WRTC928

Thanks. I'll look at it. I don't even know for sure that I want it to "kerchunk" but I'd like to know how to set it if I want to.

It's not the end of the world to have to program "no tone" from the keypad, but it is a bit of a pain in the ass. The whole purpose of programming from software is to avoid crap like that.

My RT97L arrived today, and I did some initial testing. Setup was a breeze using the software downloaded from the Retevis website. There is no software included, but the download was no big deal. There aren't a whole lot of things to set or change, so it's hard to goof it up too much. I didn't have a GMRS-specific antenna to test it with because my truck is loaned out, so I tried it with a few dual-band antennas. The Comet 2x4 had an SWR of 2.04, a couple of others had ~1.69, and once again, the much-maligned Nagoya UT-72 came out on top with an SWR of 1.23. I'll be interested to see what I get with an antenna that's tuned for GMRS. Power output was good -- 21-24 watts with all the antennas except the Nagoya. For some reason, I consistently got a reading of 26-27 watts with the UT-72. I can't explain why a different antenna would make a significant difference in power, but that's what I got. All the antennas were tested on the same NMO mag mount except the Nagoya which is an integrated unit. As far as I know, a different antenna and/or coax shouldn't change the power reading at the meter, particularly because the reading is taken before the RF energy even enters the antenna's coax. I wasn't able to test range, but I did confirm that it does indeed perform as a repeater. It doesn't "kerchunk" which surprised me a little. Not that I really care, but it was unusual. I hope to get this thing out to the field sometime soon, but my first impression is that it will be an excellent tool to have available for camping, hiking, or other outdoor activities.

I emailed BTech support and got a reply that you can't program "no tone" in the software; you have to do it from the keypad. I said that didn't make a lot of sense when you have software available. She got kinda snotty with me and said, "You do realize it's a GMRS specific repeater and you can't change the repeater pairs?" I said yes, I know that, but it doesn't address my issue. She shot back with, "Most of our customers prefer to do programming from the keypad anyway." I wanted to ask, "Or do they just program from the keypad because your software sucks?" but I figured it would be pointless and just let it go. Bottom line -- you can do it, but only from the keypad.

I don't have "trust issues" -- I have "learned experience".

Because most of the time, that's all you need. There's a GMRS repeater about 2 miles away from me; 1 watt will give me a good connection. There's a ham repeater 72 miles from me that I can usually use with 12 watts from my base unit, and can always use with 35 watts, so even though my base will do 50 watts, I never set it that high. The units in my vehicles can also generate 50 watts, but I usually have most frequencies set to 12 watts because that's all I need. The most significant limitation on radio communication is terrain, and if 12 watts won't do it, 50 usually won't either. There are a few exceptions, but you will figure them out with experience. With regard to handheld radios, one good reason to keep the wattage as low as feasible is that higher wattage will use up your battery faster. Again, most of the time, more power won't allow you to reach a radio or repeater that you couldn't reach with 5 watts. Just from a standpoint of politeness, using more power has the potential to cause more interference with other people's signals. Trying to avoid that is just part of being a decent human.

You have a good point. It almost happened to me. Just when I was about to give up and start over, a miracle occurred and I was able to log in.

I'd say definitely not necessary, since FCC issued both my licenses on the same FRN. I was just curious if it was common to have more than one FRN.

I like the idea of an agreed-upon channel for travel/emergencies, but FCC apparently has no interest in selecting one and nobody else has the mantle of authority to decree one. Amateur radio has ARRL. Although they don't have any actual power to enforce their band plans and calling frequencies, the vast majority of users go along with ARRL's plans. We don't have anything comparable for GMRS, as far as I know.

I'm pretty sure I didn't get a new FRN for my amateur license. Is it normal to have different FRNs for GMRS and amateur licenses?

I'm currently away from home, but mine arrived while I was gone. I have a friend picking up packages and putting them in the garage, so hopefully it will still be there when I return tomorrow night. I'm kind of excited to play with it and see what it can do.

I'm not sure they wouldn't. IMO, it's worth a try.

I do a little bit of both of these. I have GMRS 1-22 simplex, some "friends and family" channels, and then repeaters. The repeaters are grouped according to where they are geographically, generally based upon how far they are from my home and if they're on a route I travel quite a bit. 1-22 have no codes engaged, "friends and family" channels have codes to match whatever the person I expect to talk to has entered, then of course the repeaters have input codes I don't usually enter rx codes unless it's in a particularly busy area.

As far as I can tell, most FRS radios come with tones already set. That's how they advertise them as having "64 channels" or whatever the mierro de toro of the day is. As Alec said, most people are absolutely clueless about them. Odds are that almost nobody on an FRS radio will hear you unless you intentionally coordinate it with them. GMRS users seem to be more likely to operate without tones set when on simplex, but even so, groups tend to set tones to avoid having to listen to a bunch of other people.

I've never made a random contact on simplex. You just aren't reaching enough people. It's extremely useful for communication with people you know, family groups, etc., though.

Okay, I can live with that. I have other radios. However, I definitely want to be able to program 8 repeater pairs with tones and 8 without, but my program doesn't have any option for "no tone". It has CTCSS, DTCS, and inverse DTCS in the dropdown menu. No "none' or blank space. I'm away from home right now, but I'll email BTech when I get home and see if I can get it clarified.

Supposedly, you can enter a bunch of frequencies to scan but not transmit. Not that I really need it, but if it's supposed to do that, I'd like to know why mine won't. Mainly, I want to have one set of 8 repeater pairs with tones and one set without. For some reason, the software I have won't let me enter a repeater pair with no tone set. That seems to me to be a major flaw.

Not on mine. That's the problem. The software I downloaded from BTech seems extremely rudimentary. For example, there are only 16 channels. Period. Supposedly, you can store up to 800 frequencies and scan them. There's no way to do any of that with this software.

Okay, one more thing. How do I tell it I don't want a CTCSS or DTS code enabled? "No SQ" doesn't seem to be one of the options.

Aha. Good to know. I'll try that.

That's interesting. I can't enter anything into rows 9-16. I'd like to do what you did. After I posted, I realized that it could actually function like a base station. Since a base station exceeds the power limits for channels 1-14, it functions on 15-22 anyway. It won't scan, but otherwise it will function like a base station; i.e, transmit and receive on the selected frequency without having to use the repeater function.

I bought one of these, but I haven't installed it yet. I need to get a mast up for the antenna. For now, it's going to be a 30' flagpole because my budget won't allow a real tower. However, I've mentioned before that my house is in a very good location for radios, being on an elevated position above a river. I have a buddy who lives on the other side of the river in a simplex "dead zone". Based just upon the distance, we should be able to talk simplex, but his home is blocked by terrain. We can talk on my base unit with a Comet 2x4 on a pizza pan about 9' off the floor, so I think getting the antenna up 30' will make it possible for us to talk HT to HT pretty much all over the area. I'm less optimistic about my friend who lives in a city about 20 miles north, but I used one of those online terrain calculators, and it looks like it's not impossible. It has 16 channels in the software, but you can only enter data into 8 of them with one weird exception. Using the BTech software, if you checkmark channel 9, it automatically enters values to transmit on 440.0000 MHz and receive on 450.0000 MHz. You can change the tones but not the frequencies. I haven't tried to find out if it actually functions in that mode, but it seems like a strange thing to include. At first, I was like, "Whaddaya mean I can't use all 16 channels!" Then I remembered it's a repeater. It will probably spend its entire life on the same frequency. I entered 8 just because I could, but it seems unlikely I'll use more than one. BTech says you can use it as a base station with the supplied mic, but that's not exactly true. Apparently, you can transmit and receive on any of the 8 programmed channels, but the rest of the GMRS band isn't available. That isn't really a big deal because most likely I'll only use the mic to respond to traffic on the repeater when I'm at home, but being away from home is kinda the point of a repeater. I may program them to some local repeaters that are a bit too far away for my base unit and see if the taller, higher-gain CA-712 antenna will let me reach them.

Yep. I've even started to use that phrase myself.

The Tiger II is widely acknowledged to have been the best tank of WW2. The Germans built 1,347 of them. The Sherman was a "pretty good" tank. The US built 49,324 of them. As good as the Tiger was, it would never have been as good as 36 Shermans. Sometimes "good enough" in large numbers can provide the winning edge. It's pretty hard for me to even wrap my head around the staggering production capacity of the US in WW2. At the end of the war, the US repurposed 57 aircraft carriers to return troops home from overseas. 57. Today, there are 50 aircraft carriers in the entire world. Yes, today's carriers are bigger and better, but the ones built in WW2 were technologically the best available at the time. The US made more than 15,000 P51 fighter aircraft during the war. Just that one type of fighter. 12,730 B17 bombers. It boggles the mind.

I have 6 new unopened AR-5RMs on standby.