RCM

A lot of problems are probably exacerbated by the presence of salt, whether it be on or near the ocean or in an area where salt is used on the roads. You wouldn't believe the amount of rain we get here, but not much salt.
Btw, the wideband uhf antenna I linked does have an N connector. That's one of the reasons I chose it.

KPG-49D v 4.xx, as linked in this thread: https://forums.mygmrs.com/topic/1629-programming-a-tk880/
It's available various places for free, and in fact if you buy the cable from "BlueMax49ers" on ebay he will probably send you a copy of the software too, if you would prefer to get it that way.
 
As for radio condition, please let me know if you run across any TK-880s that need to be torn down, cleaned up and repaired. Radios like that would probably sell for $10 each or less, and I would be in the market for a dozen or so. But most of the TK-880s out there for sale are in very good to excellent condition. The arduous task of setting one up consists of connecting power, plug the programming cable into the mic jack of the radio and the usb port of your Windows computer, run the program, fill in your desired frequencies/offsets/tones/bandwidths (W/N) in the spreadsheet of the program, and click "write to radio." Done. No tearing down, no cleaning, it's actually easier and quicker than figuring out the settings on a Midland, and you actually end up with the correct settings instead of the closest facsimile the Midland offers.
There are even sellers who will program the radio for you, free of charge, when you buy one from them.
Most of the sellers of these commercial radios are, after all, radio shops. That's how they got them to begin with.
 
Not to step on anyone's toes here, but the only people I see defending the Midlands are people who have money invested in one or more of them.
 
Here's an example of what I'm talking about: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Kenwood-TK880-UHF-TK-880-1-V-2-250Ch-25-Watts-450-490-Mhz/123813584035?epid=619911360&hash=item1cd3dd5ca3:g:MxYAAOSwE5BdERZ0
I don't know this guy; I just found it in a quick search. It's on the high end price wise, at $99 + $12 shipping. But the radios look great, include the mic, mount bracket and power cable, and free programming of up to 16 channels. The seller even has a 90 day warranty.
Connect power, connect antenna. It doesn't get any easier than that.

If you are considering the Icom IC-2730A, why not look at the F6021? Neither radio is certified for GMRS and the IC-2730A is not even certified for Part 90 (it is certified Part 15 only).  In other words, if you are willing to look at non-GMRS certified radios, there is a huge world of possibilities out there, including used quality professional equipment (eBay).  Specifically, search these forums on Kenwood (including some Part 95E certified radios) and Motorola.

The link posted above is correct for the TK-880.

Larsen guys say the same things about Diamond, Comet etc. antennas.

Got antenna 1 wired up easy-peasy!  SWR shows 1.2ish.  I'll take that
 

Nice! I love the CUCV pickups. One of my friends has an M1028A1 which is the dually pickup version, Dana 70 rear (still with Detroit Locker), NP205 'case. I would like to build something like an M1028, but with a crew cab and a bobbed bed. I've seen a picture of one done like that, and it was sweet!

Nice work on the restore, Marc!  Ive always been envious of people that can do such amazing things for vehicles.
 
re: hi-lift - I’m not knocking all the great utilities those things have, but I’ve seen them darn near kill a couple people because they were inexperienced. My arb xjack will give my lifted wrangler the clearance it needs. In my case, Im more likely to need to get my jeep up in sandy beaches or mud, so a large exhaust lift is a better option for me. We can probably agree the best solution is to have both 
 
im hoping to find a friend tomorrow who will help me rewire my radio. Then I’ll let y’all know what I get with the swr. 

I wanted to do that, but my wife complained that she didn't want to see the antenna in the middle of her field of view.  Figured that was a nice compromise.  LOL
 
 
I love my farm jack.  I agree, they are a get multipurpose tool.  I like the air jacks but my Jeep is too tall.  I can't find one that actually gets the tires off the ground.
 
 
Thanks!  I know it doesn't look like it now, but that is/was an M1008 CUCV.  At least it was when we bought it.  It started life on Fort Lee, and eventually made its way here.
 
We completely restored it to original military spec, including the troop seats and paint.  The original 6.2 was in it and it only had 52,000 on the clock.  It had the IR/Service lights, 24v electrical (basically for just the starter and jump port).
 
Sadly, the motor let go, then the TH400 let go and took out the transfer case.  After that, someone smacked the bed with a big truck and made a mess of it.
 
We put a 6" lift kit on it, cross-over steering, high-performance carbed 350, rebuilt the turbo 400 with a manual reverse valve body, and slapped a new transfer case in it.  It has all new brakes.  Its about to get a new hydro-assist, front and rear winch, and some other minor stuff.
 
Anyway, we changed it so much that we decided its not much of a M1008 any more.  So we are restoring the full interior and we are going to slowly rehab the outside.
 
After the first restore...
 
http://fiveguysracing.com/marc/CUCV/CUCV1.jpg
 
http://fiveguysracing.com/marc/CUCV/CUCV2.jpg
 
 
 
 
I volunteer with the County, doing emergency comms.  So, we are setting it up for 'Hi-Visibility'. We still need to finish the paint, but this is what it looks like right now...
 
 
 
http://fiveguysracing.com/marc/CUCV/CUCV3.jpg
 
http://fiveguysracing.com/marc/CUCV/CUCV4.jpg

Okay, no worries. I know that store-and-forward is prohibited on MURS, but haven't found anything for GMRS.

I just drilled a hole in the hood of my JK and added an NMO mount. I'm using a simple 1/4 wave antenna.
 
I've been using farm/ sheepherder's/ high lift (Hi-Lift is a brand name; lots of other companies have made them) jacks for at least 40 years. It is a true multi-tool; a jack of all trades even (couldn't resist!)
Those exhaust jacks are nothing new either. They are a great invention, but the farm jack can do a lot of things an exhaust jack cannot.
 
I like your Chevy truck, Marc. I have the military version of that. They came with a 6.2 diesel, TH400, full floater 14 bolt rear with Detroit Locker, Dana 60 front, 4.56 gears. All as standard equipment.

Took a couple weeks for our schedules to align, but we were able to test swapping radios today. Tested a bunch of different configurations to see what worked the best and here are the (hopefully readable) results. TLDR: Confirmed stock antennas are terrible, NA-771R is a huge improvement. UV-5R doesn't work well on Narrowband. High/Low power doesn't make much of a difference.  All tests were performed with the below radios at these locations:Point A - GMRS-V1 - High power (5W) / Low power (2W)Point B - UV-5R - High power (4W) / Low power (1W)  To keep things simple we started with "symmetric" tests, same equipment and settings on both radios: NA-771R Antenna Tests Test 1 - We could both hear each other normally GMRS-V1 NA-771R High power Wideband UV-5R NA-771R High power WidebandTest 2 - We could both hear each other, but there was more static GMRS-V1 NA-771R Low power Wideband UV-5R NA-771R Low power WidebandTest 3 - UV-5R could hear GMRS-V1 with a little static, GMRS-V1 could not hear UV-5R at all GMRS-V1 NA-771R Low power Narrowband UV-5R NA-771R Low power NarrowbandTest 4 - UV-5R could hear GMRS-V1 normally, GMRS-V1 could not hear UV-5R at all GMRS-V1 NA-771R High power Narrowband UV-5R NA-771R High power Narrowband  Stock Antenna TestsTest 5 - UV-5R could hear GMRS-V1 with a lot of static, GMRS-V1 caught a few bursts of static but nothing recognizable GMRS-V1 Stock High power Wideband UV-5R Stock High power WidebandTest 6 - UV-5R could hear GMRS-V1 with a lot of static, GMRS-V1 could not hear UV-5R at all GMRS-V1 Stock Low power Wideband UV-5R Stock Low power WidebandTest 7 - Neither of us could hear each other at all GMRS-V1 Stock Low power Narrowband UV-5R Stock Low power NarrowbandTest 8 - UV-5R could hear GMRS-V1 with a lot of static, GMRS-V1 could not hear UV-5R at all GMRS-V1 Stock High power Narrowband UV-5R Stock High power Narrowband   Based on those tests it seemed like High power Wideband was giving us the best results on both antennas, so we only tested swapping antennas with those settings: Mixed Antenna Tests Test 9 - We could both hear each other, but there was a lot of static GMRS-V1 Stock High power Wideband UV-5R NA-771R High power WidebandTest 10 - UV-5R could hear GMRS-V1 with a lot of static, GMRS-V1 could not hear UV-5R at all GMRS-V1 NA-771R High power Wideband UV-5R Stock High power Wideband 
 
 
If you made it this far, what are your thoughts? Clearly the NA-771R at any power is the winner here, but why were the results so poor on Narrowband?

Midland GMRS antennas are pre-tuned for the GMRS band, so don't worry about SWR. ...just know that there are better alternatives out there.
 
Read on, and enjoy....

It's pronounced Marc, BTW.

This is a pretty good forum. Folks here are easy to get along with, for the most part. There are some other forums out there that would absolutely make you wish you had never heard of the forum if you hijacked an existing thread on your very first post.
 
Here's a friendly suggestion: instead of coming into a thread about a specific mobile radio to ask an off-topic question, how about starting a thread with a title like "Repeater-Capable Portable Radios" and then ask your question there?
 
That is why you got a one-word answer. And I can guarantee that one-word answer was more polite than the response such a post would get on some forums.
 
Welcome to the forum.

Quoting myself because I was just reading back over this thread and thought an update to this statement might be in order.
I searched the web and found the manufacturer's data for the dual band Yagi I have. It indicates coverage of the 902-928 (and beyond) band.
Because I didn't have a way to check the match on 900, I bought a Bird 43 wattmeter and a Coaxial Dynamics 400-1000 MHz (at 50 watts) slug. As it turns out, that Yagi is a near-perfect match.

Thanks for the help and link. I'll give it try. I have ordered a cable and should be here this week. I'll keep you posted.

There's a local, open repeater that uses multiple PLs. There's no defined purpose to all the PLs, but it mainly allows the repeater to have travel tone and a separate local tone. The rest of the tones are mostly for sticking a group of people on the repeater without the other repeater users having to hear them. 67.0 Hz output tone is available to address FRS users for emcomm. Having a bunch of tones available makes the repeater really susceptible to interference, and all the radios need to be set up with busy-channel lockout (which works a lot better when the repeater has a short hangtime of 0.5-1.0 seconds). Things start getting nutty when there's more than 3 tones configured on a repeater.

link to software https://hamfiles.co.uk/index.php?page=downloads&type=entry&id=radio-programming%2Fkenwood-programming%2Fkenwood-kpg-49d-rss_2           the TK-880 s are great radios welcome to the forum

Congrats on getting the best radio out there for GMRS!
Chirp won't work. It would be great if it were added at some point, but KPG49D is readily available free, and works well. Look for version 4.xx for Windows. I have a Windows 10 machine and it works fine except for the help files, which you don't necessarily need anyway. I originally started with Version 6.xx, thinking the later version would be better. But nope, it was DOS only.
 
Once you have the software, it will also work (with a different cable) on the TK-380 uhf HT.
 
And btw, the TK-880 can be easily programmed with freqs down to 440 or maybe even lower. The software will warn you that it's out of range, but it will accept it. Most radios are deaf below 446 or so though, and the vco also loses lock. There are a couple of simple adjustments to make it work down there while not sacrificing operation up to 470.
The TK-380 works on 440 without needing any adjustments.
 
Welcome to the forum.

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.

Depending on the firmware, the KPG-49D should be what you need. There is a firmware that requires passport software. This can be determined by watching the screen as you turn on the radio. If you have firmware 1.5xxx chances are you have passport firmware. This is easily fixed by reflashing the newest firmware through Fpro which is included with the 49D software. As far as I am aware (And I may be wrong on this) the 880's are incompatible with CHiRP.

I think I got my 49D from hamfiles for free. If you have an account there you should be able to download the file there. If you need the firmware feel free to message me and I'll send it over.

Me too. I ordered new jumpers from MPD digital so they have a lifetime replacement thing should it fail. Made sure to replace both jumpers as well lol

So a few weeks ago I took my repeater offline due to transmitter issues. I run a RKR1225 (rack mount version of the GR1225) and of course this repeater is known for its issues with burned out finals in the PA. At the time the unit was putting out .1W of its 25W of power. I didn't have time to pull the unit from the rack and disassemble the shelf so for a bit, out of wanting to protect components, I just shut the repeater off.

Fearing a PA failure I was in no rush to dismantle anything until I knew I could get the parts or ship it out to a shop for repairs. When the time came earlier this week, I contacted a shop who said I needed to confirm the PA had not already been replaced as they couldn't repair an already repaired amp. So I pulled the shelf from the rack and began to dismantle it so I could remove the radio body, however when I removed the TX jumper from the radio, I found that the coax had failed, separating from the connector. From just looking at it you couldn't tell, but everything, the center pin and the shield, had come apart and simply slid out of the end of the connector and rest in my hand!!

Concerned the PA may have been damaged because of this, I found a crap jumper I had set aside when I was given the double shielded jumper. I ran it through the meter and into a dummy load and behold, TX power returned to 25W! A little more testing, including the duplexer showed everything was working fine. I figured I would test the coax separately with a test meter for coax and sure enough it showed high resistance and feedback in the little 1' jumper.
 
In the end I purchased 2 jumpers, a bit longer than the one I was replacing as I believe the older one could have been pulled on during install. I replaced both the RX and TX jumpers with LMR240 coax and the result is that not only did the TX power come back, but the range extended a little bit as well.
This is just a reminder that even the simplest of things such as a jumper can mimic larger more costly problems. I believed it was going to be nearly $150 to repair the repeater and I even considered just replacing the unit with one that could run 50W on a 100% duty cycle. All I really needed was a $15 jumper to replace the one that failed. For those of us diagnosing issues for repairs we need to keep in mind that its not always the common problem causing the issue, and we need to make sure we always check the simple stuff we often overlook such as jumpers which are not a common failure point.

 

You know... In looking back at this, I am wondering if that wide mess centered at 927.5850 isn't an IF image on your monitor.  That 150KHz wide signal doesn't look like anything part 15, but it sure does resemble the pattern of an analog Stereo-Composite FM signal used to relay programming from a studio to a transmitter site for broadcasting.  STL (Studio to Transmitter Link) signals are normally 150KHz wide, and are in the 940-960MHz range... the bottom end of L-Band microwave.  If it's on 24/7 and never moves, that's likely your answer.