WRAF213

Absolutely, finding higher ground should be the first step towards improving a setup. Running more power only matters on fixed setups where the antenna is already as good as it can get, or on mobile operation where there is no 'finding a good spot'. Even then, there's not a huge difference between 15 and 40 watts.
 
Here's my first piece of advice for new users (and I have a bunch, fair warning): use scan mode on a radio that will tell you the active CTCSS tone or DCS code if you're looking for repeaters to use. RTL-SDR is also a good tool, and makes the entire 462 MHz band visible with good sensitivity and excellent selectivity.
 
Especially on fixed setups, grounding is important. Noise will get picked up along the coax and travel up to the antenna, where it enters the receiver. The effect is very apparent on SDRs, where the noise floor is directly visible. When grounding a setup, check for ground loops with a multimeter.
 
Learn to recognize the busy-channel indicator on your radio. When the radio detects any activity on the channel, regardless of correct CTCSS/DCS, it'll turn on the busy-channel indicator. It'll help you to know if you have the correct CTCSS/DCS for a particular system. Some repeaters use multiple CTCSS/DCS, so this indicator can be useful on those repeaters to make sure you aren't interfering with a different conversation. On Baofeng's radios, this is the green LED on top of the radio. On Motorola's commercial radios, this is a blinking red or green LED near the antenna; on their FRS/GMRS radios, this is the red LED above the display.
 
Some repeaters transmit CTCSS/DCS back to you, but only while someone is transmitting to it. If you're hitting the repeater but can't hear it come back to you once you finish transmitting, this could be a possible cause. Use the monitor feature on your radio or check the busy-channel indicator to check for the repeater's tail.
 
Don't be afraid to try simplex. If you hear a callsign with variable signal strength, they're probably not going through a repeater. It's rare to find contacts that way, but that's largely because hardly anyone calls for contacts on simplex. 462.5625 (channel 1), transmit and receive CSQ; and 462.6750 (channel 20), transmit CTCSS 141.3 and receive CSQ are good places to try calling CQ.
 
People who use MDC-1200 on their radios don't actually have to hear the data bursts, the radio can detect the burst and mute it. It gets annoying so most people with MDC-1200 radios have their radios like that.
 
This forum sure does love their Kenwood TK-880s and Motorola M1225s. They're great radios, but terrible general-purpose radios. Virtually all commercial radios can only be programmed by computer software, so you have to know ahead of time what you're going to talk to. Speaking of commercial radios, used Motorola HT1000 radios are incredibly durable and inexpensive. They use the same programming
 
Don't waste your money on the BTech GMRS mobiles, the quality control is practically absent. The GMRS-V1 is apparently alright and Part 95 accepted. Use CHIRP for programming; it will save a lot of time and headaches, while allowing for named channels.
 
When buying a used radio online, make sure the frequency range actually includes 462-468 MHz. For handheld radios, make sure that you are getting (or already have) a charger and antenna. The battery is probably shot, so include a replacement in your budgeting. I like to have at least one spare battery, so I can continue using the radio while a battery is charging. Don't transmit on a handheld radio while it's charging.
 
Counterfeit antennas are a thing, especially with Nagoya. Buy from trusted sources, or find a friend with an antenna analyzer or VNA who'd be willing to show you how to see if an antenna is good or trash. Be willing to learn how to use test equipment, or at least be aware of what that test equipment is testing. It'll help greatly in the future when you are faced with new problems.
 
GMRS isn't ham radio, but it's often used pretty similarly to 70cm. Ham radio clubs are still a useful resource where you can make lots of friends with lots of knowledge. If you don't have a ham license, they'll pressure you to get one. A Technician-class license is easy to get, costs much less than your GMRS license, and you may even be able to use the same antenna for 70cm. Different clubs have different focuses, so don't get discouraged if you don't feel a particular club is right for you. Depending on the area, hams may not like GMRS for one reason or another; but recognize the common interest in establishing reliable communications between licensed operators.
 
There's a 30 MHz gap between 70cm and GMRS, so most 70cm antennas with appreciable gain don't work on GMRS (and remember you're usually transmitting at 467 MHz, not 462 MHz). Check your antenna's documentation to see how much bandwidth you have. Most handheld antennas are broadband enough, and most commercial-band antennas actually work better on GMRS.
 
Don't put up a repeater until you know exactly what you're doing. There's enough deaf GMRS repeaters out there. Don't take on the task alone, either. The more support you have, the better (and, for you, cheaper) the repeater can be. Even a low hilltop provides significantly more coverage than a rooftop repeater. Sites cost money, but can cost a heck of a lot less if you get to know some repeater folk and can make a good sales pitch. Don't use LMR-400 for repeaters.
 
Getting above the roofline makes a big difference in suburban areas, particularly when trying to work hilltop sites. For more rural areas, try to get above the treeline if possible. If you're the only one-story house in a block of two-story houses, ouch.
 
Be it ham radio or GMRS, remember that the radio hobby is about communication. This includes, but is not limited to: rag chewing, technical talk, emergency communication, repeater building, proselytizing the wonders of properly configured radios, and being willing to help the confused. A lot of people out there try to assert their dominance over a channel and run around with a better-than-thou mentality, and over the course of your license you'll find at least one of them. They aren't out to improve either service or what each service stands for, so stay away from them. Don't let them change your perception of the radio hobby, either.
 
If you hear confused FRS users on channel 1 that can't get their radios to talk to each other, offer to help. Transmit CTCSS 67.0 and receive CSQ. They'll probably need help configuring CTCSS on their radios. Ask for the model number and look up the manual on Google. Stuff like this happens more often than I'd like to admit, and half the time those people spent a lot of money on those radios. Be a good citizen.
 
Some repeaters will beacon out their callsign. That doesn't mean there's anyone using it. Repeaters aren't supposed to do that, but not everyone has a good repeater controller. It's almost universally agreed upon that such repeater behavior is super annoying.
 
Not all repeaters identify, and that can make it a pain in the rear to figure out who owns the repeater. It's usually private repeaters that don't identify, and some legally don't even have to. It's another fact of life that makes frequency coordination difficult for repeater owners.
 
The FRS channels, especially 1-14, are flooded with business users. They're allowed to be there, and aren't looking for conversation. Let them be. They're close enough together (a few hundred feet, typically) that they won't even notice you're on the same frequency as long as you're on a different CTCSS/DCS code.
 
Not everyone is following the rules. Report egregious violators to the FCC, but don't expect enforcement action. Report criminal activity (eg. terroristic threats, use of radios in a crime) to law enforcement, not the FCC. If you happen to know who the perps are, tell the FCC as well. You probably won't encounter any such activity.
 
If you start getting involved in the commercial radio users crowd, be it on 70cm or GMRS, you'll see a lot of brand loyalty. I'm a Motorola guy, since those are the first commercial radios I got involved with and those radios meet all of my needs. We have a lot of Kenwood folk on here, and boy do they love their TK-880s. Both make rock-solid commercial radios. There's other brands out there, too. Stay away from cheap Chinese radios, those are markedly not rock-solid radios and may not have any type-acceptance whatsoever. It's generally accepted that radios with commercial (Part 90) type acceptance are fine for GMRS (Part 97E) operation, since Part 90 requirements are more stringent in terms of RF performance. While the FCC is yet to make an official exemption, they allude to it frequently in the 2017 rule change discussion.
 
Directional antennas (mostly Yagis or log-periodic antennas at these fequencies) are terrible general purpose antennas, since you need to know the direction towards the stuff you want to talk to. Commercial omnidirectional antennas covering 460-470 MHz at a minimum make the best general-purpose antennas. Browning's BR6157 is a good starter antenna, with some gain and a wide bandwidth. If you spend more than $60 on one before any sales tax, you've overspent.
 
Use FakeSpot when shopping for radios or accessories on Amazon. Don't get ripped off by fake reviews.
 
Monitor channel 1 (again, transmit CTCSS 67.0 and receive CSQ) during disasters. You may save someone's life. Prioritize your safety highest; you're still a victim.
 
Don't be a dillweed on the air that hides from consequences behind a microphone; respect is reciprocal. Not everyone you'll meet understands this.
 
When you got your GMRS license, your whole family just became GMRS licensees as well. Come up with a separate simplex channel for them and them only. It's useful when outdoors, communication between vehicles on road trips, or during disasters. Having a nationwide license to operate a radio without frequency coordination, and with unlicensed operators on FRS, is a beautiful luxury we have on GMRS that you will get nowhere else. Make sure to test your channels ahead of time, and check them regularly if you don't use them often.
 
I mentioned it earlier, but I'll elaborate on it: RTL-SDR is an excellent tool for GMRS. All of the output channels are visible with a spectrum analyzer-type visualization. Interference becomes easy to spot and identify. CTCSS and DCS decoding is straightforward and nearly instant, and works with hardly any signal strength at all. Signal strength readings can be calibrated against an absolute scale (dBm), which allows for comparison between antennas and locations. A fancy setup of them, Kerberos SDR, can do direction finding with real-time map plotting, but requires some technical knowledge. SDR is fairly recent, and there's plenty of user groups online (like Reddit's r/RTLSDR). When shopping for RTL-SDR, don't spend more than $30 for a bare unit, and don't buy anything that doesn't have a 1.0ppm TCXO or better. If the item description doesn't say TCXO, it doesn't have one.  RTL-SDR Blog v3 is a good unit, and the Nooelec NESDR SMArTee performs the same. Throw the RTL-SDR Blog 20dB LNA on there as well, life will be much better. Use a USB 2.0 extension cord with SDRs.
 
Talking on a handheld radio while driving a vehicle is illegal in California under the cell phone laws. Mobiles, with a simple PTT-only hand mic, are fine.
 
Don't get a 16 or 48 channel radio as your first real commercial or commercial-grade radio. Go for something with at least 128 channels and a screen. Get the programming software and cable before you get the radio so you aren't stuck with a paperweight. Don't give money to HamFiles.
 
If you have a lot of long conversations but all you have is your handheld radio, get a mobile radio and a power supply. Use a proper antenna (as discussed earlier) and some low-loss coax (RG-8, LMR-240, or better). PL-259/SO-239, also called the UHF connector, is a terrible connector at UHF. Avoid it wherever possible. Use TNC or N for permanent or semi-permanent connections, and BNC for connections you switch out a lot. Keep your connectors clean and seal any outdoor terminations. Assume each adapter adds 0.5-1dB of loss, so use as few adapters as possible. Get your coax terminated in whatever connector your antenna has; don't leave the adapter outdoors. Mastic tape gums up over time and future you will hate present you. If you use cheap non-outdoors coax like I did, it can get water ingress. SWR will still show a rather normal reading, but the wet insulator will suck up all your RF (easily 99% of it).
 
Good coax is thicker than you think. Take that into consideration.
 
Folk at your local ham radio club, or GMRS club if you live in an area with one, have done enough fixed radio installations to be able to help you with yours. Don't go out alone and do it, but take some notes so you can eventually help others. Honestly, they're not that hard.
 
If you're in a place that gets thunderstorms more than a few times a year, lightning protection is a real concern. Nothing will stop a direct strike, so unplug your equipment during such inclement weather. That's another reason to keep portable radios around.
 
Repeaters almost always use hardline instead of flexible coax. Hardline is expensive and requires special tools. Good feedline is critical on repeaters because you usually have a 40-watt transmitter on the same antennas as a sensitive receiver. Slight non-linear effects, even a rusty fencepost nearby, can cause issues with receiver performance.
 
If you have an opportunity to visit a hilltop repeater site (an opportunity you may get if you're involved with repeater groups), take it. The first trip to one is an experience, and you'll get to see a variety of real-world installations. Hilltop sites are surprisingly dirty; nobody's up there keeping the floors clean. Some sites are cleaner than others. It's often a long drive and fair distance from civilization, so bring a lunch and go to the bathroom before the trip. Some sites require four-wheel drive and an experienced driver to get to. Buy their dinner.
 
Flat areas can get significant coverage from a low-level repeater. Rooftop repeaters actually have decent performance in those environments.
 
Even on rooftop antennas, your simplex range to a five-watt mobile/portable can be as short as two miles. GMRS is heavily influenced by line-of-sight propagation. Building penetration is better than MURS or 2-meters. 

151.625 is under Part 90.35 as a business itinerant channel and isn't part of MURS.

Absolutely, finding higher ground should be the first step towards improving a setup. Running more power only matters on fixed setups where the antenna is already as good as it can get, or on mobile operation where there is no 'finding a good spot'. Even then, there's not a huge difference between 15 and 40 watts.
 
Here's my first piece of advice for new users (and I have a bunch, fair warning): use scan mode on a radio that will tell you the active CTCSS tone or DCS code if you're looking for repeaters to use. RTL-SDR is also a good tool, and makes the entire 462 MHz band visible with good sensitivity and excellent selectivity.
 
Especially on fixed setups, grounding is important. Noise will get picked up along the coax and travel up to the antenna, where it enters the receiver. The effect is very apparent on SDRs, where the noise floor is directly visible. When grounding a setup, check for ground loops with a multimeter.
 
Learn to recognize the busy-channel indicator on your radio. When the radio detects any activity on the channel, regardless of correct CTCSS/DCS, it'll turn on the busy-channel indicator. It'll help you to know if you have the correct CTCSS/DCS for a particular system. Some repeaters use multiple CTCSS/DCS, so this indicator can be useful on those repeaters to make sure you aren't interfering with a different conversation. On Baofeng's radios, this is the green LED on top of the radio. On Motorola's commercial radios, this is a blinking red or green LED near the antenna; on their FRS/GMRS radios, this is the red LED above the display.
 
Some repeaters transmit CTCSS/DCS back to you, but only while someone is transmitting to it. If you're hitting the repeater but can't hear it come back to you once you finish transmitting, this could be a possible cause. Use the monitor feature on your radio or check the busy-channel indicator to check for the repeater's tail.
 
Don't be afraid to try simplex. If you hear a callsign with variable signal strength, they're probably not going through a repeater. It's rare to find contacts that way, but that's largely because hardly anyone calls for contacts on simplex. 462.5625 (channel 1), transmit and receive CSQ; and 462.6750 (channel 20), transmit CTCSS 141.3 and receive CSQ are good places to try calling CQ.
 
People who use MDC-1200 on their radios don't actually have to hear the data bursts, the radio can detect the burst and mute it. It gets annoying so most people with MDC-1200 radios have their radios like that.
 
This forum sure does love their Kenwood TK-880s and Motorola M1225s. They're great radios, but terrible general-purpose radios. Virtually all commercial radios can only be programmed by computer software, so you have to know ahead of time what you're going to talk to. Speaking of commercial radios, used Motorola HT1000 radios are incredibly durable and inexpensive. They use the same programming
 
Don't waste your money on the BTech GMRS mobiles, the quality control is practically absent. The GMRS-V1 is apparently alright and Part 95 accepted. Use CHIRP for programming; it will save a lot of time and headaches, while allowing for named channels.
 
When buying a used radio online, make sure the frequency range actually includes 462-468 MHz. For handheld radios, make sure that you are getting (or already have) a charger and antenna. The battery is probably shot, so include a replacement in your budgeting. I like to have at least one spare battery, so I can continue using the radio while a battery is charging. Don't transmit on a handheld radio while it's charging.
 
Counterfeit antennas are a thing, especially with Nagoya. Buy from trusted sources, or find a friend with an antenna analyzer or VNA who'd be willing to show you how to see if an antenna is good or trash. Be willing to learn how to use test equipment, or at least be aware of what that test equipment is testing. It'll help greatly in the future when you are faced with new problems.
 
GMRS isn't ham radio, but it's often used pretty similarly to 70cm. Ham radio clubs are still a useful resource where you can make lots of friends with lots of knowledge. If you don't have a ham license, they'll pressure you to get one. A Technician-class license is easy to get, costs much less than your GMRS license, and you may even be able to use the same antenna for 70cm. Different clubs have different focuses, so don't get discouraged if you don't feel a particular club is right for you. Depending on the area, hams may not like GMRS for one reason or another; but recognize the common interest in establishing reliable communications between licensed operators.
 
There's a 30 MHz gap between 70cm and GMRS, so most 70cm antennas with appreciable gain don't work on GMRS (and remember you're usually transmitting at 467 MHz, not 462 MHz). Check your antenna's documentation to see how much bandwidth you have. Most handheld antennas are broadband enough, and most commercial-band antennas actually work better on GMRS.
 
Don't put up a repeater until you know exactly what you're doing. There's enough deaf GMRS repeaters out there. Don't take on the task alone, either. The more support you have, the better (and, for you, cheaper) the repeater can be. Even a low hilltop provides significantly more coverage than a rooftop repeater. Sites cost money, but can cost a heck of a lot less if you get to know some repeater folk and can make a good sales pitch. Don't use LMR-400 for repeaters.
 
Getting above the roofline makes a big difference in suburban areas, particularly when trying to work hilltop sites. For more rural areas, try to get above the treeline if possible. If you're the only one-story house in a block of two-story houses, ouch.
 
Be it ham radio or GMRS, remember that the radio hobby is about communication. This includes, but is not limited to: rag chewing, technical talk, emergency communication, repeater building, proselytizing the wonders of properly configured radios, and being willing to help the confused. A lot of people out there try to assert their dominance over a channel and run around with a better-than-thou mentality, and over the course of your license you'll find at least one of them. They aren't out to improve either service or what each service stands for, so stay away from them. Don't let them change your perception of the radio hobby, either.
 
If you hear confused FRS users on channel 1 that can't get their radios to talk to each other, offer to help. Transmit CTCSS 67.0 and receive CSQ. They'll probably need help configuring CTCSS on their radios. Ask for the model number and look up the manual on Google. Stuff like this happens more often than I'd like to admit, and half the time those people spent a lot of money on those radios. Be a good citizen.
 
Some repeaters will beacon out their callsign. That doesn't mean there's anyone using it. Repeaters aren't supposed to do that, but not everyone has a good repeater controller. It's almost universally agreed upon that such repeater behavior is super annoying.
 
Not all repeaters identify, and that can make it a pain in the rear to figure out who owns the repeater. It's usually private repeaters that don't identify, and some legally don't even have to. It's another fact of life that makes frequency coordination difficult for repeater owners.
 
The FRS channels, especially 1-14, are flooded with business users. They're allowed to be there, and aren't looking for conversation. Let them be. They're close enough together (a few hundred feet, typically) that they won't even notice you're on the same frequency as long as you're on a different CTCSS/DCS code.
 
Not everyone is following the rules. Report egregious violators to the FCC, but don't expect enforcement action. Report criminal activity (eg. terroristic threats, use of radios in a crime) to law enforcement, not the FCC. If you happen to know who the perps are, tell the FCC as well. You probably won't encounter any such activity.
 
If you start getting involved in the commercial radio users crowd, be it on 70cm or GMRS, you'll see a lot of brand loyalty. I'm a Motorola guy, since those are the first commercial radios I got involved with and those radios meet all of my needs. We have a lot of Kenwood folk on here, and boy do they love their TK-880s. Both make rock-solid commercial radios. There's other brands out there, too. Stay away from cheap Chinese radios, those are markedly not rock-solid radios and may not have any type-acceptance whatsoever. It's generally accepted that radios with commercial (Part 90) type acceptance are fine for GMRS (Part 97E) operation, since Part 90 requirements are more stringent in terms of RF performance. While the FCC is yet to make an official exemption, they allude to it frequently in the 2017 rule change discussion.
 
Directional antennas (mostly Yagis or log-periodic antennas at these fequencies) are terrible general purpose antennas, since you need to know the direction towards the stuff you want to talk to. Commercial omnidirectional antennas covering 460-470 MHz at a minimum make the best general-purpose antennas. Browning's BR6157 is a good starter antenna, with some gain and a wide bandwidth. If you spend more than $60 on one before any sales tax, you've overspent.
 
Use FakeSpot when shopping for radios or accessories on Amazon. Don't get ripped off by fake reviews.
 
Monitor channel 1 (again, transmit CTCSS 67.0 and receive CSQ) during disasters. You may save someone's life. Prioritize your safety highest; you're still a victim.
 
Don't be a dillweed on the air that hides from consequences behind a microphone; respect is reciprocal. Not everyone you'll meet understands this.
 
When you got your GMRS license, your whole family just became GMRS licensees as well. Come up with a separate simplex channel for them and them only. It's useful when outdoors, communication between vehicles on road trips, or during disasters. Having a nationwide license to operate a radio without frequency coordination, and with unlicensed operators on FRS, is a beautiful luxury we have on GMRS that you will get nowhere else. Make sure to test your channels ahead of time, and check them regularly if you don't use them often.
 
I mentioned it earlier, but I'll elaborate on it: RTL-SDR is an excellent tool for GMRS. All of the output channels are visible with a spectrum analyzer-type visualization. Interference becomes easy to spot and identify. CTCSS and DCS decoding is straightforward and nearly instant, and works with hardly any signal strength at all. Signal strength readings can be calibrated against an absolute scale (dBm), which allows for comparison between antennas and locations. A fancy setup of them, Kerberos SDR, can do direction finding with real-time map plotting, but requires some technical knowledge. SDR is fairly recent, and there's plenty of user groups online (like Reddit's r/RTLSDR). When shopping for RTL-SDR, don't spend more than $30 for a bare unit, and don't buy anything that doesn't have a 1.0ppm TCXO or better. If the item description doesn't say TCXO, it doesn't have one.  RTL-SDR Blog v3 is a good unit, and the Nooelec NESDR SMArTee performs the same. Throw the RTL-SDR Blog 20dB LNA on there as well, life will be much better. Use a USB 2.0 extension cord with SDRs.
 
Talking on a handheld radio while driving a vehicle is illegal in California under the cell phone laws. Mobiles, with a simple PTT-only hand mic, are fine.
 
Don't get a 16 or 48 channel radio as your first real commercial or commercial-grade radio. Go for something with at least 128 channels and a screen. Get the programming software and cable before you get the radio so you aren't stuck with a paperweight. Don't give money to HamFiles.
 
If you have a lot of long conversations but all you have is your handheld radio, get a mobile radio and a power supply. Use a proper antenna (as discussed earlier) and some low-loss coax (RG-8, LMR-240, or better). PL-259/SO-239, also called the UHF connector, is a terrible connector at UHF. Avoid it wherever possible. Use TNC or N for permanent or semi-permanent connections, and BNC for connections you switch out a lot. Keep your connectors clean and seal any outdoor terminations. Assume each adapter adds 0.5-1dB of loss, so use as few adapters as possible. Get your coax terminated in whatever connector your antenna has; don't leave the adapter outdoors. Mastic tape gums up over time and future you will hate present you. If you use cheap non-outdoors coax like I did, it can get water ingress. SWR will still show a rather normal reading, but the wet insulator will suck up all your RF (easily 99% of it).
 
Good coax is thicker than you think. Take that into consideration.
 
Folk at your local ham radio club, or GMRS club if you live in an area with one, have done enough fixed radio installations to be able to help you with yours. Don't go out alone and do it, but take some notes so you can eventually help others. Honestly, they're not that hard.
 
If you're in a place that gets thunderstorms more than a few times a year, lightning protection is a real concern. Nothing will stop a direct strike, so unplug your equipment during such inclement weather. That's another reason to keep portable radios around.
 
Repeaters almost always use hardline instead of flexible coax. Hardline is expensive and requires special tools. Good feedline is critical on repeaters because you usually have a 40-watt transmitter on the same antennas as a sensitive receiver. Slight non-linear effects, even a rusty fencepost nearby, can cause issues with receiver performance.
 
If you have an opportunity to visit a hilltop repeater site (an opportunity you may get if you're involved with repeater groups), take it. The first trip to one is an experience, and you'll get to see a variety of real-world installations. Hilltop sites are surprisingly dirty; nobody's up there keeping the floors clean. Some sites are cleaner than others. It's often a long drive and fair distance from civilization, so bring a lunch and go to the bathroom before the trip. Some sites require four-wheel drive and an experienced driver to get to. Buy their dinner.
 
Flat areas can get significant coverage from a low-level repeater. Rooftop repeaters actually have decent performance in those environments.
 
Even on rooftop antennas, your simplex range to a five-watt mobile/portable can be as short as two miles. GMRS is heavily influenced by line-of-sight propagation. Building penetration is better than MURS or 2-meters. 

Absolutely, finding higher ground should be the first step towards improving a setup. Running more power only matters on fixed setups where the antenna is already as good as it can get, or on mobile operation where there is no 'finding a good spot'. Even then, there's not a huge difference between 15 and 40 watts.
 
Here's my first piece of advice for new users (and I have a bunch, fair warning): use scan mode on a radio that will tell you the active CTCSS tone or DCS code if you're looking for repeaters to use. RTL-SDR is also a good tool, and makes the entire 462 MHz band visible with good sensitivity and excellent selectivity.
 
Especially on fixed setups, grounding is important. Noise will get picked up along the coax and travel up to the antenna, where it enters the receiver. The effect is very apparent on SDRs, where the noise floor is directly visible. When grounding a setup, check for ground loops with a multimeter.
 
Learn to recognize the busy-channel indicator on your radio. When the radio detects any activity on the channel, regardless of correct CTCSS/DCS, it'll turn on the busy-channel indicator. It'll help you to know if you have the correct CTCSS/DCS for a particular system. Some repeaters use multiple CTCSS/DCS, so this indicator can be useful on those repeaters to make sure you aren't interfering with a different conversation. On Baofeng's radios, this is the green LED on top of the radio. On Motorola's commercial radios, this is a blinking red or green LED near the antenna; on their FRS/GMRS radios, this is the red LED above the display.
 
Some repeaters transmit CTCSS/DCS back to you, but only while someone is transmitting to it. If you're hitting the repeater but can't hear it come back to you once you finish transmitting, this could be a possible cause. Use the monitor feature on your radio or check the busy-channel indicator to check for the repeater's tail.
 
Don't be afraid to try simplex. If you hear a callsign with variable signal strength, they're probably not going through a repeater. It's rare to find contacts that way, but that's largely because hardly anyone calls for contacts on simplex. 462.5625 (channel 1), transmit and receive CSQ; and 462.6750 (channel 20), transmit CTCSS 141.3 and receive CSQ are good places to try calling CQ.
 
People who use MDC-1200 on their radios don't actually have to hear the data bursts, the radio can detect the burst and mute it. It gets annoying so most people with MDC-1200 radios have their radios like that.
 
This forum sure does love their Kenwood TK-880s and Motorola M1225s. They're great radios, but terrible general-purpose radios. Virtually all commercial radios can only be programmed by computer software, so you have to know ahead of time what you're going to talk to. Speaking of commercial radios, used Motorola HT1000 radios are incredibly durable and inexpensive. They use the same programming
 
Don't waste your money on the BTech GMRS mobiles, the quality control is practically absent. The GMRS-V1 is apparently alright and Part 95 accepted. Use CHIRP for programming; it will save a lot of time and headaches, while allowing for named channels.
 
When buying a used radio online, make sure the frequency range actually includes 462-468 MHz. For handheld radios, make sure that you are getting (or already have) a charger and antenna. The battery is probably shot, so include a replacement in your budgeting. I like to have at least one spare battery, so I can continue using the radio while a battery is charging. Don't transmit on a handheld radio while it's charging.
 
Counterfeit antennas are a thing, especially with Nagoya. Buy from trusted sources, or find a friend with an antenna analyzer or VNA who'd be willing to show you how to see if an antenna is good or trash. Be willing to learn how to use test equipment, or at least be aware of what that test equipment is testing. It'll help greatly in the future when you are faced with new problems.
 
GMRS isn't ham radio, but it's often used pretty similarly to 70cm. Ham radio clubs are still a useful resource where you can make lots of friends with lots of knowledge. If you don't have a ham license, they'll pressure you to get one. A Technician-class license is easy to get, costs much less than your GMRS license, and you may even be able to use the same antenna for 70cm. Different clubs have different focuses, so don't get discouraged if you don't feel a particular club is right for you. Depending on the area, hams may not like GMRS for one reason or another; but recognize the common interest in establishing reliable communications between licensed operators.
 
There's a 30 MHz gap between 70cm and GMRS, so most 70cm antennas with appreciable gain don't work on GMRS (and remember you're usually transmitting at 467 MHz, not 462 MHz). Check your antenna's documentation to see how much bandwidth you have. Most handheld antennas are broadband enough, and most commercial-band antennas actually work better on GMRS.
 
Don't put up a repeater until you know exactly what you're doing. There's enough deaf GMRS repeaters out there. Don't take on the task alone, either. The more support you have, the better (and, for you, cheaper) the repeater can be. Even a low hilltop provides significantly more coverage than a rooftop repeater. Sites cost money, but can cost a heck of a lot less if you get to know some repeater folk and can make a good sales pitch. Don't use LMR-400 for repeaters.
 
Getting above the roofline makes a big difference in suburban areas, particularly when trying to work hilltop sites. For more rural areas, try to get above the treeline if possible. If you're the only one-story house in a block of two-story houses, ouch.
 
Be it ham radio or GMRS, remember that the radio hobby is about communication. This includes, but is not limited to: rag chewing, technical talk, emergency communication, repeater building, proselytizing the wonders of properly configured radios, and being willing to help the confused. A lot of people out there try to assert their dominance over a channel and run around with a better-than-thou mentality, and over the course of your license you'll find at least one of them. They aren't out to improve either service or what each service stands for, so stay away from them. Don't let them change your perception of the radio hobby, either.
 
If you hear confused FRS users on channel 1 that can't get their radios to talk to each other, offer to help. Transmit CTCSS 67.0 and receive CSQ. They'll probably need help configuring CTCSS on their radios. Ask for the model number and look up the manual on Google. Stuff like this happens more often than I'd like to admit, and half the time those people spent a lot of money on those radios. Be a good citizen.
 
Some repeaters will beacon out their callsign. That doesn't mean there's anyone using it. Repeaters aren't supposed to do that, but not everyone has a good repeater controller. It's almost universally agreed upon that such repeater behavior is super annoying.
 
Not all repeaters identify, and that can make it a pain in the rear to figure out who owns the repeater. It's usually private repeaters that don't identify, and some legally don't even have to. It's another fact of life that makes frequency coordination difficult for repeater owners.
 
The FRS channels, especially 1-14, are flooded with business users. They're allowed to be there, and aren't looking for conversation. Let them be. They're close enough together (a few hundred feet, typically) that they won't even notice you're on the same frequency as long as you're on a different CTCSS/DCS code.
 
Not everyone is following the rules. Report egregious violators to the FCC, but don't expect enforcement action. Report criminal activity (eg. terroristic threats, use of radios in a crime) to law enforcement, not the FCC. If you happen to know who the perps are, tell the FCC as well. You probably won't encounter any such activity.
 
If you start getting involved in the commercial radio users crowd, be it on 70cm or GMRS, you'll see a lot of brand loyalty. I'm a Motorola guy, since those are the first commercial radios I got involved with and those radios meet all of my needs. We have a lot of Kenwood folk on here, and boy do they love their TK-880s. Both make rock-solid commercial radios. There's other brands out there, too. Stay away from cheap Chinese radios, those are markedly not rock-solid radios and may not have any type-acceptance whatsoever. It's generally accepted that radios with commercial (Part 90) type acceptance are fine for GMRS (Part 97E) operation, since Part 90 requirements are more stringent in terms of RF performance. While the FCC is yet to make an official exemption, they allude to it frequently in the 2017 rule change discussion.
 
Directional antennas (mostly Yagis or log-periodic antennas at these fequencies) are terrible general purpose antennas, since you need to know the direction towards the stuff you want to talk to. Commercial omnidirectional antennas covering 460-470 MHz at a minimum make the best general-purpose antennas. Browning's BR6157 is a good starter antenna, with some gain and a wide bandwidth. If you spend more than $60 on one before any sales tax, you've overspent.
 
Use FakeSpot when shopping for radios or accessories on Amazon. Don't get ripped off by fake reviews.
 
Monitor channel 1 (again, transmit CTCSS 67.0 and receive CSQ) during disasters. You may save someone's life. Prioritize your safety highest; you're still a victim.
 
Don't be a dillweed on the air that hides from consequences behind a microphone; respect is reciprocal. Not everyone you'll meet understands this.
 
When you got your GMRS license, your whole family just became GMRS licensees as well. Come up with a separate simplex channel for them and them only. It's useful when outdoors, communication between vehicles on road trips, or during disasters. Having a nationwide license to operate a radio without frequency coordination, and with unlicensed operators on FRS, is a beautiful luxury we have on GMRS that you will get nowhere else. Make sure to test your channels ahead of time, and check them regularly if you don't use them often.
 
I mentioned it earlier, but I'll elaborate on it: RTL-SDR is an excellent tool for GMRS. All of the output channels are visible with a spectrum analyzer-type visualization. Interference becomes easy to spot and identify. CTCSS and DCS decoding is straightforward and nearly instant, and works with hardly any signal strength at all. Signal strength readings can be calibrated against an absolute scale (dBm), which allows for comparison between antennas and locations. A fancy setup of them, Kerberos SDR, can do direction finding with real-time map plotting, but requires some technical knowledge. SDR is fairly recent, and there's plenty of user groups online (like Reddit's r/RTLSDR). When shopping for RTL-SDR, don't spend more than $30 for a bare unit, and don't buy anything that doesn't have a 1.0ppm TCXO or better. If the item description doesn't say TCXO, it doesn't have one.  RTL-SDR Blog v3 is a good unit, and the Nooelec NESDR SMArTee performs the same. Throw the RTL-SDR Blog 20dB LNA on there as well, life will be much better. Use a USB 2.0 extension cord with SDRs.
 
Talking on a handheld radio while driving a vehicle is illegal in California under the cell phone laws. Mobiles, with a simple PTT-only hand mic, are fine.
 
Don't get a 16 or 48 channel radio as your first real commercial or commercial-grade radio. Go for something with at least 128 channels and a screen. Get the programming software and cable before you get the radio so you aren't stuck with a paperweight. Don't give money to HamFiles.
 
If you have a lot of long conversations but all you have is your handheld radio, get a mobile radio and a power supply. Use a proper antenna (as discussed earlier) and some low-loss coax (RG-8, LMR-240, or better). PL-259/SO-239, also called the UHF connector, is a terrible connector at UHF. Avoid it wherever possible. Use TNC or N for permanent or semi-permanent connections, and BNC for connections you switch out a lot. Keep your connectors clean and seal any outdoor terminations. Assume each adapter adds 0.5-1dB of loss, so use as few adapters as possible. Get your coax terminated in whatever connector your antenna has; don't leave the adapter outdoors. Mastic tape gums up over time and future you will hate present you. If you use cheap non-outdoors coax like I did, it can get water ingress. SWR will still show a rather normal reading, but the wet insulator will suck up all your RF (easily 99% of it).
 
Good coax is thicker than you think. Take that into consideration.
 
Folk at your local ham radio club, or GMRS club if you live in an area with one, have done enough fixed radio installations to be able to help you with yours. Don't go out alone and do it, but take some notes so you can eventually help others. Honestly, they're not that hard.
 
If you're in a place that gets thunderstorms more than a few times a year, lightning protection is a real concern. Nothing will stop a direct strike, so unplug your equipment during such inclement weather. That's another reason to keep portable radios around.
 
Repeaters almost always use hardline instead of flexible coax. Hardline is expensive and requires special tools. Good feedline is critical on repeaters because you usually have a 40-watt transmitter on the same antennas as a sensitive receiver. Slight non-linear effects, even a rusty fencepost nearby, can cause issues with receiver performance.
 
If you have an opportunity to visit a hilltop repeater site (an opportunity you may get if you're involved with repeater groups), take it. The first trip to one is an experience, and you'll get to see a variety of real-world installations. Hilltop sites are surprisingly dirty; nobody's up there keeping the floors clean. Some sites are cleaner than others. It's often a long drive and fair distance from civilization, so bring a lunch and go to the bathroom before the trip. Some sites require four-wheel drive and an experienced driver to get to. Buy their dinner.
 
Flat areas can get significant coverage from a low-level repeater. Rooftop repeaters actually have decent performance in those environments.
 
Even on rooftop antennas, your simplex range to a five-watt mobile/portable can be as short as two miles. GMRS is heavily influenced by line-of-sight propagation. Building penetration is better than MURS or 2-meters. 

It's probably some ridiculous courtesy tone. SWR issue shouldn't affect that. If the repeater just sends its CWID all the time but nobody actually uses the repeater, there's probably nobody to talk to using it anyways; it wouldn't surprise me if the owner doesn't watch it either.

Coverage maps are hard because GMRS is a line-of-sight communications service. There will be spots where you can be less than 5 miles away from a hilltop repeater and not be able to open its squelch, and there are spots where you're scratchy into a repeater that's 100 miles away. Coverage maps can be very reliable tools if both the mobile station and repeater's powers, losses, and thresholds are properly entered; the correct antenna patterns and heights are used; proper statistical losses are taken into account; and an effort is taken to ensure the topography in the mapping software matches real topography. In my experience, none or very few of these tasks are done when generating a coverage map. Real coverage tends to be much less than the modeled coverage, typically because statistical loss has a huge effect (mobile coverage requires staying above the signal threshold more than n% of the time (I usually model at 70% or 87% depending on band), while spot coverage (often used by default) assumes you're standing still in the peak of a fluttery signal), your antenna (especially if portable) probably has less net gain than whatever mobile station the map-maker simulated coverage with, site noise is a very real thing that will reduce repeater sensitivity, repeater owners may not realize that they are using a directional antenna or tower mounting position, and not many repeater owners are willing to admit that it's possible to have 4 dB of loss between the transmitter and the antenna. Repeater owners and users also like to see good coverage come out of the simulations, regardless of actual coverage, so there's even incentive for misleading coverage maps. So, there's a lot of ways to alter the coverage depicted on a coverage map, and there's so much room for variation (about 25 dB worth) that it's not possible to make repeater-to-repeater comparisons unless the same person made all the maps with correct information.
And unfortunately, it isn't possible for MyGMRS to generate the coverage maps accurately, as there's a lot of room for variation with repeater hardware (dinky little solar power repeater running 5W into a counterfeit Nagoya antenna duct-taped to a chain-link fence, vs. someone running 50 watts into a solid duplexer with preamplified receive and a 10 dBd gain antenna) and repeater locations on the map are not always accurate for various reasons. So, we just generalize coverage into a circle around the repeater's map position. It's easier for a repeater owner to estimate how far their repeater can cover towards population centers than for the owner to generate coverage maps that are correctly parameterized. It's easier for MyGMRS to handle circular coverage patterns than the rasterized geo-referenced images outputted by coverage mapping software.
Radio coverage in general should be taken with a heaping handful of salt due to the wide degrees of variability that are out there, and instead test your actual coverage with a second radio or a friend. And if you know or learn mapping software such as Radio Mobile, you can even make your own coverage maps for estimation if there's enough information about a repeater's location in its MyGMRS listing.

Coverage maps are hard because GMRS is a line-of-sight communications service. There will be spots where you can be less than 5 miles away from a hilltop repeater and not be able to open its squelch, and there are spots where you're scratchy into a repeater that's 100 miles away. Coverage maps can be very reliable tools if both the mobile station and repeater's powers, losses, and thresholds are properly entered; the correct antenna patterns and heights are used; proper statistical losses are taken into account; and an effort is taken to ensure the topography in the mapping software matches real topography. In my experience, none or very few of these tasks are done when generating a coverage map. Real coverage tends to be much less than the modeled coverage, typically because statistical loss has a huge effect (mobile coverage requires staying above the signal threshold more than n% of the time (I usually model at 70% or 87% depending on band), while spot coverage (often used by default) assumes you're standing still in the peak of a fluttery signal), your antenna (especially if portable) probably has less net gain than whatever mobile station the map-maker simulated coverage with, site noise is a very real thing that will reduce repeater sensitivity, repeater owners may not realize that they are using a directional antenna or tower mounting position, and not many repeater owners are willing to admit that it's possible to have 4 dB of loss between the transmitter and the antenna. Repeater owners and users also like to see good coverage come out of the simulations, regardless of actual coverage, so there's even incentive for misleading coverage maps. So, there's a lot of ways to alter the coverage depicted on a coverage map, and there's so much room for variation (about 25 dB worth) that it's not possible to make repeater-to-repeater comparisons unless the same person made all the maps with correct information.
And unfortunately, it isn't possible for MyGMRS to generate the coverage maps accurately, as there's a lot of room for variation with repeater hardware (dinky little solar power repeater running 5W into a counterfeit Nagoya antenna duct-taped to a chain-link fence, vs. someone running 50 watts into a solid duplexer with preamplified receive and a 10 dBd gain antenna) and repeater locations on the map are not always accurate for various reasons. So, we just generalize coverage into a circle around the repeater's map position. It's easier for a repeater owner to estimate how far their repeater can cover towards population centers than for the owner to generate coverage maps that are correctly parameterized. It's easier for MyGMRS to handle circular coverage patterns than the rasterized geo-referenced images outputted by coverage mapping software.
Radio coverage in general should be taken with a heaping handful of salt due to the wide degrees of variability that are out there, and instead test your actual coverage with a second radio or a friend. And if you know or learn mapping software such as Radio Mobile, you can even make your own coverage maps for estimation if there's enough information about a repeater's location in its MyGMRS listing.

Coverage maps are hard because GMRS is a line-of-sight communications service. There will be spots where you can be less than 5 miles away from a hilltop repeater and not be able to open its squelch, and there are spots where you're scratchy into a repeater that's 100 miles away. Coverage maps can be very reliable tools if both the mobile station and repeater's powers, losses, and thresholds are properly entered; the correct antenna patterns and heights are used; proper statistical losses are taken into account; and an effort is taken to ensure the topography in the mapping software matches real topography. In my experience, none or very few of these tasks are done when generating a coverage map. Real coverage tends to be much less than the modeled coverage, typically because statistical loss has a huge effect (mobile coverage requires staying above the signal threshold more than n% of the time (I usually model at 70% or 87% depending on band), while spot coverage (often used by default) assumes you're standing still in the peak of a fluttery signal), your antenna (especially if portable) probably has less net gain than whatever mobile station the map-maker simulated coverage with, site noise is a very real thing that will reduce repeater sensitivity, repeater owners may not realize that they are using a directional antenna or tower mounting position, and not many repeater owners are willing to admit that it's possible to have 4 dB of loss between the transmitter and the antenna. Repeater owners and users also like to see good coverage come out of the simulations, regardless of actual coverage, so there's even incentive for misleading coverage maps. So, there's a lot of ways to alter the coverage depicted on a coverage map, and there's so much room for variation (about 25 dB worth) that it's not possible to make repeater-to-repeater comparisons unless the same person made all the maps with correct information.
And unfortunately, it isn't possible for MyGMRS to generate the coverage maps accurately, as there's a lot of room for variation with repeater hardware (dinky little solar power repeater running 5W into a counterfeit Nagoya antenna duct-taped to a chain-link fence, vs. someone running 50 watts into a solid duplexer with preamplified receive and a 10 dBd gain antenna) and repeater locations on the map are not always accurate for various reasons. So, we just generalize coverage into a circle around the repeater's map position. It's easier for a repeater owner to estimate how far their repeater can cover towards population centers than for the owner to generate coverage maps that are correctly parameterized. It's easier for MyGMRS to handle circular coverage patterns than the rasterized geo-referenced images outputted by coverage mapping software.
Radio coverage in general should be taken with a heaping handful of salt due to the wide degrees of variability that are out there, and instead test your actual coverage with a second radio or a friend. And if you know or learn mapping software such as Radio Mobile, you can even make your own coverage maps for estimation if there's enough information about a repeater's location in its MyGMRS listing.

Wideband has a slight advantage (3dB) over narrowband when it comes to sensitivity. Cutting the bandwidth in half requires 6dB more power to get the same signal-to-noise ratio, but 3dB comes from having the noise power on the narrower receive IF filter. On business radio systems, this may not matter; but on GMRS, the users tend to be dispersed further as operating area isn't constrained by the license and minimal frequency coordination takes place. This effect also causes mobile flutter to be more pronounced. On modern commercial radios designed for narrowband use, the strong-signal voice quality doesn't take much of a hit when moving to narrowband channels.
 
We can't get any more pairs because FRS is already authorized for the 467 MHz interstitials. We'd need to go to 6.25 kHz ultra-narrowbanding (NXDN48 or dPMR) and use some odd channels (462.546875, 462.553125, 462.559375, ...), which won't happen anyways because digital voice isn't allowed. Adjacent ultra-narrowband channels would also interfere unless frequency accuracy is well-controlled, which raises equipment cost considerably (particularly for portables) and requires realignment during the equipment's service life. Additionally, wideband users would take interference from any of four ultra-narrowband channels, and narrowband users would take interference from any of two ultra-narrowband channels. The end result is even less voice capacity than before, unless everyone goes ultra-narrowband and maintains their equipment to high standards.
 
The repeater operator always has the option to narrowband should they want to, but there's no benefit unless there's significant adjacent-channel interference, all of the radios are properly configured for narrowband (travelers are probably not), and the radios used on the system have proper 12.5 kHz IF filters (the GMRS-V1 does not). A narrowband mandate would also screw up equipment certifications and cause the FCC to get a big headache over something that is not really a problem at all.

No. Part 90 is not your party line.
 
90.403(a), (d), and (e) all limit your communications to only the permitted uses in 90.405, and ( will hold the licensee responsible for any violations, regardless of who is transmitting under the Part 90 license.
90.405(a)(2) limits your communications to transmissions directly related and necessary to your Part 90 eligibility. Unnecessary communications clog up the limited frequency pool for other eligible Part 90 licensees; they too are paying for a license, and interfering with their essential communications with your non-essential communications can warrant FCC investigation.
90.427(a) makes it extremely unwise to publish your operating frequency and access codes to the public, as you become responsible for a stranger's operation. 90.433© also makes you responsible for their radios, and 90.443( expects you to have some sort of Part 90 compliance information for each radio used, in addition to records of all maintenance. If you're not in direct control of the radios used on your license, station inspection (which you're making yourself an easy target for) will get messy.
 
If you're claiming eligibility with some purpose you stretched the truth to make, most of your communications won't be necessary and incidental to the operations stated in your eligibility, violating 90.403. If you make up a purpose you have no intention of fulfilling, you're lying on an official form submitted to the federal government and committing a crime; furthermore, you will not be making essential communications as the eligibility does not exist and no essential communications can be made, further violating 90.403.
 
If you're going to get a commercial license because you are performing commercial activities, go right ahead. That does not authorize you to use a Part 90 authorization to do your Part 95 activities. That is what Part 97 is for. I won't condone the recommendation of Part 90 when the stated purpose of operation is in conflict with the FCC rules and better fulfilled by other services.

And with the current system of 'hide offline repeaters' and 'hide outdated listings', a lot of the repeaters that have been around for a long time get hidden by those settings and mixed in with the dead repeaters. There absolutely needs to be a user-reported repeater status function.
 
Most of the repeaters in my area aren't actually listed on MyGMRS, and those that are listed are inactive or offline. It makes frequency coordination an absolute pain. I'd consider the output tone 'public' information as well since it typically identifies a system uniquely within an a particular area and channel, and gets transmitted along with the carrier. Keeping that information hidden when reading a 'found repeater' report makes it hard to tell if that reported repeater is actually the one you're hearing. This could also help with people claiming ownership of repeaters they do not actually own.
 
When I first got my repeater, I used a particular frequency and tone that was in use nearby. Due to California's highly variable topography, I couldn't hear the incumbent user's repeater when I was doing frequency surveying, but the coverage area overlap was a serious issue. I had to reprogram the repeater and several radios, and get the cavities re-tuned to a different pair, because the only people currently allowed to report a repeater's existence are the owners.
 
Many repeater owners don't want their repeater's existence or site location to become public knowledge. I do believe it's against public interest to enable that behavior, since the 8 GMRS channels are all accessible to the public and there is no right to privacy on what information is sent over the repeater's output channel. However, there needs to be limitations on access to what specific information can be seen by other users. Frequency, output tone(s), general location, and CWID (if any) can all be narrowed down quickly with a receive-only station or two, and it may also be possible to determine whether a repeater is open or not (only the owner can give the final verdict). The user-reported repeater entries should be marked separately from owner-reported entries since there's no way to attest to the accuracy of the information, and there needs to be some inquiry as to whether there's an abuse potential for such a system that would make the risks outweigh the benefits. Personally, I think there's much more benefit than risk, and Repeaterbook uses a similar system for their ham repeater listings. Over there, change history isn't made public (allowing non-public information accidentally contributed to be removed), and the repeater owners can hide all information beyond frequency, callsign, public/private system, and on/off-air status. Unlike ham bands, there's heavy frequency reuse on GMRS because 8 channels is a lot less than several hundred channels, so there needs to be a more granular way of identifying repeaters beyond using the frequency alone. I think it could also be worth allowing 'found repeater' reports to include general comments, such as hangtime duration, activity level, or peculiarities with the repeater; but anything suggesting the input tone should be censored.

It depends on how the repeater is set up. Some have a really sensitive squelch threshold, others require a lot of quieting before the repeater unmutes. Some repeaters also have insensitive receivers, resulting in you hearing the repeater much better than it hears you. Combine a touchy squelch with a deaf receiver and you'll have a repeater that you sound very scratchy into, but you'll always hear the repeater's tail clearly.

toggle on the show offline and outdated repeaters to see them all

If I'm working simplex, I'll usually say something like "WRAF213, on 675" for the main channels, or "WRAF213, on channel 1" for the interstitials. It's a good idea to say which channel you're on so folks using scan will be able to find your transmission easily.
 
On repeaters, I'll include the repeater name/tone when calling someone, otherwise I just drop in my callsign or even just the suffix. If I needed to hear a monologue when someone hops on a repeater, I'd just go back to the WIN System.
 
I hang out on channel 1 a fair bit, but only pipe up to help people who can't get radios talking together; SDR instantly tells me their channel settings, and I only talk to the parents/adults. I scare the crap outta all the kids in a 5 mile radius whenever I get on that channel, though. It's much more fun from hilltops.

If I'm working simplex, I'll usually say something like "WRAF213, on 675" for the main channels, or "WRAF213, on channel 1" for the interstitials. It's a good idea to say which channel you're on so folks using scan will be able to find your transmission easily.
 
On repeaters, I'll include the repeater name/tone when calling someone, otherwise I just drop in my callsign or even just the suffix. If I needed to hear a monologue when someone hops on a repeater, I'd just go back to the WIN System.
 
I hang out on channel 1 a fair bit, but only pipe up to help people who can't get radios talking together; SDR instantly tells me their channel settings, and I only talk to the parents/adults. I scare the crap outta all the kids in a 5 mile radius whenever I get on that channel, though. It's much more fun from hilltops.

But it's important to realize when it's not practical to pay for more selectivity. Good commercial handhelds have enough selectivity to allow full-duplex operation by one operator, with a few feet of antenna separation. Good mobiles do better than that. If that's not enough desense protection, there's other issues at play. There's no improvement to be made if there isn't an issue, so it's just wasted money and/or lost functionality.
 
CCRs work just fine as transceivers for 99% of the population. Yes, they don't work in the busy RF environments found at an enthusiast's base station, a command post, or when working near other operators on different in-band channels. They're cheap, show people what the hobby can offer, and include a lot of features (like FPP and ridiculous channel capacity) that new operators need to find their niche within the hobby and understand what parameters need to be configured to operate cleanly on someone else's system. And when they break (probably due to a novice operator blowing out the finals or dropping it), it's not a big investment being lost. They exist in the market for a reason: because they do work, unlike what the topic's title implies. They wouldn't sell if they didn't. It's important to understand their limitations, but they're not as severe as you're making it out to be.

Look at how little filtering the RT-22 has. There's all sorts of unpopulated pads on the production model that aren't on the FCC submitted model. I bet those harmonics aren't 50dB down on production models.
 
 
Again, you're in a highly unconventional RF environment, RF power coming from the Candelabra transmitters through a typical UHF passband (370-530 MHz) should be in the ballpark of 0dBm. Most people are around -50dBm. That's a HUGE difference.
 
That said, CCRs aren't meant to be used on fixed antennas; they're designed to be used as portable radios. Most handhelds will show measurable desense on a high-gain base antenna, CCR or not. The typical CCR construction with a wide-open frontend happens to have a lot more desense. In open spaces away from other transmitters, they have a slight advantage due to less filtering loss.
 
They have their place, and that's on-site business use on the hip; can't desense if the strongest transmitter is the repeater you're using. They also work good enough for amateur use that people keep buying them. Few people in reality will cite receive performance as a reason to upgrade from a D878UV or something to a Motorola or Kenwood, it's mostly for audio quality.
 
 
Over here, where the noise floor is high on VHF, I get better coverage on GMRS than MURS, and better 800 MHz Part 90 reception than 460 MHz Part 90 reception. In my experiences with line-of-sight conditions, the higher gain from UHF antennas gives better audio (helps to make up for deep fades, which are briefer on UHF), while in mobile-to-mobile situations with some separation VHF has an advantage in punching through terrain. UHF has much better spot coverage. For mobile-to-mobile operation, ~50W out into a gain antenna on GMRS should give universally better coverage than your Part 95 compliant MURS setup. Portable-to-portable simplex will be much more variable due to terrain. Noise floor is also an important consideration in urban environments, and lower frequencies will have more noise than higher frequencies.

Look at how little filtering the RT-22 has. There's all sorts of unpopulated pads on the production model that aren't on the FCC submitted model. I bet those harmonics aren't 50dB down on production models.
 
 
Again, you're in a highly unconventional RF environment, RF power coming from the Candelabra transmitters through a typical UHF passband (370-530 MHz) should be in the ballpark of 0dBm. Most people are around -50dBm. That's a HUGE difference.
 
That said, CCRs aren't meant to be used on fixed antennas; they're designed to be used as portable radios. Most handhelds will show measurable desense on a high-gain base antenna, CCR or not. The typical CCR construction with a wide-open frontend happens to have a lot more desense. In open spaces away from other transmitters, they have a slight advantage due to less filtering loss.
 
They have their place, and that's on-site business use on the hip; can't desense if the strongest transmitter is the repeater you're using. They also work good enough for amateur use that people keep buying them. Few people in reality will cite receive performance as a reason to upgrade from a D878UV or something to a Motorola or Kenwood, it's mostly for audio quality.
 
 
Over here, where the noise floor is high on VHF, I get better coverage on GMRS than MURS, and better 800 MHz Part 90 reception than 460 MHz Part 90 reception. In my experiences with line-of-sight conditions, the higher gain from UHF antennas gives better audio (helps to make up for deep fades, which are briefer on UHF), while in mobile-to-mobile situations with some separation VHF has an advantage in punching through terrain. UHF has much better spot coverage. For mobile-to-mobile operation, ~50W out into a gain antenna on GMRS should give universally better coverage than your Part 95 compliant MURS setup. Portable-to-portable simplex will be much more variable due to terrain. Noise floor is also an important consideration in urban environments, and lower frequencies will have more noise than higher frequencies.

Look at how little filtering the RT-22 has. There's all sorts of unpopulated pads on the production model that aren't on the FCC submitted model. I bet those harmonics aren't 50dB down on production models.
 
 
Again, you're in a highly unconventional RF environment, RF power coming from the Candelabra transmitters through a typical UHF passband (370-530 MHz) should be in the ballpark of 0dBm. Most people are around -50dBm. That's a HUGE difference.
 
That said, CCRs aren't meant to be used on fixed antennas; they're designed to be used as portable radios. Most handhelds will show measurable desense on a high-gain base antenna, CCR or not. The typical CCR construction with a wide-open frontend happens to have a lot more desense. In open spaces away from other transmitters, they have a slight advantage due to less filtering loss.
 
They have their place, and that's on-site business use on the hip; can't desense if the strongest transmitter is the repeater you're using. They also work good enough for amateur use that people keep buying them. Few people in reality will cite receive performance as a reason to upgrade from a D878UV or something to a Motorola or Kenwood, it's mostly for audio quality.
 
 
Over here, where the noise floor is high on VHF, I get better coverage on GMRS than MURS, and better 800 MHz Part 90 reception than 460 MHz Part 90 reception. In my experiences with line-of-sight conditions, the higher gain from UHF antennas gives better audio (helps to make up for deep fades, which are briefer on UHF), while in mobile-to-mobile situations with some separation VHF has an advantage in punching through terrain. UHF has much better spot coverage. For mobile-to-mobile operation, ~50W out into a gain antenna on GMRS should give universally better coverage than your Part 95 compliant MURS setup. Portable-to-portable simplex will be much more variable due to terrain. Noise floor is also an important consideration in urban environments, and lower frequencies will have more noise than higher frequencies.

Yeah, being within that distance of a broadcaster is the real problem at hand. Based on your symptoms, I'm assuming there's UHF TV broadcast on that tower in the 500 MHz band (which is almost all that's left of UHF TV). TV typically runs tens to hundreds of kilowatts, and any internal or external mixing products of TV broadcast may resemble noise due to the DTV modulation. FM is more easily controlled and the harmonics aren't in-band (fourth harmonic ends at 432.2 MHz), but that still requires strong filtering. To do an actual check of your RF environment and noise floor, you'd need a good spectrum analyzer that stays linear up to at least 10dBm; most quality equipment is rated up to +30dBm.
 
If you've got noise that appears to be in-band but cavity filters improve the situation, you've probably got intermod going on. Band-reject filters near the antenna can help with that. If filtering near the receiver doesn't improve in-band performance to a satisfactory level, PIM may be at play. Right now, intermod and overload effects could mask a generally crap noise floor from unintentional radiators; don't expect to dive in with hundreds of dollars of equipment and hit thermal noise floor (though you'll have to spend a little bit more to avoid PIM and ensure linearity of any active components). A noise power of -125dBm/16 kHz is pretty typical for a quiet area, compared to thermal noise floor at -131dBm/16 kHz. HDMI/DVI are particularly egregious noisemakers on UHF LMR bands, especially with AliExpress-quality cables. LMR-400 would make a mess of your RF environment.
 
Overload effects don't cause CCRs to not be heard, it simply knocks out their ability to hear. Any RDA1846 design will show desense on almost any rooftop antenna anyways; they're meant to be used with unity-gain antennas attached to the unit and work rather well in that scenario. Desense on the stock antenna or equivalent is only encountered in rather exceptional RF environments.

Absolutely, finding higher ground should be the first step towards improving a setup. Running more power only matters on fixed setups where the antenna is already as good as it can get, or on mobile operation where there is no 'finding a good spot'. Even then, there's not a huge difference between 15 and 40 watts.
 
Here's my first piece of advice for new users (and I have a bunch, fair warning): use scan mode on a radio that will tell you the active CTCSS tone or DCS code if you're looking for repeaters to use. RTL-SDR is also a good tool, and makes the entire 462 MHz band visible with good sensitivity and excellent selectivity.
 
Especially on fixed setups, grounding is important. Noise will get picked up along the coax and travel up to the antenna, where it enters the receiver. The effect is very apparent on SDRs, where the noise floor is directly visible. When grounding a setup, check for ground loops with a multimeter.
 
Learn to recognize the busy-channel indicator on your radio. When the radio detects any activity on the channel, regardless of correct CTCSS/DCS, it'll turn on the busy-channel indicator. It'll help you to know if you have the correct CTCSS/DCS for a particular system. Some repeaters use multiple CTCSS/DCS, so this indicator can be useful on those repeaters to make sure you aren't interfering with a different conversation. On Baofeng's radios, this is the green LED on top of the radio. On Motorola's commercial radios, this is a blinking red or green LED near the antenna; on their FRS/GMRS radios, this is the red LED above the display.
 
Some repeaters transmit CTCSS/DCS back to you, but only while someone is transmitting to it. If you're hitting the repeater but can't hear it come back to you once you finish transmitting, this could be a possible cause. Use the monitor feature on your radio or check the busy-channel indicator to check for the repeater's tail.
 
Don't be afraid to try simplex. If you hear a callsign with variable signal strength, they're probably not going through a repeater. It's rare to find contacts that way, but that's largely because hardly anyone calls for contacts on simplex. 462.5625 (channel 1), transmit and receive CSQ; and 462.6750 (channel 20), transmit CTCSS 141.3 and receive CSQ are good places to try calling CQ.
 
People who use MDC-1200 on their radios don't actually have to hear the data bursts, the radio can detect the burst and mute it. It gets annoying so most people with MDC-1200 radios have their radios like that.
 
This forum sure does love their Kenwood TK-880s and Motorola M1225s. They're great radios, but terrible general-purpose radios. Virtually all commercial radios can only be programmed by computer software, so you have to know ahead of time what you're going to talk to. Speaking of commercial radios, used Motorola HT1000 radios are incredibly durable and inexpensive. They use the same programming
 
Don't waste your money on the BTech GMRS mobiles, the quality control is practically absent. The GMRS-V1 is apparently alright and Part 95 accepted. Use CHIRP for programming; it will save a lot of time and headaches, while allowing for named channels.
 
When buying a used radio online, make sure the frequency range actually includes 462-468 MHz. For handheld radios, make sure that you are getting (or already have) a charger and antenna. The battery is probably shot, so include a replacement in your budgeting. I like to have at least one spare battery, so I can continue using the radio while a battery is charging. Don't transmit on a handheld radio while it's charging.
 
Counterfeit antennas are a thing, especially with Nagoya. Buy from trusted sources, or find a friend with an antenna analyzer or VNA who'd be willing to show you how to see if an antenna is good or trash. Be willing to learn how to use test equipment, or at least be aware of what that test equipment is testing. It'll help greatly in the future when you are faced with new problems.
 
GMRS isn't ham radio, but it's often used pretty similarly to 70cm. Ham radio clubs are still a useful resource where you can make lots of friends with lots of knowledge. If you don't have a ham license, they'll pressure you to get one. A Technician-class license is easy to get, costs much less than your GMRS license, and you may even be able to use the same antenna for 70cm. Different clubs have different focuses, so don't get discouraged if you don't feel a particular club is right for you. Depending on the area, hams may not like GMRS for one reason or another; but recognize the common interest in establishing reliable communications between licensed operators.
 
There's a 30 MHz gap between 70cm and GMRS, so most 70cm antennas with appreciable gain don't work on GMRS (and remember you're usually transmitting at 467 MHz, not 462 MHz). Check your antenna's documentation to see how much bandwidth you have. Most handheld antennas are broadband enough, and most commercial-band antennas actually work better on GMRS.
 
Don't put up a repeater until you know exactly what you're doing. There's enough deaf GMRS repeaters out there. Don't take on the task alone, either. The more support you have, the better (and, for you, cheaper) the repeater can be. Even a low hilltop provides significantly more coverage than a rooftop repeater. Sites cost money, but can cost a heck of a lot less if you get to know some repeater folk and can make a good sales pitch. Don't use LMR-400 for repeaters.
 
Getting above the roofline makes a big difference in suburban areas, particularly when trying to work hilltop sites. For more rural areas, try to get above the treeline if possible. If you're the only one-story house in a block of two-story houses, ouch.
 
Be it ham radio or GMRS, remember that the radio hobby is about communication. This includes, but is not limited to: rag chewing, technical talk, emergency communication, repeater building, proselytizing the wonders of properly configured radios, and being willing to help the confused. A lot of people out there try to assert their dominance over a channel and run around with a better-than-thou mentality, and over the course of your license you'll find at least one of them. They aren't out to improve either service or what each service stands for, so stay away from them. Don't let them change your perception of the radio hobby, either.
 
If you hear confused FRS users on channel 1 that can't get their radios to talk to each other, offer to help. Transmit CTCSS 67.0 and receive CSQ. They'll probably need help configuring CTCSS on their radios. Ask for the model number and look up the manual on Google. Stuff like this happens more often than I'd like to admit, and half the time those people spent a lot of money on those radios. Be a good citizen.
 
Some repeaters will beacon out their callsign. That doesn't mean there's anyone using it. Repeaters aren't supposed to do that, but not everyone has a good repeater controller. It's almost universally agreed upon that such repeater behavior is super annoying.
 
Not all repeaters identify, and that can make it a pain in the rear to figure out who owns the repeater. It's usually private repeaters that don't identify, and some legally don't even have to. It's another fact of life that makes frequency coordination difficult for repeater owners.
 
The FRS channels, especially 1-14, are flooded with business users. They're allowed to be there, and aren't looking for conversation. Let them be. They're close enough together (a few hundred feet, typically) that they won't even notice you're on the same frequency as long as you're on a different CTCSS/DCS code.
 
Not everyone is following the rules. Report egregious violators to the FCC, but don't expect enforcement action. Report criminal activity (eg. terroristic threats, use of radios in a crime) to law enforcement, not the FCC. If you happen to know who the perps are, tell the FCC as well. You probably won't encounter any such activity.
 
If you start getting involved in the commercial radio users crowd, be it on 70cm or GMRS, you'll see a lot of brand loyalty. I'm a Motorola guy, since those are the first commercial radios I got involved with and those radios meet all of my needs. We have a lot of Kenwood folk on here, and boy do they love their TK-880s. Both make rock-solid commercial radios. There's other brands out there, too. Stay away from cheap Chinese radios, those are markedly not rock-solid radios and may not have any type-acceptance whatsoever. It's generally accepted that radios with commercial (Part 90) type acceptance are fine for GMRS (Part 97E) operation, since Part 90 requirements are more stringent in terms of RF performance. While the FCC is yet to make an official exemption, they allude to it frequently in the 2017 rule change discussion.
 
Directional antennas (mostly Yagis or log-periodic antennas at these fequencies) are terrible general purpose antennas, since you need to know the direction towards the stuff you want to talk to. Commercial omnidirectional antennas covering 460-470 MHz at a minimum make the best general-purpose antennas. Browning's BR6157 is a good starter antenna, with some gain and a wide bandwidth. If you spend more than $60 on one before any sales tax, you've overspent.
 
Use FakeSpot when shopping for radios or accessories on Amazon. Don't get ripped off by fake reviews.
 
Monitor channel 1 (again, transmit CTCSS 67.0 and receive CSQ) during disasters. You may save someone's life. Prioritize your safety highest; you're still a victim.
 
Don't be a dillweed on the air that hides from consequences behind a microphone; respect is reciprocal. Not everyone you'll meet understands this.
 
When you got your GMRS license, your whole family just became GMRS licensees as well. Come up with a separate simplex channel for them and them only. It's useful when outdoors, communication between vehicles on road trips, or during disasters. Having a nationwide license to operate a radio without frequency coordination, and with unlicensed operators on FRS, is a beautiful luxury we have on GMRS that you will get nowhere else. Make sure to test your channels ahead of time, and check them regularly if you don't use them often.
 
I mentioned it earlier, but I'll elaborate on it: RTL-SDR is an excellent tool for GMRS. All of the output channels are visible with a spectrum analyzer-type visualization. Interference becomes easy to spot and identify. CTCSS and DCS decoding is straightforward and nearly instant, and works with hardly any signal strength at all. Signal strength readings can be calibrated against an absolute scale (dBm), which allows for comparison between antennas and locations. A fancy setup of them, Kerberos SDR, can do direction finding with real-time map plotting, but requires some technical knowledge. SDR is fairly recent, and there's plenty of user groups online (like Reddit's r/RTLSDR). When shopping for RTL-SDR, don't spend more than $30 for a bare unit, and don't buy anything that doesn't have a 1.0ppm TCXO or better. If the item description doesn't say TCXO, it doesn't have one.  RTL-SDR Blog v3 is a good unit, and the Nooelec NESDR SMArTee performs the same. Throw the RTL-SDR Blog 20dB LNA on there as well, life will be much better. Use a USB 2.0 extension cord with SDRs.
 
Talking on a handheld radio while driving a vehicle is illegal in California under the cell phone laws. Mobiles, with a simple PTT-only hand mic, are fine.
 
Don't get a 16 or 48 channel radio as your first real commercial or commercial-grade radio. Go for something with at least 128 channels and a screen. Get the programming software and cable before you get the radio so you aren't stuck with a paperweight. Don't give money to HamFiles.
 
If you have a lot of long conversations but all you have is your handheld radio, get a mobile radio and a power supply. Use a proper antenna (as discussed earlier) and some low-loss coax (RG-8, LMR-240, or better). PL-259/SO-239, also called the UHF connector, is a terrible connector at UHF. Avoid it wherever possible. Use TNC or N for permanent or semi-permanent connections, and BNC for connections you switch out a lot. Keep your connectors clean and seal any outdoor terminations. Assume each adapter adds 0.5-1dB of loss, so use as few adapters as possible. Get your coax terminated in whatever connector your antenna has; don't leave the adapter outdoors. Mastic tape gums up over time and future you will hate present you. If you use cheap non-outdoors coax like I did, it can get water ingress. SWR will still show a rather normal reading, but the wet insulator will suck up all your RF (easily 99% of it).
 
Good coax is thicker than you think. Take that into consideration.
 
Folk at your local ham radio club, or GMRS club if you live in an area with one, have done enough fixed radio installations to be able to help you with yours. Don't go out alone and do it, but take some notes so you can eventually help others. Honestly, they're not that hard.
 
If you're in a place that gets thunderstorms more than a few times a year, lightning protection is a real concern. Nothing will stop a direct strike, so unplug your equipment during such inclement weather. That's another reason to keep portable radios around.
 
Repeaters almost always use hardline instead of flexible coax. Hardline is expensive and requires special tools. Good feedline is critical on repeaters because you usually have a 40-watt transmitter on the same antennas as a sensitive receiver. Slight non-linear effects, even a rusty fencepost nearby, can cause issues with receiver performance.
 
If you have an opportunity to visit a hilltop repeater site (an opportunity you may get if you're involved with repeater groups), take it. The first trip to one is an experience, and you'll get to see a variety of real-world installations. Hilltop sites are surprisingly dirty; nobody's up there keeping the floors clean. Some sites are cleaner than others. It's often a long drive and fair distance from civilization, so bring a lunch and go to the bathroom before the trip. Some sites require four-wheel drive and an experienced driver to get to. Buy their dinner.
 
Flat areas can get significant coverage from a low-level repeater. Rooftop repeaters actually have decent performance in those environments.
 
Even on rooftop antennas, your simplex range to a five-watt mobile/portable can be as short as two miles. GMRS is heavily influenced by line-of-sight propagation. Building penetration is better than MURS or 2-meters. 

But it's important to realize when it's not practical to pay for more selectivity. Good commercial handhelds have enough selectivity to allow full-duplex operation by one operator, with a few feet of antenna separation. Good mobiles do better than that. If that's not enough desense protection, there's other issues at play. There's no improvement to be made if there isn't an issue, so it's just wasted money and/or lost functionality.
 
CCRs work just fine as transceivers for 99% of the population. Yes, they don't work in the busy RF environments found at an enthusiast's base station, a command post, or when working near other operators on different in-band channels. They're cheap, show people what the hobby can offer, and include a lot of features (like FPP and ridiculous channel capacity) that new operators need to find their niche within the hobby and understand what parameters need to be configured to operate cleanly on someone else's system. And when they break (probably due to a novice operator blowing out the finals or dropping it), it's not a big investment being lost. They exist in the market for a reason: because they do work, unlike what the topic's title implies. They wouldn't sell if they didn't. It's important to understand their limitations, but they're not as severe as you're making it out to be.

Yes, I'd like to see how the tests were done. At best, it's demonstrating adjacent channel selectivity and receiver sensitivity. It's also generalizing all CCRs into the GD-77, which is quite reckless. So, we're trying to point out that these radios are junk, yet trusting the totally-not-copied-and-pasted selectivity measurements the manufacturer provided? Is repeater selectivity measured with cavity filters installed? If your noise floor is -50dBm you should be getting cooked alive.
 
One odd point to mention is that a dBu to dBm conversion isn't as straightforward as it sounds since a lot of handheld radios (especially CCRs) don't present exactly 50 ohms at the antenna.
 
I played around with a service monitor and found that my Connect Systems CS-580 had a receiver that was hotter than any of my commercial radios, and it also has a proper 12.5 kHz channel bandwidth for the narrowband setting (which doesn't really matter since I bet you're using it in wideband anyways).
 
For a well designed receiver, selectivity is a compromise with sensitivity. You can add preselectors and tracking filters, but all of those add insertion loss, which contributes to noise figure. Most CCRs run nearly naked, so the frontend-on-a-chip is exposed behind only a LNA and probably some highpass filters. They can get very sensitive, but this leaves them prone to desense from signals not necessarily near the receiver's frequency. Either way, desense is more complicated than this graph can show.

For folk that "can't stand talking to the same people every day", there sure are a lot that get real angry if someone tries to enter a conversation.
 
Most 2-meter repeaters and open, linked 70cm repeater systems around here are welcoming of new users and make it pretty clear that they are. It's just a friendlier place to start out on a $25-$50 handheld.

Record it then play back slow.