LeoG

Went to the website and found this.

 
And then found this about the HDG antenna

 
So much for the informational insert inside the box

Workarounds are the industry standard.  My dead radios came in dead.  Never even saw a charge cycle.

He was pointing out the channels that he thought were in that range, all of them are 467MHz channels and none of the channels in the radio were 467MHz.  His mistake was he looked after the decimal and matched up the 467MHz frequency when there are also 462MHz frequencies with the same decimal frequency.
There are no .5 watt channels in the radio.

Go to your membership account and change it from there if you worry this is a information grab from a 3rd party trying to steal your information.
 
I changed mine through the pop up and so far nothing nefarious has happened.
 

16' between ground rods.  Putting a coax in a glass jar etc.  Lighting is going to do what it wants even with grounding.  The grounding is a preventative measure to take care of as good as it can.  There is no 100% it's going to follow any cable, it's the least path of resistance but because of the huge voltage potentials it can leave that path.
Certainly better to have grounded the crap out of something than nothing at all.  But it doesn't mean the lightning is going to go where you want it.
I pretty much figure a direct hit is a death strike most of the time for equipment.  Near misses is where the grounding really shines.

When they said use it like a base station it never entered into my mind that it would be a fully functional radio, not even once.  I figured you could transmit on the channel it was currently programmed to.  I started out with the RT97S and that's how that one worked and I just assumed the RPT50 would be the same.  It's nice to have the microphone so you don't need to have an HT to communicate if you are in the same room as the repeater.
They did change the firmware again but when I got my repeater I was able to load all 16 channels, I have 8 setup as analog and 8 set up with digital tones.  So it's easy to switch if it becomes necessary and I don't have to break out into programming.

 

Usually when you have a 141.3Hz tone that means it's usually designated for travelers and an open repeater.

Can't you just go to map and zoom in on your area to see the repeaters that are there?

Can't you just go to map and zoom in on your area to see the repeaters that are there?

They released a press statement saying their engine failure was due to a stray radio transmission.
 
 
😉

Make sure he sells you periods and not decimal points.

That scenario Raybestos described is just about any situation a family might use GMRS for.  Going to the beach, a campsite are all going to be a hour or so away from the "home base" where you have control.
What if the home base is the mobile in the car?  Now you are in full control because you brought it with you.  I had HTs when I signed up for my license.  Is that my "control" unit?  My next was the mobile unit in my truck.  My base station was last.
So if I bring that 1st HT with my I have all the control I need over it and my license.

Maybe Mom doesn't want to go through the daunting exercise of bouncing from govt website to website in order to manage the jungle to obtain said license.  It's only $35 in monies but it's 3 years off your lifespan because of what you need to go through to get it. 😆

My wife is heading up to NYs to babysit our 2 grandsons while my boy does his bowling tournament thing.  I came home for lunch to see her off.  After she got settled into the car I took off and by the time I got to the shop she's calling me on the radio.  She doesn't have a radio in her car so she was in the house.
Turns out she couldn't find her phone and radioed me to call it so she could hear where it was.  I did, she found it LOL.
 
And that's why a radio is better than a phone, in this case LOL.

Also if you do a ctrl F5 it will clear your browser on that website and reload it.  Maybe something wonky happened with some data.
Not sure if that's universal, I know it works with Firefox

This is what I have in Firefox.  Looks normal

Ya, I have one of those 97S repeaters.  More of a bug out repeater.

OK Boyz and Girlz, here we go.
I opened up the Btech RPT50 repeater to remove the original wideband duplexer

First thing I did was check the output wattage from the transmitter.  The power supply was set at 13.8 volts and it was putting out 71 watts into the duplexer.  Had 42 watts out of the duplexer.  And not the best SWR on my 50 ohm dummy load.  Right at the edge of spec.

I turned the voltage down to about 11.5 volts and it showed about 65 watts out.  Probably the lowest I can get it.
Then I swapped the original wideband duplexer for the one that Marc so graciously tune to a single frequency for me (600).  I relabeled it so some future person doesn't think it's wideband.  I should probably strip the other frequencies out of the channel selection also.

And I tested it and got about 48 watts from it.  I said what the heck and boosted the voltage a bit and got it to put out 50 watts.

I haven't put it back into service yet, soon.  And testing won't be done until it cools off from the 98ºF it currently is.  Says it's going to be low 70s tonight.  Probably be to excited to test things at midnight, so likely around 10 or so I walk my route.  Of course I'll key it up on the way home, at home on the base and try an HT from inside the air conditioned house.  LOL
Most of the duplexers I looked at said "40-80 watts (50 watts)" so hopefully I don't melt this one.  The replacement was accepting the 71 watts without blinking and the original had the power supply set for 12.5 volts which is about 67 watts into the duplexer.
 
 

OK Boyz and Girlz, here we go.
I opened up the Btech RPT50 repeater to remove the original wideband duplexer

First thing I did was check the output wattage from the transmitter.  The power supply was set at 13.8 volts and it was putting out 71 watts into the duplexer.  Had 42 watts out of the duplexer.  And not the best SWR on my 50 ohm dummy load.  Right at the edge of spec.

I turned the voltage down to about 11.5 volts and it showed about 65 watts out.  Probably the lowest I can get it.
Then I swapped the original wideband duplexer for the one that Marc so graciously tune to a single frequency for me (600).  I relabeled it so some future person doesn't think it's wideband.  I should probably strip the other frequencies out of the channel selection also.

And I tested it and got about 48 watts from it.  I said what the heck and boosted the voltage a bit and got it to put out 50 watts.

I haven't put it back into service yet, soon.  And testing won't be done until it cools off from the 98ºF it currently is.  Says it's going to be low 70s tonight.  Probably be to excited to test things at midnight, so likely around 10 or so I walk my route.  Of course I'll key it up on the way home, at home on the base and try an HT from inside the air conditioned house.  LOL
Most of the duplexers I looked at said "40-80 watts (50 watts)" so hopefully I don't melt this one.  The replacement was accepting the 71 watts without blinking and the original had the power supply set for 12.5 volts which is about 67 watts into the duplexer.
 
 

OK Boyz and Girlz, here we go.
I opened up the Btech RPT50 repeater to remove the original wideband duplexer

First thing I did was check the output wattage from the transmitter.  The power supply was set at 13.8 volts and it was putting out 71 watts into the duplexer.  Had 42 watts out of the duplexer.  And not the best SWR on my 50 ohm dummy load.  Right at the edge of spec.

I turned the voltage down to about 11.5 volts and it showed about 65 watts out.  Probably the lowest I can get it.
Then I swapped the original wideband duplexer for the one that Marc so graciously tune to a single frequency for me (600).  I relabeled it so some future person doesn't think it's wideband.  I should probably strip the other frequencies out of the channel selection also.

And I tested it and got about 48 watts from it.  I said what the heck and boosted the voltage a bit and got it to put out 50 watts.

I haven't put it back into service yet, soon.  And testing won't be done until it cools off from the 98ºF it currently is.  Says it's going to be low 70s tonight.  Probably be to excited to test things at midnight, so likely around 10 or so I walk my route.  Of course I'll key it up on the way home, at home on the base and try an HT from inside the air conditioned house.  LOL
Most of the duplexers I looked at said "40-80 watts (50 watts)" so hopefully I don't melt this one.  The replacement was accepting the 71 watts without blinking and the original had the power supply set for 12.5 volts which is about 67 watts into the duplexer.
 
 

Well I am actually going to find that out tonight.  I have a Btech 50w repeater and it has a wideband duplexer in it and soon I will be changing that out for a single channel tuned duplexer.
The receive should be more sensitive.  The receiver will be the same, but the desense should be much less with the >-85db vs the >-45db of the wideband duplexer

Not going to be the receiver sensitivity that'll be the issue.  The wideband duplexer is what is really going to limit the sensitivity.

Or I got luck and got one that was fairly accurate.  I have two of them and they both read the same for power and SWR.  I had one on my home base and when I got the new one I swapped out to see if it would read the same.  It did, so I didn't even swap them back.  Just took the older one and it'll go into my shop setup.

Of that I am very aware.  These are mostly leaf trees so there's that....
Always had issues from the house to the shop which holds the repeater.  50w vs 25w.  I could always come in mostly clear to the house, but from the house it was hit or miss.  Then I got a 50w radio for the house and the problem is mostly gone, certainly not R9 reception but easy to talk and understand.  Needed the extra wattage to punch through the leaves it seems.  On top of that what helped later on was swapping out to the Comet 712EFC.  Eventually the repeater will have that same antenna and upgrade from the Retevis 7.2dBi.
So sometimes a little more wattage works.  And since the 1st wideband duplexer was swapped out for the 2nd wideband duplexer I've been able to hit the repeater mostly successful with a 5w HT.  R7 at best, no communication at worst.
 
Duplexer is coming in today

Of that I am very aware.  These are mostly leaf trees so there's that....
Always had issues from the house to the shop which holds the repeater.  50w vs 25w.  I could always come in mostly clear to the house, but from the house it was hit or miss.  Then I got a 50w radio for the house and the problem is mostly gone, certainly not R9 reception but easy to talk and understand.  Needed the extra wattage to punch through the leaves it seems.  On top of that what helped later on was swapping out to the Comet 712EFC.  Eventually the repeater will have that same antenna and upgrade from the Retevis 7.2dBi.
So sometimes a little more wattage works.  And since the 1st wideband duplexer was swapped out for the 2nd wideband duplexer I've been able to hit the repeater mostly successful with a 5w HT.  R7 at best, no communication at worst.
 
Duplexer is coming in today