WRYZ926

Well that depends on the amount of RFI/EMI you are getting. Most of the time you can get away with two per cable. I like to put one on each end of the cable. I don't know if that would be possible with your NMO mount. HF frequencies are a different animal and more ferrite beads will help. 5 to 7 clamp on ferrite beads seems to work the best for HF. Normally 2 works fine for VHF and UHF. Again one on each end of the coax when possible. When it comes to power cables, it is best if you can use a large enough ferrite bead to get at least three wraps of the power wires in them. If you don't have the room, then don't sweat it. Again put a ferrite bead on each end. I also did the same with the cable from the alternator to the battery - one on each end. I do suggest wrapping the clamp on ferrite beads with electrical tape or even zip ties to reduce the risk of them falling off. From the sounds of things, I wonder if you have a bad NMO mount or bad coax cable since everything else is the same as before. Look for any cold solder joints at all the connections. Cold solder joints are usually dull looking. A good solder joint will look shiny when new. I suggest going with a 1/2 or 5/8 wave antenna. Even a bottom loaded 5/8 wave like the Tram 1174 will be better than a 1/4 wave antenna. And if you can run a 35" long antenna, then the Midland MXTA26 is a good choice.

I get mine from Amazon and they work just fine. 60 Pieces Clip-on Ferrite Ring Core RFI EMI Noise Suppressor Cable Clip I like that it comes with quite a few different sizes. I use the smaller ones in my shack for computer cables to help with noise since I run my VHF/UHF, GMRS, and a HF radio in my office/shack. They are a. must if one runs any type of digital modes on HF. Are you using the exact same antenna with both mounts? Do you have another antenna to try? That would eliminate the antenna or the NMO mount as a problem. If antenna height is a concern, you can try something like the Tram 1174 which is a 5/8 wave antenna and is still only about 16" tall. It will need to be cut/tuned though. While those 1/4 wave stealth antennas do work, a 1/2 wave or 5/8 wave will work better.

@WRTZ361, I have a few questions for you Did you have the noise issue when using the magnetic mount? How is the radio power leads connected? Having the excess coax coiled normally won't cause any issues/interference. From your first post, it sounds like you are getting interference from the vehicle electric system. Some clamp on ferret beads on the cable connecting the alternator to the battery will help as will making sure the alternator is properly grounded. Also use some copal on ferrite beads on the power connection of the radio. You can also put 1 or 2 clamp on ferrite beads on the coax where it attaches to the radio to see if that helps. I have no experience with the Melowave antennas but you are using a good NMO mount and radio. The reason I mentioned putting clamp on ferrite beads on the cables/wires, is that it can and will help eliminate RFI and EMI issues. I was occasionally getting some noise when I would transmit while my 2023 Ford Escape was running. This was with my Wouxun KG-1000G and TYT TH-7800 radios. I'm using Midland NMO mag mounts. adding ferrite beads to the cables helped. I still get occasional noise but it is way less than before.

I highly suggest you read the PDF that @SteveShannon posted a link to. @WRZR953 I have a ground rod right below where my coax cables enter the house and another ground rod at the base of my antenna mast. Both are tied into/bonded to my service ground which is in the middle of both locations. Follow the actual NEC codes for proper station grounding.

Stress relief is one reason. Another reason for having a loop at the antenna is so you have some slack if ever have to work on the antenna. I have one loop at the antenna end on all of my VHF/UHF and GMRS antennas for slack and stress relief. The single loop has not effected the SWR at all.

Another reason to have a loop at the antenna end is so that you have some slack in the coax in case you ever have to work on the antenna. I generally try to leave one wrap right at the antenna for this very reason. One or two wraps in a coil will not work very well for a common mode choke. It takes a certain number of wraps and they need to be a certain size to make an effective choke.

I have not seen that happen but I have seen a buck get tangled up in guy ropes and take an antenna mast down.

There is nothing wrong with a good j-pole antenna. And @SteveShannon is correct, a j-pole antenna or any other antenna with 5-6 dB of gain will work better in hilly terrain compared to antennas with 9 dB of gain. The higher the gain is, the flatter the radiation lobe is. Think of it as a balloon. If you push on it to flatten it, you get a stronger signal but it will be narrower. When it comes to antenna designs, what matters is that it is resonant on the frequencies you are transmitting on. A simple dipole or even a vertical j-pole made from coax or electrical wire will work just fine. Getting the antenna resonant and at the right impedance of 50 ohms is what matters. I know plenty of people that use electrical wire or old coax to make j-pole antennas for UHF and GMRS. They get out just fine with those home made antennas.

I would have to agree with what you said. I would have to do some research to give a better answer. And I am sure the type and length of coax does play some part in it. I recently lost a radio due to a high SWR of 5 to 6. I had a 90 degree coax adaptor go bad and I didn't realize a branch had fallen down and was against my antenna. The combo caused my SWR to jump up and unfortunately I didn't catch it until it was too late. The finals were blown and now the radio only puts out 0.4 watts. Who knows how long that adaptor was bad. I trimmed the branches away from my antenna and removed the adaptor and my SWR went back down to 1.4 at 467.600 and 1.7 at 462.600. I am running a Comet CA-712EFC with 35 feet of LMR400 to the wall and another 16 feet of LMR400 in the shack. Needless to say I removed all of the other 90 degree adaptors from my other coax cables just to be on the safe side. The adaptors were either from DX Engineering or Max Gain. So while they weren't top of the line, they weren't Amazon junk either. This is very true. As in my situation, I have no idea how long I was transmitting with that bad adaptor. It was definitely long enough to take the finals out in my radio.

Also make sure to have the correct tone set on your radio for transmit if the repeater is using tones. You can leave your receive tones off for now. You can hear the repeater with no receive tone set but the repeater will not hear you if it is using tones and you do not have your transmit tone set.

As long as the radio has fold back protection that works properly then a high SWR should not hurt the radio. Now if the fold back protection is not working or the radio does not have that, then a high SWR can and will blow the finals. When a radio folds back, it cuts the power way down to protect itself from a high SWR. Most radios will cut the power back to 1 watt or less.

I have to agree. you don't have enough separation between the two antennas. The average person is not going to have enough room for that and why using a properly tuned duplexer is a better option. Remember that you will loose some output power when using a duplexer, that is just the nature of the beast. That being said, there is not enough difference between 20, 30, or 40 watts output from the repeater. Using the proper coax and an antenna with at least 6 dBd (8dBi) of gain will make up for any power loss at the duplexer. Make sure to get the antenna as high as you can get it. We are using a Bridgecom repeater that puts out about 25 watts after the duplexer with the antennas about 400 feet above the ground. We get around a 35 mile radios coverage area with all the hills and forested areas here in mid Missouri. Yes there are some dead spots but that is to be expected with all of the river/creek valleys and sections of red cedar trees.

I have seen people use telescoping flag poles and some of the longer painter's poles. There are many ways to get an antenna up in the air. Get the best antenna you can that fits your needs and don't skimp on coax either. Use LMR400 or equivalent coax. The DX engineering 400Max and R & L Electronics Jet Flex400 are good LMR400 equivalents at a lower price. You will want a duplexer if you are planning on using just one antenna for any repeater. Otherwise you will need two antennas spaced out far enough so they don't desence each other. The Retevis RT97 portable repeater is a good choice for portable/mobile type uses as it has a duplexer built in. The only thing one needs to add is a power source, antenna and coax. The RT97 puts out 10 watts before the duplexer and 5 watts out after the duplexer. This is enough for local comms as long as the antenna is up as high as you can get it. They can be found on Amazon for $350 or less.

I wish more radios would have that option. I installed a third party firmware on my Quansheng UV-K6 which has that feature. It is nice to have.

I'm pretty sure we run the CW ID on our 2m and 70cm repeaters at 15 WPM also and have never had anyone complain.

The UV-5 Plus will suit you just fine until you figure out exactly what you want in a radio.

Again nothing wrong with Baofeng radios, especially for someone starting out or on a very limited budget. In fact that is what I started out using. I ran a GT-5R attached to a mag mount antenna in my vehicle for a while until I decided what mobile radio I wanted. And I keep the GT-5R and the two UV-5R GMRS radios around. It never hurts to have extra radios on hand. With that said, I do find myself using my Wouxun KG-935G and Wouxun quad band KG-Q10H most of the time when I need a hand held radio. Everyone will have their favorite brand/model. Go with what works for you.

I would start with a Baofeng radio then. Make sure it is one of the GMRS versions for GMRS use only. This keeps you within FCC regulations and also keeps the curmudgeons off your back. Once you get the familiar with the Baofeng and radio in general, then you can always upgrade to a better hand held. I can recommend the Wouxun KG-935G based on personal experience. Again the final decision on what radio to use is yours to make. Remember that under normal circumstances, you will need an amateur radio license to use the amateur radio bands such as 2m and 70cm. Nothing is stopping you from listening without a license, you just can't legally transmit on those bands with a GMRS license. I will say that different types of communication is important in emergencies as the recent hurricanes have proven.

The Baofeng GMRS radios are fine, especially for starting out with until you figure out what you want in a hand held radio. No they aren't the best quality and are susceptible to front end overload, but they work and are fairly easy for most to program through the radio or with CHIRP. Or you could step up to the Wouxun KG-935G Plus which is a very good radio. Only you can decide what radio is best for you. And I will never recommend a commercial grade radio such as Motorola to someone new. Yes they are top of the line but they are not user friendly to people new to radios in general. Plenty of people have started out with Baofeng hand held radios for GMRS and/or amateur radio use.

I can't speak for using CW ID on hand held/mobile GMRS radios. I know that we have the CW ID set on our Bridgecom repeaters at 15 words per minute.

The Comet CA-712EFC is listed as 9 dBi which is 6.8 dBd. most antenna manufacturers list gain in dBi. Subtract 2.14 from the dBi value to get the dBd value.

There is a 6m repeater close to me that the owner passed away years ago. The repeater sat there running this whole time. Another club is in the process of getting it all legal again. We got lucky when it came to antennas for our GMRS repeater. There were some abandoned antennas at 400 feet that happen to have good SWR on GMRS frequencies. Plus there was already some 1 1/2" hard line ran into the building from those antennas.

Those coverage maps are a good reference but not 100% accurate. We did a coverage map when we first installed our repeater. A few of us then drove around testing to see where we could and could not get into the repeater. We compared that to the coverage maps and it was close but not 100% accurate.

@Socalgmrs You definitely love to be argumentative don't you. Two people can be within the range of the repeater and in opposite and equal directions and talk to each other. So if a repeater has a 30 mile radius of receive/trasmitt coverage and both parties can open the repeater, then YES both parties can be 60 miles apart with the repeater in between them and still talk to each other.

The coverage radius of a repeater goes for both receive and transmit. With all things being equal, you could be 30 miles away from a repeater and your friend could be 30 miles away in the opposite direction and you two would still be able to talk to each other through the repeater.