WRTC928

47 was my radio call sign in my last law enforcement job. I have a fondness for it.

You obviously have no idea what you're talking about. Hams can't use radios in exactly the same circumstances as GMRS because the test requirement is a barrier to entry for a lot of people -- which is why a lot of us have GMRS licenses/radios as well. Hams tend to be older, often somewhat debilitated, so we're not going to be using our radios while mountain biking, but by no means does that mean we just sit around and try to contact Italy. I participate in a stormwatch net, I monitor my city's emergency sirens and report how well they function, next week some of my club will be teamed with medical personnel to respond to emergencies at a marathon. Recently, during tornadoes and fires, members in the affected areas provided ongoing, real-time information on the events to emergency responders. It's not the same as running the marathon, but it's not endlessly calling CQ either. Next week, I'll be part of the staff of a regional cavalry competition. Guess what? I'll be pulling out the GMRS radio because many of the people who will be there are GMRS folks, and it also gives us the ability to talk to people with FRS radios, which some of the staff will be using. If you saw me there supporting that event, you'd think that was evidence that only GMRS people do that kind of stuff, but you'd be wrong. I go back and forth between the two modes as appropriate to the situation. A lot of us use radio to support hobbies, but also as a hobby in itself. There's a certain allure to the challenge of building an 80 meter antenna from scrap wire. It's true GMRS is most often an adjunct to some other hobby, but that doesn't mean there can't be a subset of GMRS users who want to build that antenna and a subset of hams who see the radio mostly as a means of supporting other activities.

Most of the hams I know also have a GMRS license. I couldn't say how much they use it because at present, there aren't any GMRS repeaters within range of where I live. I can use one when I'm close to Oklahoma City heard a guy I "know" from my favorite 2m repeater give his amateur radio call sign on the GMRS repeater a few days ago. He caught himself and corrected himself quickly, but I ribbed him anyway. When I'm near Oklahoma City, I usually have the 2m repeater on the left side and the GMRS repeater on the right side of the mobile, so I expect it's only a matter of time. But, no, I haven't noticed any actual hostility toward GMRS users, although a small number of the hams I've met apparently kind of think of GMRS users as "quitters" who gave up before getting an amateur license. It's more condescension than hostility.

That's good to know. TBH, I haven't had any use for it up until now because I haven't been in a situation where the frequency was so busy there would be any use for it. Should it come up, I may use it on simplex, but I now know not to use it on a repeater.

I think the concept is that the parts are less valuable than the assembled item. They'd still have to pay a tariff, but it wouldn't be as much as if they shipped a completed item.

I'm almost certain the tariff is on the value of the item at the point at which it enters the US. Most of the retail price is incurred after the item is in the US, so it wouldn't make either logical or economic sense to place a tariff on it at the point of sale.

It won't impact the cost of radios as much as you may think. The tariff is collected on the value of the item at the port of entry. That $30 radio is probably only worth $6 on the dock. Most of the expense is in transport, advertising, handling, etc. A 25% tariff would mean that $30 radio went up to $31.50. Even a TYT TH-9800 probably is only worth $50-60 at the dock, meaning it would go up from $240 to $253. I think most of us will complain just a little and go right on buying radios.

A lot of police radios used to be "2-way not 3-way". Dispatch would transmit on frequency A and receive on frequency B. All the units' radios would transmit on frequency B and receive on frequency A. Dispatch could hear and talk to everyone, but the field units could only hear and talk to dispatch. It helped keep down confusion. Typically, there were a couple of "tactical" frequencies on which the units could talk directly to one another. I don't know what they do now with all the new and different radios. I've been out of law enforcement for almost 40 years. I could see where a business with a number of field units might find something similar useful. Otherwise, I can't think of a practical use for that capability. It's interesting to contemplate, though.

On a related thought, is there any prohibition on tx/rx on different frequencies on simplex? Business users don't necessarily need 3-way communication. Most of it is between the dispatcher and the field units. If you put up a tall antenna and a base unit, you could communicate with your units even if they were out of simplex range of one another. As I read it, the 467 frequencies are specifically designated as repeater inputs. However, is there any prohibition on for example rx on 462.55000 and tx on 462.60000? Yes, it would create a lot of confusion on the airwaves, and I have no intention (or need) to do it, but I'm often curious about irrelevant technical matters. In practice, it would be simpler to put up a base unit and if the field units were out of range of one another, base could relay a message or they could just call each other on the phone. Also, this is one of the cases where those radios that operate over cell towers would be a good option. That's probably the one I would go with if I owned a business -- pay $50 a year per radio and let someone else worry about the infrastructure.

I'm of the opinion that if you feel the need to use a repeater for your business, you should install and maintain it yourself. My reasoning is that business use could create so much traffic that other people couldn't get use out of the repeater. Conversely, casual users could create enough traffic to make it difficult to conduct business. Of course, if the repeater owner is okay with business use, it's none of my business. I think of much of this stuff as being a matter of good manners. I would consider it rude to jam up a repeater with my business making it difficult for other people to use it. Not that it would necessarily happen. There's a GMRS repeater in Oklahoma City that someone obviously uses for business purposes during the weekdays, but it's still idle more than it's active. I don't know if the business owns the repeater, but obviously the owner doesn't mind. Nevertheless, if I were going to use a repeater for my business, I'd prefer to put up my own. Of course, that requires that you have access to a tower or something similar, so it's not exactly as easy as buying one and firing it up.

Sure. Let's go with that.

Hypothetically, yes, but any RF radiation has the same potential, not just the "spurious" ones. In-band transmissions have the same possibility of creating electromagnetic interference as spurious ones. Microwave ovens can cause problems because they leak considerable RF energy if not properly shielded, but they operate on around 600-1,200 watts, which is a bit more than the 5 watts of an HT. Most of the electronic devices around you are shielded to prevent leakage which can interfere with other electronics, but two-way radios are by definition not shielded. As soon as you press the PTT, unshielded RF energy is created (intentionally), and it matters not to the pacemaker whether it's on 462.550 or some harmonic, although some of them could be (hypothetically) more sensitive to one band than another. So, there's a non-zero chance that your radio could affect a pacemaker, but as far as we know, it's never actually happened, and it's not confined to just the "spurious" emissions, but includes the intentional ones as well.

Even at that, it's just an annoyance, no actual harm done. And as you say, you'd have to pretty much be talking non-stop to matter much to anyone. It would be so weak that likely you could adjust the squelch to get rid of it. As far as interfering with transmitting, I'll wager if that if I were receiving interference due to a harmonic from a 5-10 watt radio, I could just punch my power up to 50 watts and step on them.

Yeah, it can't really be both, can it?

I don't want to ask this question in an amateur radio forum because I'm afraid I couldn't get a straight answer, so I'll try it here. If I understand correctly, any "spurious emissions" will not be retransmitted by a repeater. It will pick up the strongest part of the signal and retransmit that on a different frequency. So, my question is, how much harm can spurious emissions from a 5 watt HT actually do? Yes, I understand about the possibility of creating interference in a frequency allocated to public safety or commercial radio, but realistically, how likely is that? Hams tend to think of these things from the standpoint of tall antennas and high wattage, and you likely could muck up stuff with a 50' antenna and 1,000 watts, but a 5 or even 10 watt HT doesn't seem to have much potential to cause trouble. Do commercial LMR and public safety radios have filters to eliminate the "fuzz" created by a low-power harmonic? I assume the technology exists, and if I were building a $1,200 radio for a police department, I'd certainly include it. I'm not arguing that a "cleaner" signal isn't better and more desirable, but I suspect the "dirty" signal from a cheap HT isn't going to actually matter to anyone. I already know @OffRoaderX's opinion but I'm curious what the rest of you think.

I can see that working okay, but it's certainly not cheap. For that price, you could come close to the new Retevis 25 watt repeater, which is almost certainly more rugged. It made sense when the only commercially available package options output 5 watts, but I'm not so sure it does now. Two radios designed for that purpose probably work pretty well, but the "two Baofengs in a can" stuff I've seen on YouTube is over-hyped.

About the only way to do that would be to carve off 8-10 frequencies from the 440 band, and hams would completely lose their s*** over that. I understand why. Once the camel's nose is under the tent, the rest will soon follow, and hams don't want to lose anything they have. I don't think there's any way the FCC will authorize new channels for GMRS. In this particular instance, it's not something they will consider at all, because the goal is to simplify rules, save money, and reduce regulatory burdens, and reallocating frequencies to GMRS won't do any of that. My prediction is that changes to amateur and GMRS regulations will be few or none. My reasoning is that ham and GMRS are already pretty lightly regulated and there's not much to be gained by changing anything. The only thing I could see happening is that other users could pressure the FCC to reallocate part of the amateur radio spectrum to give them more bandwidth, but again, at present that won't accomplish any of the FCCs goals. Indeed, it would make things more complicated since they'd have to write a whole new set of regulations. It may happen someday, but probably not under the present administration.

I've made an "ammo can" repeater, and it works...kinda. IME, you need about 30' of horizontal separation and 2' of vertical separation to get a result that's noticeably better than simplex. With a pair of UT-72 antennas I got pretty good results, but then it won't fit in an ammo can. They don't weigh much, so it's still packable, and if you're driving, it's no big deal at all. I've seen guys on YouTube claiming good results with antennas about 6" apart, but I haven't seen anyone actually demonstrating that. A pair of roll-up antennas should work, but you'd still need to carry a couple of 15' lengths of coax. The coax and roll-ups would fit in a large-ish ammo can with the other stuff, so it can be done, but it's not as easy, compact, or cheap as the YouTubers make it look. The range on the ammo can repeater didn't impress me either. Until now, the two common commercial ones were 10 watt units (actually probably ~5 out of the duplexer), which can still be useful if you position them advantageously, but vegetation definitely limits their range -- one of the few cases IMO in which adding more power is the solution. I've ordered one of the new 25 watt repeaters from Retevis and I'll be interested to see how it works. They claim 22 watts post-duplexer. We'll see.

I guy I follow on YouTube likes to say, "That's my opinion, and I'm an expert on my opinion."

As I see it, the biggest advantage to a repeater in your situation would be so anyone with a GMRS license could get out a message to everyone whether GMRS or FRS due to the repeater's power and (hopefully) elevation. As I commented in my previous post, you could accomplish the same thing with a good base unit, but it would have to be monitored, and you might have to relay something from a lower-powered unit. GMRS is not intended for "broadcasting", but as I read the rules, transmitting a warning message (i.e; "The NWS has issued a tornado warning for our area." or "There's a fire southwest of us moving our way.") would be perfectly permissible.

That's probably true, but I think I'd install a base unit with an antenna as high as I could get it. There may be some fringe areas where users can communicate with the base but can't necessarily reach all the other people in the neighborhood. For general announcements, it would be nice to have a unit that you know can reach everyone.

Thanks. That's good to know.

Now that I know such a thing exists, it appears they're not prohibitively expensive. here and here $50 seems cheap enough to avoid blowing up my house.

That's what I wanted to know. Thank you. Off-grid solar/battery arrays apparently typically have some sophisticated circuitry associated with them and it probably balances the voltages. 50 Ah will probably give me plenty of standby capability. Certainly enough to go swap the battery. I have damaged shoulders, and I prefer not to deal with the weight of a 100 Ah battery, especially if I want to take it somewhere else. I can always buy one later if I change my mind.