nokones

Last Friday I ran Bloody Basin and Red Creek Wash with a group. I lost my CB antenna somewhere in Red Creek because of very low hanging tree branches that were over large rocks in the Creek. It broke off below the mast lug at the mount. If you see a black Firestik II with a spring and quick disconnect that's mine. I had my antenna assembly mounted using the Mopar Heavy Duty Spare Tire Support Bracket and the integral mounting hole was essentially too thick for full thread engagement between the Walcott Radio coax cable Stud and the mast Lug thus it just ripped the lug right off the stud. So, I had to resort back to an after-market antenna bracket for Jeeps. Thank God I had spare Firestik parts to repair it when I got home. The integral antenna mount on the Mopar mount that I'm no longer using is just to the left of the Firestik antenna in the picture. Sorry no pictures of the trail run.

In California, the State-owned radio remote sites did not give away free space and service to the HAM Radio clubs/users. If they wanted to use/occupy a State-Owned site for space and service, they paid the same as any other entity.

If I am traveling/towing to a racing event or to/from a Trail by myself, I scan GMRS channels 1-7 & 15-22 with the Travel Tone on encode only, CSQ on receive. When I am going to a run, in a group and on the trail, I will only be the group GMRS channel and tone, and on the CB, I will monitor channel 16 AM.

In some cases helps to prevent intermod interference from your own station

Good point!

You guys need to stay off the grindr app

95.335.(a) says Part 90 radios can be used on GMRS freqs. (a) Exceptions. Under certain exceptions, non-certified Personal Radio Service transmitters, or transmitters certified for use in the land mobile radio services may be operated. Any such exceptions applicable to stations in a Personal Radio Service are set forth in the subpart governing that specific service. See e.g., §§ 95.735 and 95.1735.

Why not? There is nothing wrong with narrowband. One of the GMRS clubs I belong to narrowband their repeaters and there are no problems with radio communication. Public Safety has been narrowbanding well over 10 years now without any problems.

And this is where I have my speakers mounted in my 23 Jeep Wrangler Rubi 2 Dr. The Motorola Speaker is my for Motorola XTL5000 UHF radio I use for GMRS and the Cobra Speaker is for my Cobra 25 LTD Classic AM-FM CB Radio.

Please note the Motorola and Midland part numbers, and the type of connectors for each speaker. There is nothing wrong with the Midland speaker. You might want to get the Midland Speaker so you don't have to change out the connector on the Motorola Speaker.

If you are using CTCSS or DCS on the decode side of the receiving radio it might have to do with the timing parameters of the reverse burst feature of the transmitting radio or if the transmitting radio has reverse burst. Given the fact that you're dealing with cheap Chinese POS radios, it may be questionable that those radios even have reverse burst.

I'm sure there are some GMRS radio clubs in your area. You should reach out to them and if necessary become a member and ask if there is someone that is willing to help you to checkout your system. You'll find that most GMRS clubs have members that are willing to help other members and enthusiasts.

Looks like you are using the Midland mag-mount. Those are usually pretty good providing that you recently bought the mount from Midland within the last year. The mag-mounts more than a year ago came with cheap/poor connectors and where a problem.

The VSWR check will tell you if your cable and connectors are not shorted out and that your antenna is performing insofar as tuned for the GMRS frequencies. It is a way to determine there is not a problem with your cable and connectors. Maybe there is a GMRS enthusiast/friend near you that is willing to check that for you. Where do you live?

Not all repeaters have a hangtime. Do you hear any hangtime kerchunks from other users? Are you sure that you are on a Repeater Channel that transmit 467.600 MHz?

The Phantom antennae are not bad antennae. If if is the Midland Phantom it will be tuned for the GMRS freqs however, you should have a ground plane under the antenna if you intend to get some farz out of that antenna. As for being in a group of Jeeps it should work fine but do check your VSWRs to make sure everything is up to snuff.

The Shaw Butte Repeater is back on the air with both the same local and link tone inputs, at least for now. It does appear that the Links have been deactivated because in the Link mode the Towers 600 repeater just stays idle unless that repeater is not on-line. I'm too far away for Pinal to check to see if the Link is activated. Hopefully, the repeater owner for the Towers 600 repeater will get that repeater back on-line so we have coverage on the off-road trails in that area.

I think my body and paint would be protected from Tire Donuts. Steve: I know of a cheap Jeep, a 96 TJ, with stuff on it, for sale around the corner from me for $9,000 OBO, just in case that you might want better body and paint protection.

Most States require both parties involved in traffic collisions to file a Financial Responsibility Statement, usually with the Motor Vehicle Division regardless if there was a Police Report taken or not. It protects the not-at-fault driver in case the situation goes sideways when the damage to a vehicle is more than the required limit. If the responsible party does not follow through with their financial responsibility, the State will step in and take action on the responsible party and if necessary suspend the responsible party's driver's license until that Financial Responsibility is met pursuant to their motor vehicle statutes. It essentially notifies the State who was involved, the insurance companies involved, etc. It usually is a one page form you complete and either take it to the Motor Vehicle Department or mail it in. Some states allow on-line filing.

Insurance companies will total a vehicle in a heartbeat so they can minimize their financial loss by taking possession of the vehicle and wholesale it off to recoup some of their loss. Don't give in to the other insurance company's tactics. Stand your ground and force them to repair it. The value difference between the cost of the repair and the value of the vehicle shouldn't be the decision factor, especially by the other driver's insurance company, rather if repairs are made or not as long that the vehicle's safe integrity is not compromised. That should be your decision. You are the party there-of that has the loss. The worse case scenario may be that the other insurance company low-balls you and you get a check and you pay the difference on the cost of the repair. If the other company does not agree to your wish to have it repaired, you could go ahead and have it repaired and take the other driver to court for those repairs since his company did not pay for the repair. Ultimately, the other driver is financially responsible and liable for those repairs not the insurance company. Also, you should file a Financial Responsibility Statement with the State. Depending on the State and if there is a road rage statute and how it is worded, and the totality of the facts, his actions could be considered an act of an Assault with a Deadly Weapon at a minimum.

The problem child was creating havoc on both Towers repeaters and Shaw Butte. It is believed that he may be causing problems on other repeaters in the area. So far my repeater hasn't been affected, yet. I hear the Station IDs being transmitted but no repeat traffic on Towers 600 and Shaw Butte. I believe the respective repeater owners have shutdown the receivers. I do hear simplex traffic and I have heard the problem child on 575 simplex stirring up the havoc with a few people. It appears that Saturday and Sunday mornings appear to be the best days for his doings. The Towers 575 owner has given permission to a few people and I hear them occasionally. I recently have been granted permission but the tone information he sent me was either a typo/transposed so I am unable to get into the repeater and I am waiting for clarification from him on the tone.

They know exactly who it is that's causing the problem. He even gives his call sign during those episodes. I have heard some traffic on Shaw Butte and I go I try to use the site with the previous tones but no luck. I finally got approval for Towers 575 but the tone I was told to use by the owner either does not exist or was a typo/transposed. So, bavk to square one.

Maybe Motorola should have thought of a better name for CTCSS/DCS instead of Private Line/ Digital Private Line so the term would not be misconstrued as being Private. I think General Electric (GE) had a better idea in using Channel Guard (CG) for naming their CTCSS/Private as a name that can't be misconstrued as being private. I don't recall what name RCA used for CTCSS/DCS.

Some repeater owners are now requiring a specific or individual PT-T ID either DTMF or MDC1200 for authorized repeater access.

Accordingly to my recently calibrated Bird 43 and my new 200-500 MHz 100W 100D slug because the old slug did not pass muster on the calibration, my Vertex Standard EVX-R70 40 watt rated repeater is putting out 42 watts into the EMR Corp Duplexer and spitting out a tad shy of 31 watts from the duplexer into a Laird FG4605 omni 5 dB antenna with the tip at approx 30 feet.