marcspaz

Dude... Midland just completely punked out. They said the specs are 42-50 watts. They are trying to get out of it by saying it's close enough and my gear. @gortex2 The 12 feet is the total length of the antenna transmission path. I may have added too much information, causing some confusion with that statement. There is only 3 feet of patch cable between the radio and the watt meter and the meter shows a perfect 50 Ohm load, so the rest of the path, after the meter should not be relevant, no? My loss meter is showing 0.102dB on the patch cable. The watt meter is not reading at the end of the path, it’s the first item in the path (not including the cable). Even if we get really picky and add the typical 0.019 dB per UHF connector, we are assuming a total of 0.204 dB of loss, not 1 dB. That should be a total measured output power of 47.7 watts. Would you agree? I’m not trying to give anyone at Midland a hard time. I am a life-long Midland customer, purchasing CB’s, FRS and GMRS handhelds and GMRS mobile radios. I love the products. The main reason why I am even complaining is because my MXT400 (siting right next to me) is putting out the exact same power (measured) as the MXT500, which is supposed to be more powerful. So I hop people can understand my frustration.

I tested the radio using a 40 amp Astron adjustable power supply set to 13.8vdc for the power source. For a load, I first tested with a Diamond X300 Repeater antenna and a Diamond watt meter. When I did not get the expected results, I move to a Vectronics 50 Ohm resistive load, monitoring the output with a Tectronics oscilloscope and a Bird watt meter. I am using just 12 feet total of LMR400 patch cables and they all test fine. It's got a clean signal with minimal spurs. My SWR on the live antenna was 1.1:1 and the dummy load was a perfect 1:1. This radio is NOT putting out 50 watts.

That second paragraph doesn't make any sense to me. Why would you want to restrict everything, including Ham, to 12.5KHz?

I don't think the hardware exists inside the radio to support 2m transmission. Did the Anytone start life as a multiband radio with modified software/firmware for GMRS?

It's really simple.. Don't expect to be impressed unless you are looking to be impressed with the simplicity and ease of use.

@MichaelLAX I wouldn't hold my breathe. LOL I did open a ticket with Midland, today. We'll see how they goes.

@PACNWComms This is going in my Jeep for offroad use, replacing my MXT400. If I have any issues like that, I will let you know. I use my GMRS radio almost every day. I still have my MXT400 and the original mic. The radio and mic/cable are in fantastic shape. Anecdotally, every single CB, Ham or GMRS radio I have seen with a messed up mic cable, the installer put the radio too far away, leading to the user over-stretching the cables. Also, the user and installer were typically the same person. LOL

Here is a quick video of the measured wattage. Sorry I just tossed everything on the bench pretty quick...

I have a 40 amp adjustable power supply that I have set to 13.8v. I can shoot some video when I get home if you are interested. Looks like @gortex2 got you hooked up with the software link. On the Midland page, where it says MXT500 Programming, just click the setup link. The software includes the USB driver and the programming software.

Solar panels are noisy... but usually more so for HF stations that use sideband. I'm not sure you will have issues with UHF FM. Maybe a little desensing. I haven't had any issues at the house, with the base antenna next to my solar panels. Might be worth testing with a mag mount before buying something and running cables.

I edited the original post for clarification on the "two meter / 2m" confusion. I appreciate the feedback.

If you have a good, properly shielded antenna cable, running it next to the power lines, while less than ideal, should be okay. I would do everything you can to separate them by as much as possible. Otherwise run power and ground and twist the power and ground leads around one another. It will help keep RF off the power wires as well as helping prevent noise from the truck causing interference. As far as the antenna mount goes, what is shown in the picture is not a good spot at all. The light bar, rack and other items on the roof will act like a shield and you will have poor performance. I would recommend getting a lip mount and clamping it to the hood. Make sure it is about 12 to 15 inches away from the A pillar. It will work a lot better on the hood then where pictured.

Another quick update... I have to say, I do like the ease of the programing of the radio. The software is free, very easy to install and use. Also, being able to custom program channels 8 through 14 is a nice plus. I am currently setting it up to use channel 19 and 22 with 141.3 tone... and then used channel 8 and 9 for the 650 and 725 pairs for another PL so I don't have to change the PL when I want to move between the different repeaters.

No worries. I think with some of the shenanigans that happened in this form, it's understandable to question what I wrote. LoL

Dude... I didn't test on 2m. I used two distinctly different watt meters to confirm the numbers are correct. See? I tested on two meters, not 2m.

I'm not real good at detecting jokes on the interwebz... but I hope that's a joke. I mean, I am assuming its a joke.

Well, it's here.... After using a bunch of feature-rich radios I wasn't expecting much out of it, but this was pretty disappointing. The only feature difference above the MXT400 is the split tone and (maybe) the weather resistance. The biggest disappointment so far is they advertise this unit as 50w and its not. I bench-tested it with two different watt meters and it maxed out at 38 watts on the 462 MHz channels and 32 watts on the 467 MHz frequencies. I'm going to play with it for a few days and see if there are any other disappointments. I'll let you all know what I think after I give it a fair shot.

Most of humanity bases their opinions off of anecdotal evidence because those experiences shape our immediate reality. So, I try not to discourage sharing of personal experiences. I'm a scientist and there is an expression I heard long ago, when I first started my studies, that still holds true today. Nothing is impossible, just improbable

@gortex2 I think it has a lot to do with were you are and if you stimulate the traffic or not. In my experience, people meet there and then move to another frequency to leave the calling frequency open. Since VHF is still a LOS, you may just be missing the traffic if it is out there. I live near Interstate 95 in the DC metro area. I monitor with my base while working during the day and there is always traffic on 146.520, 147.525 and 446.000. They are well used by the locals and travelers who are making their way north or south and looking to chat. I even do it myself. Recently, I was driving from DC to New England, alone. The bands sounded dead, but during the day every time I called out on 520 announcing I was traveling through and looking for a contact, someone got back to me. One of the longest 2m contacts I had with a stranger was while I was heading north. I was just getting on the Cross Bronx and called out. Some guy in CT on a mountain top heard me and responded. I chatted with him all the way to RI. As we chatted, we had several other people hop in and out of the conversation too. I'm headed to New England this Saturday. I'm going to be using 20m and 2m for company since I will be driving alone. Between the two, I typically have company the whole trip.

It's okay for you and I to have a different opinion on that. I may make that urban test. I think 8 blocks is generous. Especially at night. LoL I just realized that would mean going to Tampa, Orlando metro or DC and playing in traffic, which doesn't sound fun.

@axorlov The point behind sharing my road test results are to demonstrate how insignificant a 6 dB loss is in the world of recreational family radio. In my example, it took more than a 7 dB improvement in power to add spotty communications for about 1/2 mile.

I fully agree. I segmented out the statements above, specifically to note that I used the radio's S meter as an example because it's an easy visual reference for people who don't have the knowledge and experience that a select few here have from working in some RF engineering related career. I definitely don't encourage anyone to rely on them for anything beyond decoration, in most cases. Especially in the OTC GMRS world.

To cut to the chase of it... concepts are the same, but every radio is different. Especially between GMRS and Amateur UHF/VHF compared to most HF radios. If you know how to use one radio, that absolutely does not mean you can operate any radio without firsthand knowledge or the owner's manual.

@axorlov As I mention before, I am not saying we shouldn't look for means to improve our losses. I am simply trying to stress that the increase of power, even at 4 times your base wattage, does not have the significant impact in range of which you are implying. For example, my son and I conducted real world tests in GMRS in 2020, while at our Florida home. Specifically, we decided to test this theory, due to a conversation just like this with someone else from this forum. We used a base antenna on the roof of the house, a mobile radio as a base station, 2 handhelds (1 base and 1 mobile), and a mobile radio in the Jeep My Jeep essentially has no loss (less than 1 dB measured) with a 1/4 wave antenna. At the house, I have measured loss of 4.1 dB going into a Diamond x300 repeater antenna which has a 6.9 db gain (tested) over my 1/4 wave antenna. Starting with using handheld radios and using 0.800 watts (measured), we got 8.5 miles apart before the voices became unintelligible. We switched to the mobile radios and upped the power to 5 watts (measured) and only made it to 8.8 miles before the audio became unintelligible. From there we jumped directly to 42 watts (measured) and we hit a maximum distance of 10.5 miles of usable audio. On that day, by increasing our power 53 times, we were only able to increase the usable range 2 miles, about a 20%. I used that as an example for UHF and GMRS because it is directly related. However, as we go lower in frequency, the performance increase becomes less and less because of how radio waves propagate.

I'm not going to knock anyone for wanting the most out of their system... but what you're saying about RF signals in space is not correct. There are so many variables that are involved and some pretty complex math to calculate. As far as on earth, same thing applies. Space weather, Geomagnetic storms, and atmospheric propagation combined with good antenna design plays a much larger role than power.