TrikeRadio

I have heard a local car dealership on ch 6 or 7 I think… while cycling past it on a local bike trail. “ we have the customer waiting, please bring the keys up to the front office”

This is another thread that refuses to die. would be nice to be able to mark some threads as “closed permanently” (for your own account) so old ones don’t reappear in your unread posts ever again. (Asking for this feature as a Christmas gift)

You may just have a bad one.

Should not be a problem as long as you are not causing issues for others on the frequency you choose. Sounds like fun actually.

Could be. And this school uses GMRS/FRS channel 20 (462.675 MHz) which of course is also a repeater frequency so yeah they possibly don’t hear the repeater but people close to their location hear them on open.

For what purpose? To identify the source of an interfering station maybe?

I don't know why it wouldn't be perfectly legal. all GMRS and FRS communication is considered "in the public" ... just as it is perfectly legal to photograph anyone in a public place where this is "no expectation of privacy"

I often hear the teachers and administrators at a local elementary school on simplex a few miles from my home. They seem to be using either GMRS (or maybe more likely FRS) and have a CTCSS tone on their transmissions. I'm not sure if they think that makes their communications "private".... but of course they are not. I kind of wonder if I should contact the school or school district to let them know that their radio communications are not private... or if that would just make them think I am a "weirdo" listening in. But I have heard a few funny things like "I need help over here, someone just dumped a whole tray of milk"... and ... "Johnny threw up and I have him all cleaned up... can you call his parents? he needs to get home"... stuff like that.

Thanks.. that is what I assumed but was not sure of.

When some repeaters auto transmit their ID... many in Morse Code... what is that then if it is not a "license" ? is it the owner's GMRS Callsign or is it something else?

This looks like a job for Amateur (HAM) radio if you did really want to talk between Vegas and Riverside, CA... Which means getting a Ham license and your receiving party also studying for a Ham license ... and getting some serious antennas and radios setup at your homes. Sorry... GMRS is not really capable of this. HAM on the other hand does have some linked repeaters that might be able to relay the transmission even if you were not able to get a simplex (Radio to radio direct) connection with Ham Radio.

I believe this was something the British experimented with for listening for approaching aircraft before RADAR became the best way to watch for attacking aircraft.

So was he

Another question.. when you ordered them.. .did you order it for GMRS or HAM... the radio is the same but comes preset to the mode you bought and comes with antenna that is compatible with the band you chose.

Did you get the 1. HAM 2. GMRS 3. NORMAL menu when you di the PTT1 & * Turn it on... ? you should have seen that menu and chosen 2... it would reset with all the default GMRS channels pre-programmed

Yep, that is what I have on my car's roof with my TD-H3 connected and a handset mich plugged in as my tiny makeshift mobile unit. It actually works well.

The only idea I ever thought about for having two live antennas at the same time on one radio... was having a general antenna plus a yagi pointing specifically at a further away repeater that your main antenna cant always hit. But that could just cause a lot of problems too ... I don't even know if that would be practical or a good idea. I will leave it to others with actual understanding of the technical aspects (which I do not have) to comment on this idea.

Not hitting a repeater is not really a Firmware issue like @Socalgmrs mentioned. Even with 240416 it will still work. Your issue is more likely something else not programmed correctly.. or done on a simplex channel instead of the repeater channel of that frequency... or above memory 54 (custom transmitting channel memory slots are only lower than 55 and above 22 in the GMRS mode of the H3. or... you dont have good line of sight or alititude of antenna... or could use a better antenna than the stock one. many variables but firmware is not the problem. if you need to get the firmware updated (not sure exactly why you would) you may haev ot resort to finding a friend with a PC. I understand your pain to a point. Personally I use a macbook, but I do have a windoze PC available as well for such things as this.

Yep... I gave up playing with it now... It was interesting to research it a bit anyway. It is still funny to me that Tidradio has this video about it... and he starts off saying, "Today we are going to be talking about two IMPORTANT FEATURES... " and yet, it does not actually work or do anything!

So here are some things I have found out about menu times 37 (PTT ID) and 39 (ANI-ID): (screenshots and descriptions are in CHIRP) MOST IMPORTANTLY ... Neither setting seems to actually send any ID to other TD-H3 radios... nor does it seem to work sending to other radios like Motorola ones that have this ability. So basically all of this is pointless except for knowing it. Menu item 37 (red circle with number 37) shows in the Memories tab and applies to eahc memory slot / "Channel" individually, so you can turn it to BOT (beginning of transmit) EOF (End of Transmit), BOTH or OFF differently on every memory slot you have saved. Menu Item 39 (red circle with number 39) shows up in the SETTINGS Tab and DTMF subtab . as ID CODE. Seems to apply to whole radio not per memory slot. Menu Item 38 (red circle with number 38) shows in the SETTINGS Tab and DTMF subtab as DTMF SIDE TONES and is a true false checkbox.. on or off. (not really related to the PTT ID.. Separate function that DOES work if you hi the * key, type in a code and hit PTT it will send tones for the characters audibly to the other radio) This turns on or off the sending radio's play back of the audio tones of the code. off it is silent for the sender but comes in on the transmission... on it plays audibly for the sender on clicking the PTT and also transmits the audible tones. - but I know no real use for this in GMRS except maybe of old ol repeaters that use this to be controlled by audible tone codes. There are other settings below in the SETTINGS Tab and DTMF subtab ( in CHIRP) which also seem to apply to the PTT id - but also do not seem to change anything, make anything work, or show up on the radio's own settings menu anywhere. The DTMF DECODE ENABLE can be checked and unchecked in CHIRP.. but will not save to the radio when uploaded... it always is UNCHECKED when you read it back in to chirp. So after all that... it seems to me that 37 and 39 and the other settings that only show in chirp are "vestigial organs" (like the appendix in your body) left over and not used elements which are reserved for future or don't actually do anything useful anymore. I would love to be proven wrong if anyone does know how to make this PTT id thing work universally or even just between two Tidradio units.. but it does not seem liike they really do anything. Like I mentioned above in point number 4.. menu 38 does control if you hear the DTMF codes you can enter using the * key... on it will audibly play them on the sending radio and the receiving... off will make it silent to the sender but transmitted to the receiver.

There is nothing on the screen display examples in the manual about where such a code would even be displayed. I have tried a few things .. on simplex.. via a repeater... to different radios. wil try some different timings of keying I guess. and no, I don't have an amateur license so, yeah won't be trying that yet.

Does anyone know anything about how the menu items 37 (PTT ID), 38 (DTMFST), and 39 (ANI-ID) work? (I am using the GMRS mode BTW) I have: 37 set to BOT (beginning of Transmission), 38 set ON 39 set to a numeric code I want to send. (I'm not absolutely sure that 38 is related to the others but I think it is) When I transmit I don't see that code show on the display of my other TD-H3. I also tried sending to a repeater and to another user with a Motorola radio, and he said my code was not showing on his radio (normally does for others who transmit to him through the repeater). Documentation in the manual is pretty minimal and only tells you how to set the features, but there is no description of how it should actually work or what you might see and where on the screen. TIDRADIO also has a video out about the menus 37 and 39 but in it, they just tell you the same thing the manual does and do not actually demonstrate it on the video. * I'm just wondering if anyone else has used this feature and if so ... what am I missing to make it work? and how does it work exactly? (smart alec responses will be chuckled at and promptly ignored - reasonable and real responses will be greatly appreciated)

I agree, TID should have indicated that above channel slot 54 it is RX only on the GMRS setup. It is not documented anywhere in their information that I can find. The only thing I can figure is that in GMRS mode the idea was it was "restricted" for people who are new... but that still doesn't make much sense since they could still have restricted to GMRS only frequencies but allow all "channel slots" to be RX and TX capable. ** Is there anything about getting it FCC GMRS certified about this restriction that they seem to have imposed for no reason and not documented? I don't know why there would be. But again, there is a way around it for those who know how to properly and accurately set it up in "NORMAL" mode but... yeah, that is not the FCC GMRS "certified" mode. I hope that TIDRADIO does decide at some point to change the Firmare to allow TX above 54 .. but ... I'm not too terribly bothered about it now that I know of it. I just wish like you said that they had DOCUMENTED it and been upfront about it from the start. (and reviewers who did not discover and mention it just means to me that they did not fully test it before their youtube review. (at least not enough to stumble across the problem. But to be fair, I think it took me a month before I noticed that it was a problem)

I agree... My experience with the stock antennas on the TD-H3... they are "Good"... but the Nagoya 771G ... and even Tidradio's GMRS tuned 771 whip are MUCH better. Actually seems like the Tidradio 771 is as good as the Nagoya 771G in my own experience.

Some people can't justify $400 HT radios. Yes, there are a few quirks for every radio. I have had my TD-H3s for about 5 months and find them to be more than I expected. Are there some things I would like to see done differently? Yes, of course. But they have surpassed my expectations – surprising me at times how well they work. So, to each his own.