, covering most of Southern California.

Maybe I am the only one, but I am confused about the purpose of this ongoing rant. Complaints on an online forum are not going to change anything. If you want change, file a Petition for Rulemaking with the FCC. Then get people to support your petition. But, to the points you raise. First, about GMRS radios themselves: Some of your facts are wrong or off target, there is no need for a -5 MHz (not KHz) offset on a GMRS radio. There are only 8 repeater input frequencies defined and those are all 5MHz higher than the 8 defined repeater input frequencies. And, the number of internal memory locations (aka "channels) that a given user needs is very difficult to determine. Probably more than 22, but 180? Zello? Zello works just fine without a GMRS radio at all. But, Zello is an Internet (IP) based app, which means anything that connects to Zello needs an Internet connection. But, you also suggest GMRS should work when away from any cellular infrastructure. So, how is your Zello equipped GMRS radio supposed to connect to Zello when you are in the middle of nowhere? And you complaint about morse code, I really don't know what that is about? We live in a free market economic system. Manufacturers are free to offer products they feel will meet customer and investor needs. You have a choice. And, if you don't like the certified GMRS products you can choose from, there are plenty of other options, from super-cheap CCRs to super-high end Part-90 commercial equipment. Technical questions aside, your major complaint seems to be about licensing fees. Here again I think you are off base. Many services, especially commercial, marine, aviation, LMR, broadcast, common carrier, cellular, etc. have licensing fees and they are often quite expensive. At $7 a year, GMRS is cheap by comparison. Yes, it is more than Amateur. But, Amateur radio is also considered a public service, with a long history and International agreements. And, what difference does it make who you pay a licensing fee to the FCC, the ARRL, a local radio club or whatever? But, even here you are not current. There is now a proposal in the FCC to lower GMRS licensing fees to $50 and add a fee for Amateur radio. The reason? It appears federal law requires fees be set to recover costs. The GMRS fee was bringing in too much money, ham radio was bringing in nothing. You also object to being taxed on your GMRS radio, but have no issue with the FCC requiring a cell phone company to offer a GMRS repeater service on every tower for free. When you consider the equipment and installation costs, plus administration and maintenance costs, are you willing to pay for that every month when Verizon and AT&T raise your bill to cover their costs? There is no free lunch. Ok, you obviously feel strongly about something, otherwise you wouldn't have started this topic and posted 7 follow-up comments. But, it is really hard to understand just what it is you are complaining about and what you think should be done about it. Can you succinctly state the top 5 high level problems you see with GMRS today, the reasons you think those are problems, and 5 proposed solutions.

Hey folks... I have been seeing a lot of antenna related posts lately. Some info I have read lead me to create this post. I want to try to help people understand design types and how antenna SWR and Gain are impacted. I am not going to get too technical, because I don't want new people to feel lost or leave with more questions than answers. As an FYI, while the concepts apply to all antenna types, I will be focusing on vertical antennas, such as what we use on our vehicles. First, lets discuss basic antenna standards and why antenna length matters. The best way to describe how basic antenna length is relevant, is by comparing an antenna to a speaker. Pretty much everyone understands that a speaker vibrates to make noise. We also understand that small speakers do a better job at making very high frequency sounds (tweeters) and really big speakers are better for making very low frequency sounds (like a sub-woofer). Antennas are the same way. The lower in frequency, the bigger (or longer) the antenna. The reason for this is because, like a speaker, antennas resonate (or vibrate) the best at one very specific frequency. As you go higher or lower in frequency, you are moving away from the antennas resonant frequency This becomes important for several reasons. One is because the closer the antenna's resonate frequency is to the frequency you want to transmit on or receive on, the more range and fidelity you get. Another reason is because the energy that gets sent to the antenna must go somewhere. If the antenna is not at the correct length to vibrate at the desired frequency, that energy gets wasted by being "reflected" back into transmitters, as well as desensitizing receivers. Any energy that gets reflected back into the radio is typically identified by the Standing Wave Ratio (SWR) or the ratio of transmitted (forward) energy vs. reflected (reverse) energy. Here is why we watch SWR. If your transmitter is putting out 50 watts, and your meter says you have an SWR of 1.7:1, that means only 45 watts of energy leaves the antenna and 5 watts goes back into the transmitter. A high SWR not only causes power loss, but it also generates heat as well as applying reverse electrical energy to the parts. If enough of a percentage gets reflected back into the transmitter, it breaks. It is very well documented that with the current technology we have, the threshold is an SWR of about 3.0:1. So, now that we understand, on a very basic level, why antennas need to be a specific length to work the best, and also have a basic understanding of what SWR is, lets discuss antenna design. So, what's the standard? An isotropic antenna. This is a theoretical antenna that radiates equally in all directions with the same intensity. Basically, a perfect sphere. The antenna is said to have a power gain of 1 in the spherical space all around it and has an efficiency of 100%. The concept of an isotropic antenna is often used as a reference antenna for the antenna gain. What is antenna gain? Glad you asked! There is a lot of science behind that... so I am not going to bore you with science. Instead, lets talk about food! Everyone loves food and its pretty easy to understand. So, the concept of gain is this... you only have 100% of your energy available. There is no such thing as an antenna magically giving you more power. You know the perfect sphere radiation pattern mentioned earlier... well in the real world, the closet we have ever come to creating that, actually looks more like a doughnut. Imagine a perfect doughnut. Sounds yummy right? Well, you only have 100% of the doughnut. What do you do if you want the doughnut to be wider, say... to fill a box better from side to side? I mean, its a whole doughnut. Easy... you squish it from the top and bottom. Then the doughnut gets shorter from top to bottom, but the food has to go somewhere. So, it spreads out wider or "gains" width in sacrifice of height. Well the more you squeeze from the top and bottom, the wider it gets, but loses height until the doughnut is perfectly flat and the 100% of the doughnut as been spread as far as possible. The squished doughnut thing makes sense, right? Antennas that have "gain" do the same thing. They squish the radio energy doughnut, forcing it to be wider to cover more distance, but at the sacrifice of signal height. This means that while you can transmit and receive further side to side, you lose elevation. Lets imagine you are at the bottom of a hill and your buddy is at the top. If you don't squish the doughnut, he can hear you because the doughnut is at its full height. But if you squish the doughnut, people further away at your level will now hear you, but your buddy who is very close at the top of the hill will not. So, gain has a trade-off. If you live in a hilly or mountainous area, you may want to avoid high gain antennas, so as your elevation changes, you are less likely to lose touch with someone. Compare that to being on the water, in flat(ish) desert or talking aircraft to aircraft, you may want a very high gain antenna, because there will be no significant elevation differences. Now, from here, we could talk about the benefits of stacked phase element antennas, takeoff angles and a bunch of other stuff. However, unless you have a more advanced understanding of antenna propagation and design, and plan on getting into some high-tech stuff, it will likely cause more confusion. Not to mention, for what we are doing... those items are almost not relevant when it comes to helping you pick the correct antenna for your application. So, let talk about how gain and SWR can really be confusing and how numbers can trick you into making a mistake. Remember when we discussed antennas needing to be a specific length to resonate at the desired frequency? Well, many high gain designs cause the antenna to properly resonate at only small segments of the frequency spectrum. Basically, what these means is (as an example) instead of being resonant and having good SWR across 100 megahertz, the antenna design may cause the antenna to only be resonant and have proper SWR at 10 small groups of frequencies inside that same 100 megahertz range. Watch the two videos linked below for a better understanding. In the first video, I have a Diamond NR7900A mobile antenna. It has 3.7db gain on VHF in the 140MHz-160MHz range, and 6.4db gain on UHF in the range of about 440MHz-500MHz. You will see that while measuring the SWR (or the antenna and cable resonance) you will see that in the VHF segment, the SWR varies somewhat quickly, but only has a single swing, from high to low and back to high inside of about 20MHz. When I switch to UHF and test the higher gain portion of the antenna, you will see the the SWR bounce up and down a few times as I sweep about 30MHz. This shows that the higher the gain, the more the antenna design may actually make it so the antenna is not usable on your desired frequency. Of course this all varies by brand and model, but the principle is still universally true. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rh6w46VM_Ng Now, in this second video, we are looking at a UHF 1/4 wave antenna. This antenna is considered to have a gain factor of 1, and any number times 1 equals itself... so effectively, no gain. You can see that we sweep over 50MHz and while the SWR wavers a little, the SWR is stable compared to the high gain antenna and 100% safely usable through the whole spectrum, never going over 1.4:1 from 440MHz to 470MHz. Again, reinforcing the idea that the closer the antenna is to the desired resonant frequency and the less you squish the doughnut, the broader the usable frequency range will be, the broader the geographical coverage will be, the less risk of losing power due to poor SWR, and less risk of damaging your transmitter. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5GiPLzVzbg So, to wrap this up, I want to discuss antenna tuning. Some antennas may need to be cut to the proper length to resonate on the desired frequencies. This is typically done with antennas that either have no loading coils (1/4, 5/8, 1/2, 7/8 wave length antennas for example) as well as some bottom loaded antennas. A bottom loaded antenna is an antenna that has a whip that is not the correct physical length to be resonant on a desired frequency, but the coil of wire on the bottom makes the antenna electrically the correct length. General speaking, for VHF and UHF, I recommend staying away from antennas with coils in them if they have been physically shortened for looks/clearance reasons. These antenna work, but are not very good performers. That said, there are some antennas that are "pre-tuned" at the factory to perform correctly in the indicated frequency range. These are typically gain antennas that have a collection of coils and capacitors on the antenna to help create the phasing and properly stack the elements. These are referred to as LC networked antennas. If you have an antenna that has stacked phasing and/or LC networks and you can't get a good SWR... unless the manufacturer provides directions on how to properly do so, do NOT trim the antenna to try to achieve the proper resonance, as you will only damage the antenna. The coils, capacitors and whip elements are precisely cut to work together. If you do not get a good SWR, either you need to pick a new location to install the antenna, the antenna is not properly grounded or the antenna is damage and should be replaced. If you do trim a stacked phasing and/or LC network antenna, in most occasions, the antenna never gets to the proper length regardless of how much you cut the whip and you end up tossing the antenna in the trash. If you get it tuned to a target frequency, it's usable bandwidth will be so small that the antenna will not have any real value. I have seen some people try to tune high-gain antennas, get them tuned to about 1.7:1 or even 1.9:1 and as soon as they tune 10KHz in one direction or another the SWR skyrockets. I hope this helps with some of the antenna questions.

If you are asking, its already too late.

Why would you care what they say? Just tell them that its an iCom and they'll say it sounds great.

I have a GMRS license and I decided I wanted my amateur radio license as well. So I studied for the Technician test for the last few weeks off and on, and I took the test this morning. (Side note: I live in California, but currently visiting Wyoming, so I took my test in Wyoming. The VE's were happy to have me.) I passed the Technician test 100%. Then the VE's asked if I wanted to try the General test, which I was completely unprepared for. Turns out I am pretty good at guessing, I almost passed (I scored 25 out of the required 27 to pass). My favorite part was when the VE was grading my general exam, he was shocked that I actually got as many correct as I did. "Unbelievable" was his exact word. Just thought I would share. I guess my point is that for the folks that complain about the testing, it really isn't that hard.

Based on all your multiple previous comments about how EVERY person you know dumps EVERY radio (Midland, Retevis, TidRadio, Wouxun) unless that radio happens to be the same brand of radios that you use, it is becoming clear that you don't actually know anyone. ... Or, you are just F.O.S. But either way, your mythomaniac comments are great for pointing at and laughing so keep up the good work!

Who sits around and thinks up this kind of stupidity? No! Not just no, but hell no! This is another hairbrained attempt to make GMRS into "ham radio lite". I am an Extra class ham, and I am 100% against this. GMRS (Class A CB) was originally another means of personal (and at one time, business) communication. It should remain that way. It should remain 100% analog. GMRS allows for reliable communication with a short wavelength (think being able to use an ht in a car without an outside or excessively long antenna). It is great for families, friends, and even properly licensed hams, to keep in touch, especially with family and friends who just do not want to be bothered with testing, radio theory, etc. If someone wants to enjoy the hobby aspects of ham, play with digital, etc; then let them get off of their dead behind and study and take the tests or shut up! Those who are already hams and who want to turn GMRS into ham lite or other extension of ham radio, please use the privileges you have on ham or upgrade if that is not enough. People are continuously trying to wreck a great thing that GMRS is with these bright ideas.

Sorry, I don't agree. He simply made a joke about the thread title. His joke was funny, and not offensive. Your response however, was, in calling someone a DICK. I clicked on the thread expecting it to be about someone other people on the forum might know, perhaps asking if anyone had heard from Terry, or maybe if anyone thought a product or service someone named Terry offered was worthwhile, or maybe letting people know Terry had passed away. Nope, just a post asking a question about a radio. Good question, bad thread title, which I am sure was not intentional on your part. Thread titles are used so people know what the thread is about. Calling someone a DICK for making a joke about a thread title that doesn't come close to describing what the thread was about is an emotional knee-jerk reaction. Maybe take a second to breathe and rethink. ONce again, I believe your mis-named thread was not intentional, but it did nothing to tell anyone what your thread was about, hence the joke.

99.99% of hams i have met in person were very pleasant and are not sad-hams. It's when you go online that the sad-hams thrive, and thats where the young people go to learn, and often the first thing they run into is a sad-ham. That is what happened to me - I went online and had the audacity to ask questions about the test or electrical theory or something that I didnt understand, and it was quickly made clear to me that people asking such questions were not welcome in this exclusive club. Not just once, but multiple times, in multiple places. I see it here every day, and have even seen it a few times already in this thread. HUNDREDS of my viewers have also commented on my videos that the exact same thing happened to them, so the impact of sad-hams cannot be denied.. I am actually thankful because when the sad-hams turned me off from ham I found GMRS and realized that I dont want/need a "hobby", I just needed a better way to communicate on the trail - and GMRS does that perfectly for me. The sad part is that most sad-hams dont realize that they are the ones giving a bad name to their hobby, and also giving me more material to make fun of.

Did they explain how the radios hack into and connect to a WiFi with a password? PS - I am not only a Navy Pilot, but also an Army General, so you should listen to what I say.

How will passing the ham test make the GMRS Pro useful?

I heard a rumor that the YouTube GMRS Queen will be making a video about this radio very soon.

Bullshit. That’s a cheap shot that paints all of us with the same brush. Yes, there are those that simply memorize enough to pass the Technicians test, but they don’t hang around long. There are still many who work within clubs to help provide backup long distance communications. There are hams helping out during every tornado, flood, and hurricane.

I don't usually like to post videos, but this video was inspired by many comments that I have read here and in a few ham-radio forums.

Another "Expert"....and you guys think I make this stuff up.. I didnt even mention that he only has a ham callsign..

No.. Although many hams do slum on GMRS in many areas, the main use for GMRS is utilitarian communication - ie; when off-roading and in a group, hiking, traveling with multiple vehicles, etc. Sadly, it sounds like in your area many of the rag-chewers have taken over.. But once you get out of reach of their basements, like out adventuring in the desert or mountains, all their noise goes away. I run a repeater, partially run another repeater which is one of the largest/most used in Southern California, and run a group - not only am i not a ham, most in the group are not hams either.

I have one right here on my desk.. It's a nice upgrade the the UV9G.. The release has been delayed due to supply chain/shipping issues, but it should be available soon (my GUESS is 30-60 days, but this is only a guess).. Some new stuff on the UV9Gx: theme able color schemes much brighter LED flashlight stiffer knobs can receive down to 219Mhz more power control settings for better battery life a priority channel button, pre-set to the official highway channel, CH19 more pre-programmed frequenicies and most important a ROGER BEEP .................affiliate link below.. Oops.. sorry.. bad habit.

Hey folks, I am leaving for vacation in a couple of hours and don't have time for a proper test... but I wanted to let you all know that I got the radio back from Midland and I can't be happier. With a quick bench test using low pressure alligator clip test wires for the power supply, I am now getting 48w of output power on both the 462MHz and 467MHz frequencies! I'm sure with a proper power cable, it will be perfect. Once I get home and have a chance to do some proper testing for output power and 12dB SINAD receiver sensitivity test, I'll share the results.