JB007Rules

I'll bite on this one so you can get a realistic idea how much money it costs to put a super high end tall repeater in. Here is a copy/paste from my costs for my system. It's argued that if I went with the correct repeater (Motorola Quantar) from the get go I could have saved $806 ($365 + $200 re-tune on the used Kenwood TKR-850 + the $150 preamp).... SO say $7989.77 total.... I couldn't afford it and didn't want to deal with it out of the gate to be honest. These costs are obviously not including any radios or monthly tower rent. Nor does it include the correct test equipment (Dummy loads, antenna analyzer, etc etc). I also don't have a duplexer any more but when I did that was an additional $800 for a good 4 cavity EMR corp Band pass/band reject unit. These costs DO include 66.6 hours of run time on dual 12V batteries at stand-by / 15.38 hours of talk time at 25W (half power). + charger. Note that the charger isn't very big because the Quantar also charges the batteries when power is restored. That is in addition to however long the 1500VA APC will run it at full power on AC which isn't tested but looking at the LCD screen of the battery it shows about 2 hours stand-by on that and keyed at 50W of power, about 30 min of talk time. You don't *NEED* Northcomm cables or all the backup stuff so if you consider a Quantar out of the gate and you subtract the other items you'd be closer to $7215.47. It's also worth noting that you don't need a pre-amp with a quantar so that saves you a bit since a quantar's receive is insane good. Every site is different and I'm on a receiver multi-coupler that has a pre-amp built into it. Numbers below: Item: Cost: Part Numbers: Notes: DB408 $952.50 DB-408B Feed Line $1,327.20 AVA7-50 x 280' @ $4.74/foot 6' Stand Off Bracket $0.00 S-600 Got as part of the tower climb Clamps $108.28 MS-SB50 Grounding kits x 2 $30.38 SG158-12B2U ($15.19/each) Repeater $395.00 TKR-850 Tower Climbers $1,700.00 9AM - 6PM 1-5/8" Female N Connectors $227.36 158EZNF - 2 @ $113.68/each 105AH Lead acid battery $267.00 Installing week of 6/14/21 Noco G3500 3.5A charger $63.70 G3500 Bought 11/23/2019 1500VA APC Battery Backup $178.60 BX1500M Repeater re-tuning $200.00 Pre-AMP $150.00 Northcomm Cables $200.00 Polyphaser VHF50HN $120.00 105AH Lead acid battery $332.00 Installed 2/16/2022 Quantar $1,328.13 DC Cable 3084989T03 $71.76 DC Cable TRN5155A $67.27 Quantar Tuning - Northcomm + Cables + Controller $899.20 Freight for Quntar $86.39 TOTAL: $8,704.77 Hope this helps!

Sorry I might have sent you 3 messages. Not sure how this messaging system works lol. Anyways the last message I sent you should be what you need.

Check your PM's WRMS528

It's also worth noting that 99% of the time a GMRS call sign will be a "WRxx123" or a "WQxx123".... However there are 1% (or less in fact) of users (Here in the midwest there quite a few of them actually) that have the "old school" call signs which are 4 letters, followed by 3 numbers. For anonymity reasons I'm not going to put any active calls out there but you can go to the FCC database and search by type - ZA for GMRS, hit "active" and hit the search button. With this same/old school GMRS call signs, you'll also see businesses registered as well. Dow Chemical is one for example. Back in the day the FCC used to offer valid GMRS call signs for companies. This isn't the case any more but as long as whoever has that call sign has renewed it year after year after year and pays those fees, it's still active and valid. Thanks!

I paid by the foot from Primus in Morris, IL. It's $4.74/foot and I bought 280' of it for the transmitter antenna I had installed. I borrowed my dads car trailer to get it (See the aforementioned website, it has a pic of the feedline in the pictures section). Yes, this is a 110W repeater tuned down to 50W. Days... You mean years. This repeater *could* do 110W for years on end with zero issues based on the experts that know more about them than myself. Not sure what assumptions were being made (if any), but I want to iterate that I *DO PAY MONTHLY RENT* for this tower. It's FAR from free. I also had to sign a lease agreement and carry a 2 million dollar insurance policy. This isn't some rinky-dink old abandoned tower which I'm getting for free. I'm a paying customer to the tower owner just like anyone else. As such there is no way I can just be "booted" from the site like others have mentioned. Yes, I'm aware of those things happening but will not happen here as a paying customer lol. As far as the site, there is a guy that checks the site on a yearly basis for issues/clean up and maintenance. I can assure you that if this repeater was causing problems for others there, or if another repeater there was causing issues for me that matter, that won't last too long. The offending machine would have to be repaired/replaced/fixed because that would never fly lol. To take that a step further, it's *NOT* easy to get onto a site like this either. It took nearly a year of back and forth to make this happen and a site survey was done prior to me going on the site to make sure what I was putting in wouldn't cause issues. You can check the history of everything here as well. You can read from the bottom up to see the time-line starting on 4/30/2020: https://mygmrs.com/repeater/3838 I hope this helps add some clarification.

1-5/8" on the transmit line I installed. I believe the receive is 1-1/4". If you'd like to see pictures (outdated now showing the TKR-850 of course) and a coverage map go to http://rugged575.com/ I'm good with my tower owner, all things have been considered and signed off for as far as studies. Trust me on that one lol.

Preface: This thread isn’t to start a war against 2 different manufactures… you do you! I’m sharing the FACTS of what I’ve done here and the experiences that me and my users have had! You can leave the arguments off this thread! Kayyyyyy, thanks, bye! I have to share this success story because it’s worth everyone reading IMO. I will start by stating that I’m well over 5 figures in on the Rugged 575 repeater in Naperville, IL on a commercial tower which has the receive antenna at the top at 300’ and the transmit 50’ further down at 250’ (Which I paid to install). It’s been quite a learning experience and I don’t care how much money you may have; experience wins here! You can check the repeater listing for the back-story and read from the bottom up: https://mygmrs.com/repeater/3838 I’ve had this repeater on air since 8/17/2020. As a whole, it’s worked VERY well for what I need for my family and for the hobby in the suburbs of Chicago. While it doesn’t have near the traffic as other local repeaters (Joliet 550 which is another local only repeater (Not linked) which is also taller), it’s stayed on the air 24/7/365 with zero down time. The repeater was the VERY CHEAPEST component in this ENTIRE build with the antenna, feed line, and tower climbers costing FARRRRRRRRRR MORE of course. In the words of Corey, a $1,000 radio with a $30 antenna is a $30 radio and a $30 radio with a $1,000 antenna is a $1,000 radio. This is and always will remain true and he is correct 100%. With this theory, off I was with a cheap $365 Kenwood TKR-850 which was also aligned by Corey up in Wisconsin (Thanks again for your help here sir!) with a massive antenna and feed line system. It worked VERY well for the last year and a half and is still a working backup system at this point. I was also lucky to finally tie into the sites master UHF receive antenna at the top through a 1-8 split multi-coupler (so no duplexer as I’m using 2 different antennas) which made ALL the difference in the world VS using 1 antenna with a duplexer. Fast forward a year and a half later we come to the Motorola Quantar which I finally had the time to take on and install and has been installed for about 2 weeks now with ZERO changes since I left the tower site! This Motorola Quantar repeater *IS*, up until now 2/26/2022, the best repeater you can get according to the people I’m surrounded by that know more than I do about it – You all know who you are! They are *ALL* right (again, I never said they were wrong!). I never doubted them or thought they were wrong, but I wasn’t “in tune” with the whole, IMO, “overhyped” Motorola game to say the least. (Can you blame me?!) Here it is in plain text: I WAS WRONG ABOUT MOTOROLA. In particular the receive is INSANE, which always has been the selling point of this particular repeater and it’s one of the main reasons why this repeater excels over Kenwood (and others I’m sure but I cannot comment as I have no personal experience) ... It’s hard to fully explain in writing but the Quantar has *ALL* the things that “normal” repeaters (any brand other than Motorola) simply don’t have and simply put, it runs C-I-R-C-L-E-S around the Kenwood TKR-850. Without getting too complicated, a pre-selector being the most important part is key here combined with a receiver that makes a Kenwood look like a children’s play toy. The experts that know more about it can explain better but it’s more of a “system” than “just a repeater”. This is why it takes up 3 times more rack space and sucks down electricity like Darjeeling even at standby… Anyways, getting on 2 separate antennas with 50’ of vertical separation was the first BIG step basically doubling the usable coverage especially for hand held radios which was done last year. The 2nd step was the Quantar which doubled everything yet again. Many of you see Quantars on Ebay for $800 or $1,000 bucks and its hit or miss… I can assure you that by the time you’re done getting it CORRECTLY tuned and shipping it to and back, you can simply DOUBLE that number. I’ll put the numbers below so you can actually see but it’s NOT cheap. Sunny Communications out of Cali has done me right numerous times and they are the one that provided this Quantar this time too! Now for the tuning: A big shout out to Mark Dannon at Northcomm in Plano, TX. This man deserves a gold medal and is a FORCE to reckon with. His intelligence, experience, and overall willingness to not only help and DO IT RIGHT from beginning to end is just the start in addition to his post-sales support. He has equipment that your normal “radio shop” simply doesn’t have, and he *DOES* do it better. I’d even challenge ANY radio shop to tune a Qunatar, then send it to him and he’d make it even better. I’m LITERALLY not a spokes person for this guy or his company and I am *NOT* being paid to put this review here but what he has *IS BETTER* than any other “radio shop” and he specializes in Motorola Quantars too. I have to iterate this loud and clear that your repeater is only as good as the equipment that tuned it and this guy has it all dialed in and WILL run circles around others even with “$40,000 worth of equipment” (measly) … Trust me here as he has far more than that… In closing, I want to state some insane improvements which the numbers show in plain text proving its worth. I’m redacting names and call signs but if you read this and recognize the scenario then you know who you are!! 1) A gentleman in the SAME TOWN only 6 miles east, in a VERY, VERY hard to service area in low elevation next to several high rises blocking the signal couldn’t even get in on an HT 6 miles away, had to stand on his balcony to BARELY SCRAPE IN now get in now gets in FULL QUIETING on a 5W HT anywhere in his apartment. 2) A gentleman 59 miles away who could barely scrape in 2/10 quality on his 50W mobile and couldn’t even hear the repeater on his HT now gets in 9/10 almost full quieting on his mobile and can hear a conversation loud and clear in his living room on an HT 59 miles away with the same 50W of power going back out. Even better, he can get in 4-5/10 quality on his 5W HT but he has to be OUTSIDE to do so… Literally how is this possible… The curvature of the earth alone is in the way. No this isn’t a band opening; this is EVERY DAY…. 3) Personally, I could scrape in with a 1/10 quality (literally all static) on the first level of my sister’s house in Downers Grove, IL which is only a measly 11.15 miles away from the tower is now 8/10 almost full quieting on the first level on a 5W HT (Tree city, trust me here). Was 6/10 on house level 2 is now 10/10 loud & booming full quieting from the 2nd level of her house on the same 5W HT. 4) Another gentleman hasn’t EVER even been able to even key the repeater from his work on a 5W HT can now get in with a 7/10 in quality. More perfection… 5) And for me personally… I’m only 9.5 miles from the repeater at my house…. Not far, right? Except when I wiggled/moved around just a bit people couldn’t tell I was moving around…. Now I can be crazy with my 5W HT and hold it sideways like you see in the movies (DUMB), walk around while talking and literally no one even notices… Literally no picket – fencing… Like some magical sorcery… Literally I’m not making this up… Upon talking to others, we’ve noted that the Kenwood TKR-850 was a $1200 - $1600 repeater when new VS the Quantar being $20,000 - $25,000 new…. Well, it shows… Damn does it show… I’d encourage ANY wide area repeater owner to upgrade whatever system you have to a Motorola Quantar (With the right tuning!!!) and TRUST me, you and your users will be glad you did. I’m not knocking Kenwood (Well I am for their repeaters) but literally the Quantar has it beat hand over fist! Sorry, this might sting to some but for others it’s a “Duh, I told you so” situation! I still have THOUSANDS of dollars’ worth of GOOD Kenwood radios… (NX300’s, NX800 Mobiles, TK8360’s, etc etc etc) and I’m *NOT* going to go and replace them all…. I’m still going to use them; but I’ll be DAMNED if I don’t think twice…. THREE times before considering another radio purchase and trust me, I have a LOT of radios lol! They say Motorola invented the 2-way radio and now I see how & why. Thanks for your time and feel free to comment and leave questions below. I’ll do my best to answer them between work and life.

Thanks for all the info on this! So far the FAA has denied my entry thus far! More to come later!!

Thank you! I also reached out to my tower owner where my repeater is on and he recommended Valmont and Sabre as well

Preface: This question is cross-posted on the Midwest GMRS Facebook page. EDIT: Preface 2: If this is in the wrong forum area, I apologize in advance. I wasn't 100% sure I put it in general; please move it if it's wrong. EDIT AGAIN: I think lots are misunderstanding why we're doing this. No, we're not going to spend a million dollars to install one GMRS repeater. This will be a public tower which we will rent tower space out to for anyone who needs tower space. This is a way to make money for us but also, we'll have our own tower so why wouldn't we put up a massive repeater? :). I own Rugged 575 myself which is a 300' tall GMRS repeater and I pay tower space for that so that game I know VERY well and have well covered. This is one of the next projects we have is all. Question to other repeater owners and more importantly tower owners about commercial tower pricing: My business partner and I are getting quotes to build a free-standing radio tower in Magnolia, TX. I have a quote from Rohn for 300’ and 500’ self-supporting. We have enough room for a guyed tower so we’ll consider that too but we would much prefer free standing. The 300’ one in particular isn’t as expensive as I’d thought at $133,935 + $19,980 for lighting, delivery, and anchor equipment. This also isn’t including installation which they didn’t quote me like they did on the 500’ one below. Maybe half of that would be let’s say $200,000 for the foundation + maybe $40,000 for install which brings the total roughly to $394,000 VS the 500’ is a whopping $476,920 + $46,930 for lighting, delivery and anchor equipment. They did quote $83,765 for install for the 500’ guy and $400,675 for “Foundation Installation - Drilled Pier (Caisson) based on Presumptive soil” which brings the total to $924,525 for the 500’ guy Anyways we’re considering 500’ over the 300’ one because we want the larger tower. My question to you is, besides Rohn, what other companies can I get competitive quotes on for 300’ and 500’ towers? What brand are your towers? Notes about the tower type: This Structure is designed for: Design Code: ANSI/TIA-222-H Wind Speed: 125 MPH per ASCE 7-16 Wind Speed With Ice: 30 MPH with 1.00 inches Ice Risk Category II Exposure Category: C Topographic Category: 1 Price above includes: Tower Sections Step Bolts for Climbing Tuf Tug Safety Cable Type System w/o Trolley or Harness for One Leg Only (1) 5ft Lightning Rod w/4ft Extension (no downlead) (1) Base Grounding Lug per Leg - Grounding Materials to be supplied by Others (1) 12-Hole Waveguide Ladder w/3ft spacing (Tower Base to Top) Top Beacon Plate w/o Extension - see Optional Items for pricing on Lighting Kit I have the actual PDF quote as well if anyone needs to see it as well. Please send me a PM. We plan on using this tower not only for a big honkin' GMRS repeater, but also for private business radios, local state and federal com systems and for cell phone providers + microwave backhauls, etc. Thanks for your time and Happy Thanksgiving!

I wish I could like this post more than once... This PERFECTLY sums up my verbiage and writing from the from my post from September 28th, 2020 on page 3... Literally I've read through this half a dozen times and wrote down key points before going live on my tower site. I was going to go into this in my first post from last year but I thought it might have been off-topic but you can see now clearly it's *NOT* off topic. I wanted to thank you for writing this and leaving this post here, it's VERY good and I hope others actually read through the entire Part 95 thing as well.

I would like to point out that here in the Midwest, based on my direct observations, GMRS closely follows the VHF 2 meter band openings. I've contacted the Baraboo 550 repeater from a 5W Kenwood NX300 HT standing in my front yard of my house in IL... that's about 136 miles as the crow files from my house north and a bit west. It's worth noting that that the Baraboo 550 repeater is an absolute monster and it's up on top of a very very tall mounting range. This is the website I use to follow those band openings: http://aprs.mennolink.org/ Further more, there are repeaters in Arizona that are on mountain tops that also easily work 100 - 150 miles out with the proper antenna/feedline/etc. It all depends on your location in the country, the height of the repeater, and the atmospheric conditions! Thanks!

I'm in IL an hour behind you FYI cuz I'm in Illinois!

Hey old thread! I've since got two DB408's and have more DB404's on order too lol. I can help you on that Glen! I've shot you a PM with my phone number. It would be best to be remoted into your computer using something like Team Viewer so I can look at your config while you're connected to the repeater (That way we can actively write the config as we make changes. That is good too cuz I can put my code plug on my other screen and we can do a direct comparison! It took me MONTHS to figure everything out on the TKR-850's but I'm pretty damn good at it now!!! Do you have a V1 or a V2? I have only Version 2 repeaters as they have WAY more features than Version 1 repeaters do! Thanks!

Understood there and agreed 100%! For that I would then reply to update the mygmrs.com repeater listing to show the correct coverage (5 miles I think is the least you can do) if the coverage turned out to be far less than expected. Thanks!

I'll bite on this one. I cannot speak for everyone but I know for me during the week during normal business hours (M-F / 9-5) I am quick to reply back to everyone that has requested use of my machine. The weekends can get dicey as I'm busy with family and the kids but I always reply on Monday morning when I get back to my shop. I'm in front of a computer all day and my email is always up so there is never a reason for me to not reply. As far as backup power, my system has enough backup power for 48 hours with my testing I've done before the batteries run out. I also have a generator on standby ready to go for something longer than a 4-day outage. I'm fortunate to be on a tower site which is in the same farm as Comed is where they have their own tower too and their main com systems are located so the power nearly never goes out and if it does it's not very long! I also have my machine set up to run at only 25W when on backup lithium power to conserve power too! That being said, the fact of the matter is that there are a *LOT* of low-height, home-brew repeaters which aren't going to reliably (I’m talking driving around and talking) cover very much anyways or maybe they don't want you using it because it's a small family repeater for local family only usage. With a repeater running at a house that only has 3 - 5 miles of reliable coverage, what would be the point of replying to a person that is 10 or 15 miles away that cannot get into it no matter what anyways?? Which leads me to my next point… I know that before I went on a commercial tower site, when I had my machine at my house at 47', I received TONS of repeater requests and I gave my tones out but I put an * on it that stated "This is at my house and only reliably covers 5 miles tops. If you are outside of this, there is no way you will be able to get into this repeater and use it reliably" The other thing I see every day are over-inflated coverage bubbles. I see TONS of home brew repeaters listed (There is one right near mine for example) that's running at a house that claims to have a 15 mile coverage radius when you cannot even get into it 5 miles out on a 45W commercial grade Kenwood with a $200 commercial roof mount antenna. Hell, I can BARELY scrape into it at my house on my base which is 47 feet tall 8.41 miles away and I have a DB408 antenna. In my opinion I see lots of repeaters that show a far, FAR, greater coverage ring than they can *ACTUALLY* reliably use so when people get on the map and see that massive coverage ring, you would think/assume that they are more tempted to request access to it which inflates that email flow asking for access to a repeater they’ll literally never be able to get into unless they happen to be travelling in that area. That would be my biggest guess as to why repeater owners wouldn't reply. The other fact is that everyone is busy with work and kids so emails get missed/buried. Thanks!

I agree. I added the Rugged 575 to this as well a few months ago for this exact reason. I left it as private/closed too but with my email to use it. I gather that hams use this website the most (I'm not a ham) but I figured it'd be ideal to get my GMRS repeater on there so they can see it if they decide to get a GMRS license

I'll be travelling to the US VI soon here. I've been the main supplier of all the in vehicle laptops (Toughbooks) for the police, fire, ems, and for the hospitals. I have some monster meetings and installs coming up (Which I was supposed to go down in March then the over-hyped rona appeared.... But I digress there...). Anyways I'm planning on bringing both a high power (45W) and my hand held to try to make some contacts from my hotel room. I don't know yet when I'm going (probably another couple months here if I had to guess) but I will call out when I do get there! I've enjoyed reading the conversations and thanks for all your input Gman!! I've learned a lot from reading all what you wrote! Very helpful!

I left my CW ID on my repeater as the default which is as follows sending out my call sign: TX Interval Time [min]: 15 (Per FCC) TX Delay time : 5.0 CW Speed [word/min]: 20 CW Mod. Delay Time [ms]: 600 Audio Frequency [Hz]: 800 I will say this: I could certainly slow it down but on the surface 20 words/min doesn't seem unreasonable but I of course cannot read Morse code for beans even if it was set to 1 word/minute LOL. It would slow down the ID'ing portion when the repeater does spit it out which might aggravate most of the people that want to just use the repeater and don't care about Morse code decoding. Thanks!

I'll bite here. Rugged 575 in Naperville, IL has a 1500VA APC which is cheap as a primary AC battery backup. This will run my repeater for a LONG time... Like a couple days or more depending on usage. After that dies I have a 90AH Lithium Iron Phosphate battery (LiFEpo4 like others have already mentioned) that I built myself from scratch. This will run that repeater for about a week as well. What is nice is that if you get a proper commercial repeater (I have several Kenwood TKR-850's) is that you can set it to not only send out a tone over the air when the power switches to backup power but also to transmit a subtle beep when you are using it so you know it's on emergency/backup power. Take that a step further and you can also set the repeater to go down to 50% power (or any amount of power I choose) once it goes to said backup system to further extend your run time. I didn't do that myself as I believe in emergency situations being at full capacity is ideal... That and I have so many other batteries and generators that I wouldn't even worry lol. If you wanna save a ton of money (Like half the cost) I suggest you learn how to build your own LiFEpo4 batteries. Battle born batteries are nice but you're paying $1,000 for a battery you can build yourself for $550. The best resource for that would be to watch Will Prowse's videos here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoj6RxIAQq8kmJme-5dnN0Q Thanks!

Okay, I’ll bite here. I own a repeater (Rugged 575) in Naperville, IL at 300' receive / 250’ transmit. It’s on a commercial site with other UHF and VHF radio systems as well. Not only have I spent nearly 5 figures setting this up correctly but I monitor it as if it was my baby, cuz, you know, it *IS* my baby. I built it with no financial help from anyone else. Of course there was other help I received by LOTS of other commercial repeater owners (Those of you that are reading know who you are) as I’ve come a long way in the last year and some change here. I have my repeater system set up for several different private family usage cases and I also have a tone for public which I closely monitor as well and others that are out there do use it. As a repeater owner I’m super happy to turn my radio on and hear other people using it. As a matter of fact just yesterday some other licensed GMRS users were using my repeater and I needed to use it with my wife as I was at the grocery store and I broke in and said, “hang tight guys, I need to talk to my wife for a minute. I’ll let you know when I’m done”. Anyways, I flipped to our tone, talked with her about the particulars, then went back to the public side and said “Carry on guys! Glad to hear you out there using the machine”. That being said, mine is set to “Ask permission” as well because as others have mentioned, I want to know who is using it to verify their license and location because it’s my system and it’s my responsibility to make sure it’s up to par on the commercial shared site. I have sent an email back to EVERY! SINGLE! PERSON! As well welcoming them with the tones to use it! I haven’t had the need (yet) to ever reject anyone from using my repeater but I still keep a tab on who has access to it as in my opinion, it’s my responsibility to do so. Not only that, but I have my custom verbiage I send back with every request as well stating that this is a family repeater as well and to aid to traffic on the other PL tone. Heck, I’ll paste what I send you can see where we are coming from with this: “The tone for my repeater is XXXX (left blank) (N – normal, not inverted). When you key up for the first time please identify yourself using your call sign and call for ROB. I am regulating who is using my repeater as it is being used for my family as well. I have received an exceeding amount of requests to use my repeater. Originally this was set up for family only use but seeing as the range is far better than expected, I have opened it up on an as-requested basis to any licensed GMRS operator. PLEASE NOTE: ALL TRAFFIC MUST YIELD TO MY FAMILY. The tone for public use is different than family so if you see your radio lighting up receiving on 462.575 but no audio is coming through on your radio it's because my family is talking so please do not key up until that traffic has cleared. Thanks and I hope to hear you on the air!” That being said, sometimes users don’t understand what a multi-table is either so I will say this too: When you first use a new repeater you should ALWAYS call out for a radio check IMO because you don’t know how that repeater is set up and should NEVER assume anything! I was in Iowa once and I made contact to the owner on the traveler tone (I was travelling) and he told me that it’s linked to another repeater in California! NONE of this information was posted on mygmrs.com and upon googling I couldn’t even find it either!!! It was good to know that I was keying multiple machines too and me and the owner had a nice long 30 minute conversation and he was glad I keyed up and shouted out! To sum up further as a repeater owner: *MOST*, but not *ALL* repeater owners don’t mind you using their machine I’ve found. Now I’m in the Midwest mind you, so again, no assumptions would be made for other machines that I’ve never used, but around here most repeater owners are very happy to have you on their machine and it brings a great smile to their face to know that they are serving the public with a reliable communication system and growing the hobby as well! Remember that GMRS isn’t HAM and HAM isn’t GMRS. A *LOT* of people out there want GMRS for family use under one license and that’s what I’m doing but I’ve decided to open it up to the public as well as the coverage is fairly decent. I looked at getting a business license and could have easily done it too but I like the idea of being able to chat with my family *AND* other GMRS users so here we are! Thanks!

Rod, Rob - WRDU235 here from Montgomery Illinois. Sorry I just saw this now. Is it too late to add me to the list? It's about an hour and a half drive for me but I want to meet all of you guys

Hey guys, I'm on vacation here in Whitefish, Montana and I can hear a CW ID every 15 minutes. I tried keying up the BEAR 1 machine but that's 160+ miles away and didn't respond. I doubt it would go this far but that's the ONLY 625 repeater listed for this state? I started hearing the machine as I came up north bound on route 83 and it was working clear in Kalispell as well and works inside my condo I'm renting here at the Ptarmigan Village for the next 3 days. Any idea on this repeater? I was going to try to make some contacts. Rob, WRDU235 - Montgomery, IL. Thanks!

FYI: We have a nationwide net every Sunday at 7PM Central (8 Eastern). The linking map is here: https://link.mygmrs.com/map I don't think that those repeaters are linked but it might be worth nothing that if the owners can link them and join the large weekly net that would also be cool.

Thanks for that information! I can't wait til this DB408 comes in! Any day now!!! I ordered it (again) last week on Tuesday. Yeah, one issue I've had with the cheap $60 antenna (And everyone said this would be a problem so I'm not surprised) is that for example my wife was about 8 miles out at her parents house on a 45w mobile and I could hear here LOUD AND CLEAR transmitting back to the machine but me being at home transmitting super clean to the repeater it couldn't get back out to her. So essentially it could hear VERY well but the mouth just couldn't get it back to her 8 short miles away. I've also witnessed this when travelling out west on Interstate 88. Due to the geography I'm at a HUGE elevation advantage when shooting west. At any rate I was able to burp the repeater at almost 22 miles but it couldn't spit it back out to me. Always a transmitting shortcoming. With a correct antenna and proper ground I think we'll be cooking with gas here soon.