OffRoaderX

Mine was receiving radios at 10-20 miles away.. but.. yah.. other than that, you're right.

I made a repeater using to KG-1000Gs and I never had an issue with duty cycle, even when our entire group was banging away at it for days at a time. I DID however run into the issue of desense which was limiting the range of the setup - I was getting 25+ miles, but why my geography I should have been getting a lot more fars. As Mr @WRYZ926 said, I too upgraded to a purpose-built repeater and with LESS power out, i get 2x+ more fars.

Surprisingly good!

Pro Tip: Normal people only answer questions when someone asks a question. You're welcome.

My GUESS is that you are describing an MDC, which is a digital tone that some radios output containing their radio-ID. Similar radios can decode the MDC tone and display the ID, or other person's name on the screen.

My fix would be to send it back and tell them to either send you one that works as advertised, or give back your money.. But, thats just me...

That Joshua Tree repeater has great range - i was hitting it last weekend from out around Desert Center and toward Blythe. The Palm Springs Tram repeater also has great coverage and the Mesa Crest repeater has great High-Desert and Inland Empire coverage.

I have one mounted on a cookie-sheet in the window. You only need a few inches of metal around the base, and it doesn't even need to be solid-metal, it can be strips. There is also an inexpensive ground-plane mount you can by that will do the job, but i dont think the hand-railing alone will do the job unless it's at least 6-10 inches wide. My 72G on the cookie-sheet works fine - it has an SWR below 2 and I can hit repeaters 70 miles away and talk on simplex with HT's ~20 miles away.. YMMV based on terrain.

Sir, the term "CCR" is racist and moolahphobic.

The best and most important functions to have on a radio are the ones that are most important to you and allow you to do whatever you want to do with your radio. In other words, only you can answer that question. That said, by far, THE single most important feature to have on a radio is the Roger Beep - because without it you will never be able to draw-out all the Sad-H.A.M.s and laugh at them when they start crying about hearing your Roger Beep.

Is the duplexer correctly tuned for whatever frequency you are using? and are your two RA87s properly shielded to prevent de-sensing each other?

EDIT: Upon reflection, never mind.

Based on all of the detailed information you have provided, I would say "probably a lot of things"

Yah, there is a reason for that.

Ok.. Mine did not do that.. It's not in the user-manual because this radio does not have a Roger Beep.. So yours must be defective. What did BTech Support have to say?

Aluminum will work, but your mag-mount wont stick to it as well as a cookie-sheet.. However the wife will probably complain less about using the foil vs the cookie-sheet. I'm sure that "some people" will leave a more detailed, 10-paragraph explanation complete with the molecular differences between steel and aluminum and the RF calculations, all just to say "it will work" ....

The offset is 462.700 +5Mhz = 467.700 - thats what you are seeing on the screen when you transmit. Because it's a GMRS radio, you dont have to worry about entering the offset because it's all automatic. The radio is working 100% as it should. If people aren't hearing you it is because you are either not in range of the repeater (just because you can hear it does not mean you cant hit/use it from your radio), you put in the wrong tone, or did something else wrong.

You wont find it in the manual because the 50V2 (at least, the one that I had) does not have a Roger Beep.

What kind of report are you trying to download, and as already asked, WHERE/HOW are you trying to download it from?

I want to see him tell us.

Oh my, that sounds serious! So what will happen if he uses an illegal radio on GMRS?

The fact that the OP, and a thousand others have to ask this question, prove that this is incorrect. It might be written down somewhere, but the fact that nobody knows and even less people abide by it shows that, in the real-world, this is incorrect. as @Sshannon said, there is no [widely-recognized] call channel IN USE - to refer to some outdated and UNUSED reference is disingenuous at best.

I dont think you actually understand what the term "major issue" means. Now please write a page-long explanation of why i'm wrong so more people can laugh at you.

yah, i'm outraged... because its such a major issue...

I stand corrected.. ONE other guy ...