WRXB215

If you have any emergency who are you going to call? 
If the brown smelly stuff hits the fan, everybody else will also have the same emergency and everyone else will be trying to transmit at the same time and hopefully you know what happens when more than one person tries to key up when someone else is keying. There will be a gazillion people keying at the same and they won't care if you're transmitting or not and they will not be polite and ask for a break. It will be a total radio chaos and you won't be communicating with anyone.
Public Safety Agencies have the same problem when an extreme life & death emergency happens, but most public safety radio systems these days have a feature to prevent more than one transmitter being keyed at the same time and jamming up the frequency. Also, public safety agencies usually have training for those situations and strict radio discipline.  GMRS user don't have that training or any radio discipline for during emergencies.
It would be best for you to have other contingency plans during those emergencies, the 9-1-1 and GMRS systems will not be the solution during those times for you. The GMRS is not an emergency radio system, but it "may" be a system for communication to use when the emergency subsides.

HT antenna are usually not rated for more than 5w so most don't try. They are usually very compromised and are a barely passible design for the job.

The elbow connectors are generally really bad. They a lot of time are not constructed internally very well. The 90° design often induces other issues. Generally, speaking avoid them.

If the ground plane is an issue. How's about a jpole or slim jim. They are compact and integrate a counterpoise into the design, so no ground plane necessary.



Sent from my SM-S901U using Tapatalk

Yes, and that’s how most coax with N connectors is. 

You don’t need to see them. Line of sight means that UHF radio waves travel in a mostly straight line. Lower frequencies frequently bounce off layers of the atmosphere; UHF cannot be relied upon to do that. It pierces through the atmosphere and travels farther without attenuating. Hams use VHF and UHF to communicate to the space station or to bounce signals off the moon. Nor does UHF follow the curvature of the Earth. 
A half mile is seldom the outer limit, but under certain circumstances it might be. On the other hand many of us frequently enjoy ranges of several or even many miles.
Most people get GMRS radios for communications while they’re doing other things, like hiking, fishing, off roading, or recovering rockets out in the wide open spaces. 
 

I have found that to be true. My Baofeng radios saw an improvement with a Nagoya 771 antenna while my Icom, TYT/Explorer, and Wouxun radios do better with the stock antennas.

You have to be knighted by the Queen @OffRoaderX.

You have to be knighted by the Queen @OffRoaderX.

@WSFP385 just an added note, some radios actually perform better with the stock antenna. Sometimes the stock antenna is well designed and is tuned to that specific radio and is hard to beat. I don't know if your radio is one of those.

You have to be knighted by the Queen @OffRoaderX.

Yep, I'm moving in that direction myself. I've made trips across Texas with lots of repeaters programmed from RepeaterBook just to find that not only is there no traffic but I don't even receive back a tail squelch. There are repeaters available but I don't like have a bazillion programmed in that I have to wade through.
Edit:
As far as programming is concerned, I have an AnyTone AT-778UV and have yet to successfully program it through the front plate. CHIRP all the way for me.

As you can derive from @gortex2 post, narrowband isn't really a bad thing. You just have to use what the repeater is using.

@WSFP385 just an added note, some radios actually perform better with the stock antenna. Sometimes the stock antenna is well designed and is tuned to that specific radio and is hard to beat. I don't know if your radio is one of those.

All my users on those repeaters use older Midland gear. Works very well for their useage. Even my APX stuff has both narrow and wideband to accomidate when needed. One of the repeaters has been like that for almost 15 years. 

@WSFP385 just an added note, some radios actually perform better with the stock antenna. Sometimes the stock antenna is well designed and is tuned to that specific radio and is hard to beat. I don't know if your radio is one of those.

I just change as needed on my midlands. I find its a waste of time to preprogram stuff that may or may not even be there. KISS method for me. 
 

I honestly can't tell is you are serious.  LOL
  
 
Yeah, I giggle to myself when I hear this.  Unless I am with other radio dork friends.  Then we get a good laugh together.  Especially when I hear a guy and his wife doing tests while she is home and he is driving around, and no matter how bad he would sound into the repeater, she would keep saying "the gauge is full, but I can barely hear you.  I think the radio is broken."
  
 
Yeah, that is typically the way I help people.  I'll tell the stuff like Loud and Clear, A little 'pan fry' static, about 50/50 SNR, but still 100% understandable, I'm missing words, negative copy.  I figure that type of stuff is the most helpful.  And of course, that only helps if I hear the repeater Q5 myself.  If not, sometimes I just say, I'm too far from the repeater to tell for sure, but it sounds ok."
 

Hi Mac,
It usually helps to post a more detailed question rather than relying on what can be a cryptic title.  
There have been a few radios where the power outputs of programmed channels appear to be recalibrated after programming.  I don’t recall if the AR-152 is one of those.  Some posts have even mentioned that the result seemed like the power output was inverted after programming, so high power in the menu put out less power than low power.  I’ve never experienced that with Chirp but that’s not to say that others haven’t.
If that’s not what your title alludes to, please give us more detail. You’ll find that most of us here enjoy trying to help answer questions. Disregard those who react negatively.

You have to be knighted by the Queen @OffRoaderX.

If it is that big of a hassle and it is useless, I would just pull the plug and walk away. Spend your resources on something else.

Here is a novel idea @Socalgmrs, if you don't have anything positive to add to a conversion, maybe you should just NOT reply. No one likes a Negative Nancy
@RayDiddio hopefully you won't have to wait too much longer. 

I TRIED to warn you!
 
*Their.. .and.. Do you seriously think anyone came here to find out what you would do?  

Nooelec makes the HackRFOne, which starts around $320 and transmits at up to 15dBm (31.62mW, .032 watts, which is less than 1/10th the power of an FRS radio on channels 8-14. Any meaningful transmission would require an amplifier which will carry its own separate cost, and would mostly only be permissible on amateur radio frequencies (with appropriate amateur license).

Disable the Rx tone is troubleshooting step #1. It's not necessary for using the repeater (but for filtering out, ideally, non-repeater traffic on your radio's end). But if it's set wrong for some reason, it'll also filter out your repeater.

Apparently Nautel uses this tool as well and provided this legend:
 
 
from video: 
 
 

What are your criteria?  What does “better deal” mean to you?  Cheapest? Works on most different services (ham, MURS, and GMRS?), easiest to use on GMRS?