GreggInFL

Nice.

GMRS is the sweet spot for many who want to get into radio. I've been surrounded by radio most of my life. Dad and I were both in comms in the military. I have family, friends and neighbors with mega ham licenses and have always enjoyed watching them work the airwaves. I'm a PE with a masters degree, so the tech is not intimidating. Folks who don't know assume I have an amateur license, which I don't. FRS works but is very limited while amateur is fantastic but requires jumping through hoops. GMRS is a good compromise.

That's no big deal. Hell, he replied to one of my posts with something like, "Jeeezus, WTF are you thinking?" Now that's funny.

Thanks everyone. Time for Plan B. BTW, I have the ubiquitous UV-5R and a couple of GM-15Pros.

Probably 100' total.

Did the antenna make much difference compared to stock?

Oh, burner phones are on the buy list. We cruised Rome - Athens - Istanbul last year and the marine VHF came in handy. Had this amusing conversation with a crew member: Me: What frequencies are used in this port? Him: We don't use frequencies, we use channels.

(Couldn't find an existing thread...) Considering travel to Japan, Taiwan, mainland China, S. Korea, Australia and New Zealand. Should I bring a radio?

Thanks Steve. Makes sense. I'm guessing I shouldn't use the 30 year-old coax which is conveniently attached to my now-unused DirecTV dish, right?

I've been told that HTs lose a large percentage of power pushing through the cable of an external antenna such as a j-pole. I get that conceptually, but does the better antenna make up for the power loss? (<-- New to this.)

Where did you find the name field? I just checked the software and ran dry.

Anyone not using a Farzometer 2000 is a loser.

I bought this last fall: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09TPZ221K/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1. Seems to work well, though I haven't done anything that would resemble scientific testing.

I have the same radios. As someone recommended, forget the repeaters for now and just start talking via simplex, i.e. radio to radio. Put both radios on the same channel and push the button. These are dual-band radios so be sure the little arrow is pointing to the same channel on each radio.

I was going to say "UV-5R" but didn't want any heads to explode.

He makes a good point. I'm new to this as well and noticed that I didn't know what features I wanted because I'd never used one. Nothing wrong with buying a $20 CCR and turning it on. You'll soon get a feel for what you like and don't like -- and probably end up with a Wouxun. You can chuck the CCR in the glove box.

I didn't realize "stale" was a word used generically wrt databases. Then again, I haven't written any code in decades, so I must also be stale. Thanks, Steve. Helpful as always.

I'll bite. What's a stale repeater?

This is my profile to the local repeater, which is challenging to hit with a 5W given the vegetation. You may be fighting some elevation issues: https://www.scadacore.com/tools/rf-path/rf-line-of-sight/

While GMRS is a bring-your-own-contacts service you can bump into strangers. It's not like amateur radio but it can still be amusing. I'm new to this and when I first connected to a local repeater my radio check was picked up right away by a trucker who uses HAM, GMRS and CB. He was legit in his usage but also ID'd with his handle; “This is XXXX123, a.k.a. 'Roadrunner,'” or something similar. Since my HT was fresh out of the box the roger beep was on and he gave me the Sad Ham treatment about it. “I'm gonna call you Mr. Roger Beep.” I replied, “Yeah, I've heard that some people don't like the roger beep.” He came back, “Hey, I've seen that 'Some People' guy. He's good!” Roadrunner: Hey, Mr. Roger Beep. You out there? Me: WRYP592, a.k.a. Mr. Roger Beep monitoring. Rested and ready to beep. And we're off...

With all the water in Florida I guarantee you can find GMRS users who have added Marine VHF to their radios.

Welcome, Mike! Thank you for your service. I'm new here as well. I suggest you buckle up 'cause this crowd knows what it's talking about. The ham input is icing on the cake.

I hear the local pet boarding kennel.

This new guy should have picked up on the licensing issue. Good stuff, guys. Thanks. (I love this bar.)

I assume you are referring to offering products for sale. How about internal business operations; e.g. Walmart running its stores with GMRS (assuming the company would want to)?