marcspaz

@gortex2 I really need to get to TN. Between the Tunnels and Winrock, I am missing out on a lot. I have never been to a JJ event. They look fun, but always seem so crowded and I have trouble justifying the money, when I can wheel the same place outside of JJ either free or really inexpensive. What do you have done to the JT? I have a Metalcloak 3.5" True Dual suspension, Adam's drive shafts, Fusion 4x4 2.5 ton AL steering and some 37" Mickey Thompson ATZ's. Working with a local shop to build some custom East Coast Dana 60's for the front and back, with 5.13's and Ox lockers. Once the 60's are in, I am going to either a 40" or 42" tire.

That's awesome! Do you use Ham or GMRS to support events? Ham is really popular around here, but occasionally I see REACT and a few others use FRS/GMRS. I love working the bike events. We have one coming up soon. 100K fund raiser for Willing Warriors. Can't wait for that one.

@gortex2 that's awesome that you have so much time in. There are not many people I have met that stay that dedicated for that long. Stinks to hear SAR in your area is lacking. That is such an important role. Honestly, the last SAR/USAR training I have done was over a decade ago and the actual use was almost 21 years ago. About 3 days of rescue and about 3 weeks of recovery. I hope I never have to use those skills again, but with the weather we get, we should still be training. The JT and JK sound like they are decked out very well. If you ever do any offloading and want to make a weekend trip to Rausch, AOAA, Uwharrie, etc.. drop me a note. I am a member of a few clubs and we do a group trip at least monthly. I use a Z Automotive Tazer to control my factory lights, auto park, and some other features. All of the commercial lights came from LED Outfitters in NY. I have been using their hardware for about 5 years and I am very happy with them.

I've shared on a few occasions that I do volunteer work using amateur radio to help out. The other day I did some volunteer work with the Marines, supporting the Marine Corps Marathon Historic Half Marathon. Part of what I did for the marathon is sweep the course to make sure everyone was clear and safe. I know I have shared pictures of my radio setup before, but I also have emergency lighting. Since I work with DOD as well as law enforcement and other emergency services, I can legally run yellow and white strobes while assisting the served agency. Unfortunately I was way too busy to shoot any pictures or video while I as working, but when I got home I popped a couple photos and a quick video of the Jeep with the lights going. Thanks to the repeater in my Jeep, I was able to run my HT most of the day. It was a really good time. Does anyone else volunteer? Any pics or video you want to share?

I am just south of you in Woodbridge. A friend of mine has 5 unlisted repeaters in Seven Corners, Gaithersburg, DC and Haymarket/Gainsville. They are all pretty quiet. One is used by a local CERT team and even that one is pretty quiet. The one my friends and I use is the one in the Haymarket/Gainsville area. If you PM me, we can put some time aside and test on one we can both reach. Also, I can give you the details on the Haymarket/Gainsville machine and you can see if you can reach it. He just doesn't what the info on any websites.

@Blaise , send me a PM if interested.

but... but... but... it's the internet. I'm pretty sure its mandatory. LOL

My favorite lie was "chics dig it". Also, had someone tell me you can't mimic NVIS by bouncing UHF signals off of moisture or debris in the atmosphere by pointing the antenna toward the sky. Nor can we have actual NVIS propagation during major geomagnetic storms and Arora storms. I guess the GMRS gurus know more than the JPL communications scientists that work for NASA.

Let me get this right.... you come in here more than a week ago, make 1 post to stir the pot on a subject you know very well has history on this forum. Act shocked by the same responses that are in every other thread about this and then pop smoke with a backhanded snarky attitude. Does that about sum this up? Did someone put you up to this or are you just terrible at being a troll all on your own?

I mean, in your defense, you said "programming software such as CHIRP" So, I'm a semantics guy and saying use something "like CHIRP" isn't the same thing as saying "use CHIRP". That said, I will agree with the aforementioned that because CHIRP isn't compatible, it can cause confusion for new people by mentioning a platform that doesn't actually work. @OffRoaderX... did this dude just assume your license status? Hahaha

What's RR?

I am curious @WRKC935, if this was a one time thing or has there been some BS and this was the proverbial straw?

It's personal property. We don't owe anyone anything. I think stopping someone from verbally abusing you and threatening you by removing their access to your personal property sounds smart, not immature. Too many people seem to overlook the point that this is personal property and the owner has all the rights and privileges that go with that honor. Just my opinion, rather have the owner hear venting instead of losing their cool. Having people to talk to and work through problems is healthy and we are hear to support like-minded people in the GMRS community. Sounds like the perfect place for the discussion.

As a repeater owner, I support whatever you do. That said, I would have explained that as a repeater owner, you are only responsible for content that originates on your device. You are not responsible for transmissions that originate on someone else's device. If they have a complaint, they need to complain to the originating station. If that isn't good enough for them, its too bad. The level of stress I am seeing in your post is way to high and not worth it. Don't let them get to you. If unplugging the system brings that stress level down, more power to you.

That is 85 aeronautical miles in the hills of PA. The HT isn't going to work.

OP hasn't come back... bummer. @Screech Not sure if you had a chance to mess with the MXT500. It's a nice setup with compromise between "easy out of the box" and advanced performance. I have been recommending them to people who already have a no-frills radio and are looking for a replacement with a touch more to it. Out of the box, it's almost the same as any of the other complete kits, with the exception of it actually displaying your CTCSS and DCS values instead of a sequence number. However, you can enable repeater use, it has 8 customizable channels for programing via the software (including custom names/display options), supports split tones, and can easily be switched between NB and WB, for improved quality of comms depending on what the other person/people are using. When they released this radio, I started thinking they may be starting to develop a product line that will appeal a bit more to advanced users. That said... I really agree with what you feel the mindset is for people getting them. Monthly, I have people with zero experience with radio and they what something for traveling in groups, going offroading, camping, etc. If they don't want to spend a lot of money and understand power/range, battery and speaker limits, I push them toward a cheap HT. If the want more range, battery life and to hear better while driving, then I push them toward one of the Micro Mobile radios. For Hams and advanced GMRS users, I tell them about the the KG-1000 (since its based on a Ham radio) and/or depending on the person, the MARS/CAP mod for existing gear.

Well, I hope my post may help clear things up. I doubt it, but hopefully. I know I stir the pot with some of my posts about this, but reality is, this is my current and typical daily situation while I'm driving around... I'm probably still go a stir the pot when this topic pops up though. LOL

I mentioned this before. I think there is some confusion between two different conversations being had here. I think people are mixing up ORI compared to a standard simplex channel. In early to mid-2000’s, Popular Wireless and the Personal Radio Association came up with the idea of an Open Repeater Initiative (ORI). It was designed to get repeater owners to open up and share resources instead of locking them down, reducing difficulty to get access to a GMRS Repeater system. The idea was to make it easier for a GMRS licensee to use available resources. The ORI standards were simple. ORI epeaters were open to all users regardless of a club/group membership or not. Implementation of the 141.3 CTCSS/PL, which was and still is referred to as the “travel tone”, so people could program their radios as a standard when traveling or visiting different areas. Lastly, the repeater pair 462/467.675 (rCH 20) was to be used. However, as time moved on, it morphed into any repeater pair using 141.3 as a standard PL access and did not require prior permission. Even though Popular Wireless and the Personal Radio Association are gone, the spirit of ORI still lives on today. While many people consider repeater pair 462/467.675 (rCh20) the official travel channel because of the verbiage of "travel tone" of the rCh20 pair, I am not convinced this is what @OffRoaderX and others are talking about when supporting CH19 as the road channel (or travel channel). I believe they are advocating use of a simplex channel with no tone. So, anywhere you go, regardless of if a repeater is around, you have a main channel to communicate on while traveling. Also, if I understand them correctly, using a channel other than 20 is a good idea to reduce confusion and accidental interference from cross-traffic on channel 20, since so many repeater owners are still honoring the spirit or ORI. So, Randy... am I completely off base or does that somewhat sum up what you're discussing and advocating for?

I'm not sure there is any kind of sites that focus around setup. Out of the box, the MXT275 is no more complicated to install or use than a CB. There is an option to enable use of a repeater, which your best source of information on that is your owner's manual. Do you need help understanding what repeaters are or what they do? Do you have any specific questions?

I may be wrong, but I'm fairly sure the full details are only available if you are a licensed operator and have a membership to MyGMRS.

So, something new that I am extremely disappointed about with my MXT500. When I got this radio, I did not bother doing any real testing of the receiver for noise rejection, filtering and selectivity. And today I don't need to because I know it sucks. The receiver is so bad, that I may send this back to Midland for repair and then sell it, because it's not reliable and therefore not usable. I went offloading this weekend and opted to use my MXT500 because it is water and dust resistant and my other radios are not. I used the radio for about 14 hours a day for 3 days, out in the mountains of PA. This was the first time I used the radio for more than a few minutes for testing and getting familiar with the radio. On the first day, after having the radio on for about 30 minutes, a few people I don't know started chatting on a close-in repeater. The repeater is close enough to me that I receive its signal well enough that there is zero noise/static in the signal. After just 3 minutes of hearing the chatter, the receiver started cutting in and out. Not the audio, but the actual receiver would flutter as I watched the signal meter and hear the audio just go away and comeback rapidly. I turned on my handheld, just to confirm it wasn't the repeater or interference and the handheld was receiving the conversion perfectly. This issue persisted over the entire 3 days. If a conversion went on for more than a few minutes, the receiver went to crap. To make things even worse, it started raining on the second day and it rained all day. The whole time my headlights were on, we could hear a distinct crackle and interference with the receiver. Also, every time the windshield wipers moved, you could hear the wipers motor in the receiver. On top if that, my Jeep was completely off and a buddy pulled along side me to talk, and I could hear HIS windshield wiper motor on my radio. This is not a wiring issue with my Jeep. It is not an issue with filters on my power lines or my antenna cable. I simply unplugged my existing amateur radio equipment and plugged the MXT500 into the existing power and antenna system. None of my other gear has any issues on these connections. Now, as if that wasn't bad enough, listen to this... I was talking to someone at their home, on my local repeater while driving around last night (just dealing with the noise and receiver flutter] and I needed to jump out of the Jeep and run in a store. The repeater is about 25 miles from my neighborhood. So, I hoped out and grabbed my handheld so I could keep chatting while walking around in the store. The guy I was talking to asked me if I made any adjustments to my radio. I said "I just got out of the truck and switched to my handheld". I thought he was going to give me a bad report, but instead he said that may handheld radio had a better signal into the repeater and the audio was much much better. When I got back outside, I confirmed the Midland was in wideband and on full power. I'm so disappointed that the transmit signal of the Midland and the receiver quality or so bad. I mean, my quality into the repeater was better with a 5w HT while inside a building from 25 miles away... my heart sunk even more. I know you can't see it, but im making my sad face.

It's funny, I travel and go wheeling up and down the east coast several times a month. I never hear anything on 19 on the highway, but I always hear people on 20. And as far as offroad, at the National and private parks I hear people on every channel pair. This weekend I was at AOAA doing some wheeling and there had to have been well over 200 people sharing 22 channels. It was busy. Anecdotal, I know. Just sharing an experience.

HAHAHA... It's early in the year. Hopefully I can redeem myself. ?

May as well not waste your time, unless this is entertaining to you. You're trying to argue points of view with someone who believes a seriously hobbled service is the best for emergencies because the most amount of untrained people who will never actually engage in emergency responses has near untethered access to $9.99 FRS radios they can steal from retail stores or from their kids who got them as Christmas gifts. I think its funny that he keep taking jabs, implying Hams are old and senile, but then brags about getting his license when he was 10 and the chics dug it when he was a kid.

I lost my license while talking an unlicensed user, Seriously.... I have no idea where I put it. I ended up having to print another copy. Ah.... I'm just joking. I didn't lose my license, but i did get a strongly worded scolding from the club president. He said "Don't feed the monkeys."