Jones

A "Community repeater", where one person or company owns it, and a community of subscribers rent access to it, is in fact, Part 90. Private, one-user repeaters for business are also covered under Part 90. If it hasn't been changed, the law used to specify that on a community repeater, each business or set of users had to have their own license. Such a repeater would first have to be frequency coordinated, which means after you secure a site, you need to contact a frequency coordination company, The FCC does not do this. There is a fee that varies depending on which company you use for coordination, and I'm not sure about the current cost, but it used to be around $600, just to get assigned a frequency pair. After that, there is a cost for licensing from the FCC, and I also cannot help you there, sorry. I've been away from commercial two-way for several years. Hopefully someone else on this site will know more about the current fees and costs.

For ham personal use, it wouldn't be necessary, but if you intend to let other hams in town use your cross-band, then yes, as a courtesy, I would ask permission of the repeater owner. Also make sure to set up proper security in the form of CTCSS or DCS to access your link, as to avoid causing interference to the repeater. For GMRS, cross band is of course, illegal.

He has tagged the article as BTECH V1. I think he means see above tag. ...right at the top of the page, under the title.

It sounds like you are wanting us to reassure you by telling you that those 701c are the big bomb diggetty, and that you'll talk for 30 miles further on one of them, but that's just not the case. You are not going to see much difference, if any at all on UHF, by spending money on one of those over-rated, over-priced Japanese named Taiwanese antennas. If you were operating VHF, as in 2-meter ham or MURS, one of those would get you better range, but on UHF they make no difference. Yes, I have a 701, (not c version) on a Wouxun KG-UVD1p, and it does much better than a stock antenna on 2 Meters, but it makes no difference on 70cm (430-450MHz) than the stock antenna, and it gets worse performance on GMRS (462-467MHz). The c version at least is tuned for MURS and GMRS, but still wont give any true gain over the stock antenna on GMRS. With that said, I don't know what other information you are looking to gain. We're not being snarky, we're being truthful. If you are expecting triple or double the distance with one of these antennas, you will be disappointed. You will be lucky to gain an additional 25 feet of range over the stock antenna.

The straight answer is: No, a longer antenna will NOT help. An antenna HIGHER UP IN THE AIR will help tremendously. Those guys walking around with a 19-24 inch long rubber antenna flopping around from the top of their walkie-talkies are on VHF ham bands, not GMRS. ...or else they are idiots. BTECH will gladly recommend that you buy anything that they sell, if it makes you happy.

If you can afford it, use the LDF4-50A. Perhaps even LDF5-50A if your run is longer than 100 feet. At 460MHz at 100 feet, RG-8x has a loss of 9.4 dB. LMR 400 has a loss of 2.7 dB. LDF4 has a loss of 1.4 dB. LDF5 has a loss of 0.82 dB. If you are using LDF Heliax, it is just fine to use a short jumper at the end for flexibility going into your radio. Also, keep in mind your cost vs. return on investment ratio. How far do you really need to talk? Personally, I use LDF4-50A, but I'm only running about 80 feet.

If you are planning on eventually running 100 feet, you WILL need better coax cable. RG-8x is NOT RG-8u. 8x is the small coax used for CB radio. Even the best grade of 8x has over 9 dB of loss at 462MHz at 100 feet. For the low-cost/best performance per dollar ratio, go with LMR-400. NOTE: I do not EVER recommend LMR-400 for repeater use, but for simple base station operation, it works great.

I think you may be confusing a drip loop for a common-mode choke. If you have a proper antenna, with a true unbalanced feed point, you do not need a choke at the antenna. Those are only required if you have one of those cheap ham-type J-poles, or other balanced feed antenna. If you do need a choke on your antenna, do NOT make it by coiling 1/2" line. Leave the 1/2" straight up to the base of the antenna, and use a 3-foot jumper of RG-8x, RG-58u, or similar small coax to make your coil, which should be 4 or 5 turns about 6 inches in diameter. You can also make a common mode choke by taking a foot-long jumper of RG-213 or LMR-400 and put ferrite clamp-on chokes all the way from one end to the other. Again, on most decent commercial antennas, this is not needed. A drip-loop is simply a low-point in the coax right before it comes into your building, so that rain running down the coax will drip off onto the ground, rather than get funneled into your house. This is not even needed in all installations, as sometimes the coax is not running down a tower, but rather across a roof, under a soffit, or into a conduit. Short jumpers at each end aren't going to hurt you much. As Lscott posted, use type "N" connectors where-ever possible for lowest loss.

If you can't hear the repeater on the regular 675 channel, then you must be running tone squelch, or "Private Code" on that channel that is not the same tone as the repeater. ...otherwise you would hear it. 675 is 462.675 on receive whether you are on repeat mode or not. That is exactly what tone squelch is for... so you DON'T hear anything but other radios with your selected tone.

I don't have a GMRSV1, but if it is like other Btech rigs with CHIRP, then you would select 'TONE' for transmit tone only, and if you want tone on receive as well, then you would select 'TONESQ' which will allow you to set both tones separately. If you want to receive everything, there is never a need to set a receive tone on your radio.

With the proper computer software, the limits on the UV899 can be set so that it is usable from 136 to 174MHz VHF, and from 400 to 520MHz UHF. Where to find the correct software is another question, which I cannot answer at this time.

Yes, these channels only work if they actually travel through a repeater. No repeater on that channel in your area means no comms on repeater channels. Keep in mind however, that channels like 15 and REPT15 are the same receive frequency, only the transmit changes on the REPT channels, because repeaters do not hear and re-transmit on the same frequency. You are still hearing channel 15, but in REPT mode, your actually transmit 5MHz higher in frequency, which the repeater hears, and sends back on channel 15 for all to hear. If someone is talking through a repeater that you hear on 15, you will hear the same thing on 15 or REPT15.

At this point, you need to bring in a third radio to do some A-B-X testing. See if you can borrow a known-good FRS handheld from a friend or neighbor, or just buy a cheap one from a discount store. One of your radios has a problem, and I do not yet have enough information to determine which one.

I read the specs on the Tera, and what I've found is the thing is set up by default to scan when on channel 16. It is likely that it is in scan mode, and when you transmit, it will stop on whatever channel it was last going past. If you key up the Midland first, the Tera will stop on the frequency it hears, and stay there for a few seconds, thus you can then transmit back to the Midland. The frequency chart for the Tera does not line up with the Midland. Channels 1-7 will be the same, but on the Tera, when on channel 8 or above, you need to add 7 to the channel number to match the Midland. In other words, if the Tera is set to Channel 11, you will be on 462.625, which is channel 18 on the Midland. If you are trying to use channel 16 on the Midland, then set the Tera to channel 9, and you should be able to talk.

Comic relief break: "My wife said she was going to leave me unless I quit spending so much time on the radio. ...OVER"

Possible problem #1 - units too close together. solution: they won't work in the same room with each other due to overload. Move them apart by 100 feet or more. Possible problem #2 - CTCSS or DCS settings do not match. - "Private Codes" are NOT the same number on each unit. Solution: Get a chart for each unit, and set them for the same CTCSS frequency or the same DCS code - watch for normal or inverted codes. Possible problem #3 - Tera unit on charger, using speaker-mic to make a "pretend" base station. - Solution: Take it off from the charger base. The thing is meant to run on its battery. It WON'T transmit properly while sitting in the charger stand, and will transmit a loud 120 Hz buzz, if it transmits at all.

It would be helpful to know what kind of noise you are hearing. Also, what kind of power levels are you running, and what type of radios? This may well be a case of local noise at your location. You should check for noise generators like cell phone chargers, (especially those new wireless chargers), older light dimmers, older style LED bulbs, even fish tank air pumps can generate RF noise. I my case, I recently found that a certain brand of electric blanket causes RF noise, even when turned off, so I just unplug it when I get up.

It might just be a bad cable. If it were from eBay, that would be a problem... however, since you mentioned you got it from Amazon, just return and exchange it, or return and refund it. Amazon is great about that kind of customer service.

Minor nit-pick here... When I go to the shop area on MyGMRS.com, I seem to be stuck in there, as in there is nothing to click on to return to the main root page of mygmrs.com. Clicking on the HOME link returns me to the shop home page, as it should, but clicking on the MyGMRS.com logo on the top of the page also returns me to the shop/mygmrs.com page. I think that clicking the main logo from the shop home page should return to the main site page rather than shop home again. Same with forums as well. while clicking on the top logo from a thread page, it is nice to go back to the forum home, but clicking the main logo from the forum home page should return to the main mygmrs page. Right now, clicking the logo from the forum home page goes nowhere, just re-loads the forum home page.

The OP said he wanted to be lawful. The MARS/CAP mods for ham radios are not in any way legal to use on GMRS/MURS. Those mods are only legal if you are in fact a member of the Military Affiliated Radio Service or the Civil Air Patrol, using the radio on the military frequencies just outside of the ham bands.

Forget all of that bulkhead connector stuff. That is a problem waiting to happen. If the cab ever has to come off, just replace the whole mount if needed. That would be cheaper than all of the added connectors for that bulkhead setup, and those connectors ARE lossy. Here's another better idea... just drill a hole in the top center of the cab roof, and mount the antenna there. If the cab ever needs to come off, the antenna comes with it. You will also get better results with the antenna on the roof than you would with it on the rack due to a more evenly distributed ground plane around the base of the antenna.

Height is everything. The further up in the air you can go, the better, and longer range you will have. On the roof would be ideal, if you can hide it somehow. ...perhaps connect it to a vent pipe on the roof, and paint it some flat, light gray color so it doesn't show up unless you are looking for it. The attic would be OK, as long as you don't have those metal-backed shingles on your roof. Those will kill the signal.

"...Just wasn't sure if using smaller diameter cable would have an effect on the radio performance per some of the discussion I read about." The small cable to stay away from is RG-174u and its equivalents. That is the small stuff you find as the stock cable on the Midland Micro-Mobile antennas. Most NMO mounts come with preinstalled RG-58u, which is slightly smaller in diameter than a #2 pencil. RG-174u is about the diameter of the ink tube inside of a Bic pen.

At less than 15 feet, the standard RG-58 type coax that comes on the NMO mount will be fine, unless you are getting those NMO mounts that have an N connector on the bottom, in which case go with LMR-240. If you are using those NMO mounts with the SO-239 connector on the bottom, send them back and start over. I read that as if he is installing 1 each on 3 different vehicles.

That stubby antenna is more than likely a 5/8 or 3/4 wave normal mode helical antenna. It would have not as much gain as a true 5/8 wave, but due to a low-angle "flattened doughnut" radiation pattern, it would have slightly more gain than a 1/4 wave antenna. ... theoretically.