WRYZ926

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.

The amateur version which is the KG-Q10H works on 2m, 1.25m, 70cm, and 6m right out of the box. The KG-Q10H can be unlocked so that it also works on MURS and GMRS.

We finally had a chance to put our Motorola Quantar repeater and Arcom RC-210 controller online yesterday. Man what a difference it made. This setup works a lot better than our older Motorola repeater using a Raspberry Pi as a controller. We still have a few bugs to work out and tweaks to make but overall I am highly impressed with the new setup. There is always a learning curve with any new setup and the hardest part was programming all of the extra features in the controller. One hint if using this setup. Make sure to shut the time out timer completely off in the Quantar if you are using a time out timer in a controller. We missed that and it did cause some issues last night until we shut the TOT off in the repeater.

We have been picking up another repeater here lately when the band opens up between 8 and 10 in the morning. The signal is weaker at about a S4. I've only heard that other repeater during that time period. One morning last week I ws talking on a repeater 55 miles west of me to a guy in Springfield Ill. He is about 168 miles from the repeater. Once the band closed around 10-10:30 he was gone.

I have the KG-Q10H amateur quad band version. It is an excellent radio with a much better receiver than any Baofeng or other cheap radio. It even puts my Icom IC-T10 to shame. Yes the KG-Q10G will receive all of the frequencies /bands. The following is from Buy Two Way Radio's website. https://www.buytwowayradios.com/wouxun-kg-q10g.html?___SID=U 76-108 MHz (FM) RX Only 108-136 MHz (Airband, AM) RX Only 136-174 MHz (FM) RX Only 222-225 MHz (FM) RX Only 320-480 MHz (FM) RX Only 714-999 MHz (FM) RX Only Only you can decide if the extra cost is worth it to you. For me it was worth it since I got mine on sale and was the same price as the Icom IC-T10 and a much better radio. Granted you are asking about the KG-Q10G GMRS version which can not be unlocked for transmitting on other bands.

@piggin glad to hear that you and your family are safe. I had a few issues with the Midland MXT500 . The main issue was the power output was low. The max was about 33-35 watts. The other things are more of a gripe such as having to change everything from narrow band to wide band and also having to update the firmware to get more than 30 something memory slots. Otherwise the MXT500 worked fine and they are very easy to program. My MXT500 went to our club's ecomm trailer. I agree that the MXT500 is definitely overpriced for what it is. But so is the Wouxun KG-1000G that I am currently using. Especially when you compare both to the Icom IC-2730. While I don't have the Wouxun KG-905G, I have been very pleased with the KG-935G and KG-Q10H radios. As you mention, the batteries last a long time if you aren't doing a lot of transmitting/rag chewing. I am going to get some spare batteries for both. For those worried about backup power for a base station, a decent 50AH LIPO4 battery and a solar charging setup works well for a single 50 watt radio. Especially if you are running it on low or medium power. I keep a 50AH LIPO4 battery in the shack for when we loose power during storms. That allows me to communicate during Sky Warn nets and with others as needed. So far I have only had to use the battery twice this year. I have an uncle that lives in the Goldsboro NC area and they faired way better than western NC. He had cell service and internet the entire time. I'll have to ask him if he participated in any of the emergency nets since he has his amateur and GMRS licenses.

That error usually means one of two things. Either the cable is not plugged in all the way or you chose the wrong com port number.

There are plenty of good 20-25 watt mobile radios that will work just fine without breaking the bank. A good antenna and quality LMR400 or equivalent coax is important. I have had good luck with the Jet Flex400 coax from R & L Electronics and the DX Engineering 400Max coax.

This is very true. And the band/frequencies used will make a difference too. I can reach the local 2m repeater that is 21.5 miles away with a HT inside my house. Some brands of radios do better than others. My Icom and Wouxun HT's work the best. But I can totally forget about trying to get into the 70cm and GMRS repeaters from inside the house with a HT. This shows the difference between VHF and UHF. All three repeaters are on the same tower. I can't even get into the 70cm repeater with a HT outside in my yard and getting into the GMRS repeater is very hit or miss. Ouch. The old lathe and plaster walls are going to give you all kinds of grief since most have chicken wire inside the plaster. Your best bet is to pick a spot inside to keep a HT at and run it to an outside antenna.