RCM

Since you have the tuner, you have nothing to lose by trying it. The high swr does increase feedline loss, but if it works there is no reason not to use it.

Welcome to MyGMRS

To start out with, The Amps rating on the radio should always be lower than that of the power supply. The Kenwood 880H (nice choice as this is the only radio I run BTW) uses 12.8Amps when transmitting on high power. Using a 15 amp or higher power supply that delivers 12.5-13.5 volts should be fine. I use https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01EWG6YT8/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 this power supply for the house "base" radio. I do get a slight hum when the fan turns on, but for the most part it works without an issue. The whine should go away if I use a choke on the power wires but I was too lazy to order them.

I do not know much about Ed Fong antennas to really give you much advice on them. They seem to be custom home built antennas, which could be hit or miss. There are commercially available antennas for the 460-470 mhz range that may work better. I originally used a diamond 200U with good results, Now I use a comet 712EFC which has higher gain and is working great. One thing to note about mounting however. Keep in mind the primary use of a fire escape. You will need to run your feedline and mount the antenna in a way that would not interfere with an emergency evacuation should it ever occur. You would not believe how many times I've seen ham radio operators and CB'rs just throw the feedline across the fire escape completely blocking it should people need to evacuate. Or they mount Yagi antennas (a directional antenna) that block the escape. When I talk to some of them it seems their concern was that they could escape and the hell with the rest. They just don't realize they could be charged if someone is hurt or killed should a fire break out. So be sure to take great care with that for everyones safety!


 

While browsing Midland's web site, I saw their HAM radio offering, it is the same as a lot of other CCR's with a Midland sticker.  I'm off of Midland for GMRS now because I don't want to have to deal with trying to use a narrow band radio on my local repeaters networks which are all using wide band.

My repeater is open to all licensed operators who operate according to the laws governing GMRS. Users don't have to email and ask permission; however I appreciate those that do, as it gives me a chance to get to know the users of my machine. It's just a courtesy thing.

My repeater is open to all licensed operators who operate according to the laws governing GMRS. Users don't have to email and ask permission; however I appreciate those that do, as it gives me a chance to get to know the users of my machine. It's just a courtesy thing.

Thats nice but pricey lol. Also I don't have a MOL account (I cant even figure out how to get one) making it difficult to get software, but it is nice to hear Motorola finally moved forward with their software accessibility lol. I still remember the DOS window and the big black box that needed its own power supply.

I use TK880's for mobile units, mostly because the MOL software is a pain to get (And at times requires an out of date OS and a RIB depending on how old the radio is)
 
Kenwood TK880's come in 25 and 50 watt models and the software is easy to get at a low price. The software also can be run on windows 10, and the cable is simple as well (No complicated RIB or anything) I've gotten all three 880's for less than $50, though one or two of them needed some cleaning. To reduce the number of programs I use, I ordered the 380 series portables which use the same software as the 880 mobiles. The only thing I dont like is that you can only store 10 "Tones" for CTCSS/DCS that you can select. I have the travel tone set in there and a few other codes for use when I travel. Outside of that the radios work really nice.
 
 

I miss being out west. Almost unlimited wheeling. And generally people took care of what we had. OHV parks arent my cup of tea but thats all we have in Texas. Public land is a rarity here. I spend a lot of time in Arkansas around the Ouachita Ntl Forrest.  

 
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Mostly Jeeping in the mountains of West Virginia and Pennsylvania.
 
 
http://fiveguysracing.com/marc/HardRock/Rubi_W_Lift.jpg
 
http://fiveguysracing.com/marc/RauschCreek/June_2018/images/20180616_115106.jpg
 
http://fiveguysracing.com/marc/RauschCreek/June_2018/images/Image12.jpg

Hey Marc,
What kind of wheeling do you do? My wife and I have a pair of Arctic Cat Wildcat 1000 X's.

Welcome! I have to say, I got into GMRS for going Offroad with friends of mine... but this forum has really got me digging into GMRS more and more. The folks here are a pretty good group.
 
I have several MTX400 radios. 1 had an issue and Midland fixed it in just a few days with a replacement. The only down falls I have found is, its only narrow band and features are minimal. It really seems like a "Welcome to GMRS 101" radio. You should enjoy it... but when the bug bites, you will be looking for an upgrade. LOL

I used to set up a trailer with 40 ft crank up tower, solar panels, and outriggers. We used it for oilfield PTP communications and also for MotoTRBO demos. All we needed was an S-10 pickup with a hitch ball to drag it around.
 
 
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My repeater is open to all licensed operators who operate according to the laws governing GMRS. Users don't have to email and ask permission; however I appreciate those that do, as it gives me a chance to get to know the users of my machine. It's just a courtesy thing.

Thanks. Yeah, I've read about those problems. I definitely wanted T/A, which is reportedly a huge memory hog. But by not pushing the maximum channel count and limiting use of tags I was able to make it work.

All gmrs repeaters are private. They operate at the sole discretion of the owner.

It can be about coordination.  Though GMRS has no official coordination it helps others decide a frequency that might be open in your area.  I know every repeater operator in the area and we do all things possible not to cause interfirance among though known repeaters.  Several are not listed but we do our coordination on our own.  This is no way stops someone from putting up one, but allows us to do it and not cause others problems.  I recently was going to put up a .700 repeater but someone else did and decided to go to .675 as it was open in the area.

well i actually ended up getting 2 radios, a tk-860 and a tk-8160. both work good. the 860 is my base and the 8160 my mobile.i stayed away from midland.
did allot of reading before i ordered. decided old kenwood commercial radios (which i've always enjoyed) would be a good fit for me.

Bird 43 with number 5E, 25E, and 50E slugs will cover GMRS nicely.   -pricey though.

I talked to Rugged Radios today.
 
The GMRS 25 has the following specs, according to the sales person.
 
IP67 rating
RX and TX tone selective
25khz bandwidth
Field - microphone control - programmable
They have them for sale, though have not directly marketed them yet.
$250
 
The price seems steep to me, but for a person like myself who just wants to have a radio that works, and doesn't want to mess with things too much, it might be worth it.
 
I am considering getting one in the near future, as I don't have any radios yet and just got my license. I have been searching for a while now.

It seems to me this has come up a few times over the last year . I always used the donation approach. I have alot of money invested in repeaters, antenna and cables. If folks want to donate great, if not its on me to cover the costs. I didn't put them on the air to make money, I put them there to use. If others can use it and can afford to help with electric or repairs great. If not its up to me. What your proposing is a LMR system. I for one dont believe in not letting folks use it if they can't afford it. 

Many were doing that all along. I don't think that the rule changes changed much in practice. Occasionally, you could see when they forgot to (or just didn't care to/couldn't) change the radios to narrow band. I rarely heard anyone giving call signs on any FRS frequencies before and don't hear it all that much now.

95.319 (b )  does not hold much water. It does not specify who those folks might be. However I like that the rule exists. More below.
I am also a GROL. Years ago, the FCC under pressure of a certain Radio Vendor Evil Batwing Corp, removed the requirements for a GROL to perform tuning, repairs and service of LMR equipment. They did this no doubt, so they could pay technicians a smaller wage and to reduce liability. The FCC rewrote Part 90, putting the responsibility on the licensee to ensure the equipment worked as required.
 
95.337 as underlined, describes the condition under which a modification becomes a violation. You can modify if it still meets rules. So lets say you want to install a wire into the radio to tap the discriminator or grab COR logic. That's a modification, but it is benign. Or you are a bench tech and the radio comes in with a blown final and you determine that no OEM part exists, but you are aware that an MRF123X is same part, install it, test the radio for spurs and harmonics. That is technically a modification, but not a violation. Then comes Sparky McSpark with his golden screwdriver. He goes into the 40 watt Midland and twists some coils and turns a pot and now his bird wattmeter shows 60 magical watts! That is potentially a violation.
 
As far as Part 90 and FPP. I am OK with running Part 90 radios within the rules. I think the FPP sort of pushes the envelope however. You can accomplish same thing with a small laptop computer and RIB. I was programming Saber Radios with an HP200LX palmtop and DOS RSS long before FPP became a thing.
 
Back to 95.319 (b ) . If you read the new rules closely (I can't cite off my head) there is as mentioned above, a rule that hints at the use of non part 95 certified equipment and it refers to "reserved sections" within the RC and GMRS rules. I think that a reasonable rule change could acknowledge that certain Part 90 radios are technically compliant with Part 95 GMRS and that  95.319 (b ) could be the qualification required to use Part 90 radios within GMRS.

The Certification rules are written as much for the manufacturers of new radios as they are for the licensee. If you look at the history of FCC enforcement of equipment certification you will see little of it has been directed at the licensee.
 
What does all this mean?
 
If you have a radio that was certified in 1989 under much less stringent rules, it is still certified. I have some Motorola Systems Saber radios. They are dual certified Part 90 and Part 95. They also have some features that if activated clearly violate some rules, like encryption. But the radio is still certified and if programmed and operated correctly complies with present rules. 
 
If the FCC were to crack down on the use of part 90 equipment used in GMRS, they would be very busy. I think that even though you may be driving an automobile with a helicopter turbo jet engine, violating all EPA and NHTSA standards, as long as you stay between the lines and watch your speed, the police won't bother you. 
 
Now the problem is, that there are a lot of newbies buying some pretty dodgy and cheap Chinese radio gear and they may be inclined to install an equally cheap 50 watt Chinese power amplifier to this gear. If they do that, and a spurious signal bothers the local air traffic control tower, they will be in a heap of trouble.

Antenna gain is selected based on the site and required coverage area. It is a total misconception that more gain is better. Depending on the antenna height and terrain you can do more damage then good with higher gain. Site engineering is an important part of any system, science and methodology will always provide the best results over what one may think. Unless you are stacking UHF Yagis you will gain nothing by phasing omni's together, you would be better off setting them up diversity using power dividers but this involves its own engineering and the proper test equipment. Co phasing omni's was and still is popular for 10 and 11 meter but that is HF AM not UHF.
 
I currently have several DB-420, DB-411, DB-408, DB-404 and a single Sinclair SC329-HF2LDF in use at different sites both part 90 Commercial and GMRS. Each one selected for the installation and desired coverage. The antenna is the biggest factor in any radio system with the coax the second, trust the science. I have and still do see allot of people wasting money and being unhappy with system performance over bad antenna selection.
 
Just my $.02 
Corey

That's about as close to a smoking gun as you're going to get from the FCC. They are aware that people are using surplus Part 90 equipment - and they don't intend to anything to stop that use.
 
As others have mentioned, there's never been a single enforcement action by the FCC against anyone for using Part 90 equipment in Part 95.  If you've been around the block with the FCC a few times, you begin to realize that many of the rules have been written after the fact.