Lscott

I did some more searching on another site. Assuming the frequency is really 462.5125 I found the following: 462.5125 DMR MO 4 ROCK SECURITY & EVENTS INC. WRAK353 PONTIAC IG SECURITY COMPANY: RADIOS WILL BE USED FOR COMMUNICATION BETWEEN EMPLOYEES 462.5125 DMR MO 4 United Parcel Service, Inc. WPMR963 MADISON HEIGHTS IG APPLICANT IS A DELIVERY SERVICE. THE RADIOS WILL BE USED TO COORDINATE THE ESSENTIAL ACTIVITIES OF THE BUSINESS. 462.5125 DMR MO 5 X-Cel Industries, Inc. WQTT460 Southfield IG Radios used to coordinate activities around a coating facility.

In my experience it's also somewhat buggy too. Maybe by now they have more of the crappy bugs fixed. Also the firmware in the radio had some annoying quirks too. The feature I find most useful is the DMR monitoring mode in the radio. I wish my commercial radios had this, but that wasn't necessary since the market for them ends up with the radios pretty much programmed up once and that's the end of it.

Cool. Like to know what you find.

You can try removing the antenna on the radio. That's a cheap kind of signal attenuater. Do that when the signal gets real strong with the antenna connected. When you get close enough to the source the radio should respond even without the antenna connected. One other trick is flip the radio over so the antenna is horizontal. The source antenna is likely vertical and the cross polarization results in may cases another 20db attenuation. Then rotate in a circle. When the signal is minimum either the end of the antenna is point nearly towards the source or directly away from it. Try that in several locations and that can help pin down the area.

I wondered the same thing. I wouldn't be surprised if radios got swapped around between plants.

What if they don't drive?

Flex-N-Gate is licensed for 462.5125MHz per FCC database. Emission is narrow band FM. Plant location in database is BATTLE CREEK, MI CALHOUN County. https://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/UlsSearch/licenseFreqSum.jsp?licKey=3494581 I wonder if somebody was miss programming radios for DMR and they ended up at the R.O. location.

I see several company's in that area: Flex-N-Gate (large comlex) Thierry Corp Dixon and Ryan Corp United Resin Corp ArborOakland Group Bowlero Lanes and Lounge (almost on the NW corner)

I would be interested in knowing what you find out. My work office is by 14 Mile and John-R. That's only about a half dozen miles or so from where you're looking.

To get back on track for the thread's topic there is a series of posts on radioreference.com on this exact topic. A few helpful posts shows how to look up Part 95A radios the FCC has certified. I would also imagine changing to Part 95E would also find newly certified radios as well. https://forums.radioreference.com/threads/part-95-gmrs-radio-list.275040/#post-2046099 Then the same person posted an updated procedure: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TThis may be slightly better than what I posted back in 2013. FCC OET Authorization Search Under Application Information: Application Status: select All Granted Statuses Under Equipment Information: Frequency Range in MHz: select 462.55 to 467.725 and uncheck Exact Match Rule Parts (up to three): select 95 and uncheck Exact Match Under Formatting Options: Show results in You can select HTML to view it on the web site or select Microsoft Excel or XML to generate a spread sheet. I just tried the Microsoft Excel format and it generates a file that your browser will want to download. I don't know how that works on a smart phone or Windows. On a Linux PC with Firefox it opens a download dialog box. If you use part 95 instead of part 95A the results could be different. It might include FRS radios too. 95A should include only GMRS radios but some of them (and FRS and CB and MURS) might have only 95 without the letter. I need to check that. Specifying the frequency range 462.55 to 467.725 should exclude MURS, CB, RC and other PRS devices. Today that returned 3969 lines. Some radios have multiple grants or permissive changes so the actual number of devices is way less.

Yes that could also work. Excellent suggestion.

The expected voltage depends on the cell chemistry. Some Lithium cells have a terminal voltage around 4+ volts at full charge.

Good guess! Boost converters can be designed and built in a very small volume these days if only a few watts are required. And as you assumed it's built into the battery pack.

That's the usual offset, however the rules don't require it. Note the FCC rules simply state what frequencies can be used for communications through a repeater, sections A and C, but don't mention a required offset. https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/chapter-I/subchapter-D/part-95/subpart-E/section-95.1763 Some have used a non-standard offset, still using the official frequencies, as a means to keep many users off a repeater since many radios "assume" a fixed 5MHz offset with no option for changing it. That leaves just those people with commercial grade radios that allow programming in separate TX and RX frequencies.

There are some companies that make solar panels specifically for USB charging that would be a better choice in that case since they have done the "engineering" already. Again don't take this as a recommendation but as an example of what is available. https://www.renogy.com/e-flex-21-portable-solar-panel/

Your USB charger is a fixed 5 VDC at either 1 or 2 amps of current. You will need something to provide that. If it's 2 amps then you'll need at least a 10+ watt solar panel for power, more like 15 watts. The DC to DC converter would need to supply 5 volts DC at the required current. The input voltage range would be about the same as in the Baofeng case.

You need more than just a solar panel. The battery pack they use is a Lithium Ion type and has very specific charge requirements. That is satisfied by the charger base. You need a solar panel and some type of regulator to keep the input to the charger base within specifications. DO NOT try to charge the battery pack directly off the solar panel! Most solar panels for low to medium power applications output up to 20 to 22 volts DC, likely way to high for the charger base. You can use a DC to DC converter with a wide input voltage range and a fixed output voltage to feed the charger base. The Baofeng charger base has an input of 10 VDC, 12 VDC would likely work OK. Then you need DC to DC converter that would take a wide input voltage range from the solar panel and output a fixed 12 VDC. One example, don't take this as a recommendation, is at the following link. https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/mean-well-usa-inc/SPBW06F-12/7707012 Datasheet specifications. https://mm.digikey.com/Volume0/opasdata/d220001/medias/docus/2289/SPBW06%2CDPBW06_Ds.pdf The input voltage range is 9 to 36 VDC so this should cover a 5 watt solar panel. You can find some 5 watt solar panels on line. I've attached some photos of a few I have. You'll likely pay around $20 to $30 for one. You'll also need some cable and connectors to wire in the DC to DC converter and connect to the charger base. Solarverter.pdf Solarland SLP005-12.pdf 5 Watt No Name Light Aluminum Frame Solar Panel.pdf

I don't know. I think there are some reviews on YouTube on the topic. I would also do some research on-line to see if there is anything. As popular as they seem to be somebody likely has done some recent testing. One other place to check is the FCC site. If the radio is legally sold in the US it should, required, to have an FCC ID. Using that you can look up the grant and test reports. The grant by the way will likely just show just a certification for Part 15, not 97. The FCC's main concern is the radio is blocked from receiving cell phone frequencies. You can do an informal, crude, test using another radio. TX on 146.0MHz on the test radio. Then using a second radio some short distance away tuned for 438.0MHz, that's the third harmonic, and see if you can pick up a signal. If you can you likely have a problem. If not the radio "might" be acceptably clean, at least on VHF. It's no guarantee it's OK on UHF however. Dual band radios typically have two transmit "chains", power amp stages and filters, for each band. Both need to be checked. You can try the same kind of test on UHF but you'll likely will need a scanner that can tune up around 1.2GHz to 1.5GHz to catch the third harmonic. Your final option is try at a local Ham Radio club. Somebody there might have a spectrum analyzer, I have a model in mind on my wish list to get sooner or later, or access to one. You can see if a test of your radio can be arranged. I'm sure you won't be the first person in a club who wants to know if their cheap radio meets FCC emission limits.

Yup, it's a multi-multi-band radio. You can transmit on a half dozen VHF and UHF frequencies all at the same time. I had a buddy at work who got one of those super cheap BF-888's UHF radios to experiment with it. There is a hack to program in some VHF frequencies. He tried it. It worked all right. Then I tuned my radio for the third harmonic. Oh-oh... I could hear him even better on the third harmonic spur! Well that ended that experiment. Never used that radio again.

I was at the Ham swap a while back in Fort Wayne Indiana. Part of the free test bench, used for checking used radios people buy before leaving, had a Rigol spectrum analyzer setup. The link below is the model I believe they were using at the time, DSA-815. https://www.rigolna.com/products/spectrum-analyzers/dsa800/ Some people were solicited specifically so they could test their radios as an informal survey. The results were socking for some people when they saw the results. The original classic UV-5R was well known for poor filtering of harmonics on the output. I found the attached VHF spectrum tests for one on-line and a copy of the schematic, likely the first generation design, for the radio. UV-5R VHF Harmonics Test.pdf SCHEMATIC Baofeng UV-5R.pdf

You're entitled to your opinion, but public disregard for the FCC rules is discouraged on this forum.

Well, that depends on your current, future plans and interests. 1. Do you have or want to get your Ham license too? A significant number of GMRS users also have their Ham license. For example I am dual licensed. 2. If answer to #1 is yes, then do you plan on using the radio for both services? There are used commercial grade radios with Part 95 certification so they are legal to use on GMRS, and can be programmed for Ham 70cm band frequencies. I have a number of those and they each have their place and uses. When you say cost isn’t important there are some radios that run up to the high 3 figures and low to mid 4 figures, so you might want to quantify that a bit more. Those radios typically are the commercial grade types, tend to work better and have a lot of features the usual CCR’s, Cheap Chinese Radio, don’t offer.

Interesting product. Didn't know anything like it existed.

There is definitely capacitive coupling. It's not magnetic so the mount won't hold, but electrical it will work just fine.