WRYD530

Haven’t seen this topic really discussed. What radio(s) are everyone using. Home base station and mobile. Let’s include antenna and cable as well.

Why can you not put up the antenna outside? Hoa? I believe I read somewhere they cannot lawfully stop you from putting up an antenna outside. Anyone else confirm this?

I currently have a mxt575 with a mxta26 antenna mag mounted to roof. I would like to add another radio to another truck. I could save a couple hundred bucks and go with a mxt275 15 watts and same antenna. Will I be disappointed with the range on 15 watts?

So my home base can “listen for me but not hear all the other chatter” my mobile will be open to all coms, and i need repeater for more range.

Let’s say I’m on a repeater channel 18 with an uplink of 141.3 to activate the repeater and i have a home base radio that i want to leave on most of the time but dont want to hear all communications. I then set receive tone to say 67.0 or whatever i decide so i only hear transmissions from my mobile radio that is set to same down frequency. Correct? And yes I realize there is no “privacy”.

I have that antenna. Works great. I have it mag mounted on the roof of my Sierra crew cab about 6 inches forward of the brake light. Gets it up high with a good ground plane. I have had no issues with scratching as i use the rubber protection. On my antenna. lol. Even had it tip over hitting a branch. No damage.

So 50 watts is the maximum allowed to transmit on GMRS. If i setup a repeater with 2 radios a duplexer and separate antennas for each radio and the best cable i may still lose about 10-20 watts correct? So is there a way to boost the 50 watt radios to actually get the 50 watts out of the transmission?

Got the antenna trimmed and hooked up. 20ft of cable for now. Got a SWR of 1.42. Seems pretty good. Will it improve after I take the meter off? Is there some losses from all the connectors in testing?

Thanks for the advice on the trimming slightly long then filing. Actually i was going to mount mine to the chimney which is at least 20ft plus a 10 ft pole that should be some decent height considering my truck gets 40miles to a repeater. Only thing is if i fall i probably will never work again. Well it is for gmrs so totally worth it. Maybe i can steal a cherry picker for a few hours. Anyway… cable recommendations? 50ft probably.

Just got my TRAM 1486 and would like to get some help on trimming. Obviously don’t want to over trim. I use all GMRS frequencies and repeaters also. Anyone else think they have theirs trimmed perfectly. And yes i do have the instructions but first hand experience is better. Also recommendations on mounting to house.

From my experience the handheld units just don’t have much range. I’m in Ohio. Pretty flat and lots of trees. My range with handhelds is 1-2 miles and that’s with extended range antennas. My mobile unit is the MXT575 with mxta26 center mag mounted on pickup roof. At least 40 miles hitting repeaters. Working on a home base unit trying to get antenna at least 30ft up. The consensus here is antenna height is king.

Seeing this post late. What setup did you decide on? Not sure if anyone asked this but what is your goal for gmrs. Off road communication, just general comms?

My setup is a Midland MXT575 with a mag mount MXTA26 center mounted on my Sierra 3500. I can hit a repeater approximately 40 miles away. I’m in NE Ohio and it’s pretty flat with lots of trees. I custom mounted it under the dash by my left foot with an aluminum bracket. I can still access the usb-c plug if needed but the unit is pretty much out of sight. The mic is mounted on the left of steering wheel with a ProClip mount. It’s easy to see the mic without taking my eyes off the road.

Looking at cable. Would it be a good idea to upgrade from the stock midland cable to a Messi & Paoloni ultraflex 7 since I need to add length anyway to run into can? Any advantage to that? I can get it custom length to any foot. Also what connectors should I go with?

I’m looking to put up a home antenna. House is about 20ft plus I’d like to add 10 more to that plus antenna height. What’s a good antenna? Plus do I need to run a ground inside the pole and into the earth? Also probably looking at less than 30ft of cable since it won’t run all the way down pole to ground. I’m going to run it into upstairs bedroom to radio setup. What’s a good cable for that?