LeoG

Well, this isn't encouraging. I checked the resistance and it bounced a lot but more or less settled at around 10 ohms. Checked my mobile and it's open circuit. The cable was acting like a capacitor to a point sweeping up and then down to settle at 8.9 ohms. That sounds like the resistance of 50' of wire to me. Wish I had an old fashion analog meter with a needle.

If I were to take a resistance reading on the coax with the antenna connected I assume it should read open, of course disconnected from the repeater. Not exactly much I can do from the ground. And access to the antenna is difficult right now being up there. But I have a feeling if this persists it's going to have to come down to be inspected. At that point I'll put my power meter terminated with a dummy load at the end of the run to see what's actually getting there.

All of what you said are how I've based my thoughts, back from my knowledge of installing CB stuff. Other than not realizing the RG8 cable was more waterproof than the LMR400. I expected quite a bit of protection from the tube. I made sure the coax was centered and had no contact with the tube also. I thought it would be very difficult for water to actually get into the fittings with the setup they provided. I thought maybe air moisture might be able to get in there eventually but not physical rain getting into the connector itself. As for grounding my thought was it's mainly for lighting/static protection and not really an antenna ground. That the ground plane provided what the antenna needed to function properly.

So it made my performance much worse? Right now I don't have a physical ground. It's a metal building, metal mast with a metal support. Not sure if the side of the building actually has ground contact in any manor but I'm betting it does. I was using the ground plane as my ground until I get the setup permanent at which point the system was going to get it's true ground.

Well it's been the weekend and the problem still persisted. When it was raining I was doing some testing and the signal waned. I expected it. After it stopped I wasn't sure what to expect because all those trees in my way now had wet leaves. But I came back from visiting my grandkids over the weekend and the problem still existed. In my CB days I never sealed the fittings. And I know CB and UHF are drastically different. So I'm just running on antiquated knowledge.

OK, I seem to have an issue. After I lowered the squelch to 1 and had much better results we had a rain storm. No lighting or anything like that, just rain. My SWR stayed the same. The power output from the repeater went from 6.4 watts to 7.8 watts. The distance I was able to achieve dropped dramatically. Down to something like 1/4 mile, even in the direction with no trees which I had about 5+ miles. Any guess to what might be going on here? The antenna has a SO239 connector as well as its mate on the LMR400 coax. The MA-09 antenna has an aluminum tube that covers the connectors/connection and I would say it would protect it from rain. Was there something I should have done to seal the connection?

Bingo. Thanks.

Does anyone know what the "S" is on the display here?

52, 53 and 54 allow you to use those frequencies when you are in the open mode (unlocked) Not sure what the #32 is for.

Well I plan on doing a testing phase since I think the trees are killing my signal. It rained and the distance after the rain ended was really reduced. Thinking all the water hanging on the leaves. So I am going to take some 16 ft 2x4s and join them together to get 48 ft off the ground. And if that doesn't clear it I'll add another 16 ft to that. And if that doesn't work the repeater system will go to the house and just be local for me and my family. I got permission from my landlord at the shop to put up a 50 ft mast if I wanted to. Concrete pad and then attached to the building near the peak and another 24' free standing if the specs say it'll work. It's something similar to one of the Rohn tower parts. 10' tower pcs put together to reach to the sky. If it needs to be guyed then that's out too.

Choose paper for English. And yes, everyone gets this same question. Not sure if they think it's funny. But it is. Can't wait to see the video that emerges from this LOL

The only difference between the tone and the digital was the digital didn't pretend to transmit. But with either activated and zero squelch it wouldn't receive a signal and re-transmit it. So squelch level 1 it is.

Ya, if there was a beep I would have engaged it. But nothing of the sort unfortunately. Thanks for the suggestion anyway.

The Retevis software is pretty basic. Squelch settings include going from 0-9 and that's it.

On the way home (of course) I thought it might work with a Digital tone instead of a frequency tone. With white noise all tones are there all the time, so maybe it's being triggered. I really doubt it, but it's something that can be tried. I'm figuring that setting 1 is as good as it's going to get. This is where digital has the disadvantage. Whole numbers vs continuously variable with a squelch knob. Instead of whole number 1 squelch. If it had a knob you might be able to get away with .5 or .7 squelch in analog.

No go on the Ze-ro The repeater says it's transmitting but has no power output. I can't key in with an HT. Just sits there dead with static on the speaker of the repeater. As soon as I set it back to 1 all is good. So much for that experiment. But squelch on 1 has helped significantly. I am still going to need that antenna up higher.

I had a very specific spot where it stopped responding to the HT. I perceived that as range of the repeater. I thought it should go farther but there's those trees. And after seeing the squelch level default it occurred to me that the squelch setting might be what is limiting me and not the transmitter power and leaves. I'm at the shop right now and I'm going to set it to zero and see what happens. Thanks Steve

Right now currently I am running a CTCSS tone on my channel. I have the repeater setup for 16 channels, really 8x2 channels and each has a different setting so when I change (while experimenting) I can see what might work better. Currently I am on 725 and a 100Hz tone with my squelch at 1. The basic wonder for me is if I set it to zero is there the possibility of the repeater triggering on the noise. I expect no, because it's waiting for the tone. And does setting the squelch give me more range because it can now "hear" my HT further out. Not saying that my range will increase like it has more power. I guess just saying because it's more sensitive to the input signal therefore it will respond to the weaker signal. I think I've already proven it because I can tag my repeater farther out, nearer to my house. But it still has a tough time getting down to the middle of the hill I'm on reliably. At this point I'm sure the signal will be almost worthless full of static. But I'm getting there and starting to understand some things I didn't know I needed to know LOL.

OK, now I have a question. When I set the repeater up it was at squelch level 5 and I moved it down to 3 apparently. I was thinking about it last night when I went into the settings program and saw that default was 5. I actually didn't realize that I had put it down to 3. So today I put it down to 1 and low and behold I got more distance. Makes sense because it makes it more sensitive to input levels. Now is there a proper squelch level for a repeater? Should I have it at zero? And I tried the eliminate squelch tail function in the repeater and it did exactly that. Killed it 100%. But that also means I can't hear when I'm connecting by myself so I put it back to it's default off position. Any insight on what the squelch should be set at would be helpful.

I started looking around for a pad that had it on it. For about $100 or so you can get something. Now I figure EOL is coming up soon and wanted to get one with Win11. But they aren't giving those away like the Win10 ones. My wife's computer is Win10, but she doesn't like me playing on it.

This is the first time I've run into EOL on Win7, Chirp next. Otherwise it's been pretty happily chugging along. Some of the symbols on the internet don't show up right anymore. The little magnifying glass that represents "search" now can show up and a letter combination "fl" for some odd reason.

Looks like it's too late for that. Let'm have it LOL.

I remember when they said that Win10 was going to be the last Windows platform. That it was going to just be continuously upgraded but that was it. Then they announced Win11. And like you said, I guess the old Ferrari needed to be replaced because the ashtray was dirty.

I have the same issue. Win7 computer and cannot install CHIRP next. I can install the legacy version but it doesn't work with the TF-H3 radio. Install doesn't go and says needs Win10 to be installed.

Reasoning that the weight of the cable can pull on the antenna or fitting and damaging either could have some merit. But as a drip loop that seems silly. Of course it will work as a drip loop. But the whole assembly is in the rain and will get wet. There is no reason to have the drip loop any place other than where the coax enters a building to keep water from penetrating. As for the loop acting as an inductor and attracting lightning I find that a bit hard to fathom. One loop of shielded wire isn't much of an inductor and the whole of the height of the antenna in the air is going to be the main attracter of lightning, in my opinion. Grounding the antenna will attract lighting to as it puts the ground potential up in the air. Again inconsequential because we are talking miles of distance and maybe 30-50' of rounded pole rising into the air.