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Extreme

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Everything posted by Extreme

  1. Taptalk on your phone and choose medium size.
  2. "...and am anxious to get this outdoors for some range testing!" Me Too!
  3. ..and coming, and coming. Kinda like the $35 license - coming.. LOL
  4. I've had my best luck posting photos with Tap-A-Talk and my phone.
  5. I change to NAME on my repeater channels so I can add repeater Name and last 3 of Frequency. Those with no repeater in my travel vicinity are named RPT xxx. Fit as many letters as your particular radio allows. CLVY 550 BMTN 575 RPTR 600 ELKO 625 RPTR 650 SPCK 675 BMTN 700 QZIT 725 REX 550
  6. Anxious to hear from the first one here to actually pay $35.. I'm like, uh-huh, sure... right!? Looking forward to passing along the good news to my 4x4 club members (a few of whom went ahead at $70 in the past month). An aside: are any of the Midland HTs repeater capable and/or have removable antennas?
  7. I programmed area Ham repeaters into my 880, got the out of bounds message but hit ok and proceeded. I'm in listen only mode but did eavesdrop on a Boise area ham conversation last hunting season so it worked. Couldn't have talked back if I'd wanted to since my TX was fried at the time. Just programmed ham into my new 880 for the SxS and same notification.
  8. No trouble here after about a year. Did return one that quit the Scan function. Simple R/R from BTWR.
  9. Thanks for another option. The TV antenna is aluminum and I assume grounded, so if I add an 8" or so square of .09 aluminum sheet to that horizontal surface with the 1/4 wave antenna centered, it should provide an adequate ground plane. Pretty much the same setup I have on my S x S with roof/kayak rack over a plastic roof. grounded to the frame/rollbar an 8 x 8 x 1/4" aluminum plate - it works very well. Coax route should be nearly straight down to where the radio will mount in my basement compartment. With a 6" 1/4 wave antenna it will be equal or lower than other components on the roof when retracted via the TV antenna. I'll check that assumption very closely before I proceed. Oh, and KES-8K is the Kenwood external speaker. The KES-5 is for horn notification & PA, is 40w and requires more accessories. The KES-8K supersedes the KES-3 and is 10w, plug and play.
  10. The Kenwood KES-5 external speaker is 4 ohm so I guess the existing speaker(s) should work? Mono is fine. I still might just get the Kenwood speaker and put it on an easily accessible magnetic mount under the compartment where I'm planning to mount the radio, so it's easy to remove, and outside where I can hear it. After looking things over a bit I think that will be the simplest radio mount for access to 12v, a solid mount with no disassembly, the radio within reach of the antenna mount, and straightforward cable routing. Assuming the factory antenna on the 5er is grounded I can simply add an 8"-ish square aluminum plate to the antenna 'blades' for a ground plane, run the cable straight down thru the roof and it will extend my 1/4 wave an additional 3' when cranked up. Whether it will affect the function of the TV antenna remains to be seen, but we don't use it anyway. I'd guess at least 15' height, not too shabby. Also, I have several HT, including the 805G but really like the extra power of the mobile + added antenna height. I have mobiles in both my off-road rigs, and HTs for the quads and/or kayak. FWIW we spoke at 25mi. with 805G to Kenwood 880 mobile (simplex) last year where we camp. Mobile - mobile should be at least as good. https://www.amazon.com/Kenwood-Original-KES-5-External-Speaker/dp/B00M2436RG Thanks for the input, gets my brain working.
  11. Probably easier to just get the KES-5 and find a place to quick-mount it. Only 3' of cable included but that's an easy fix. I'm assuming the external speaker will cause the built in speaker on the head unit to bypass and not have any output?
  12. I know this has been discussed but I neglected to bookmark it and search didn't produce the thread. I have a pretty good visual of what I want to do for installing a 30w Kenwood TK-8180 in my 5th wheel. I don't need to get elaborate on antenna mount and think just a metal groundplane attached to the rubber roof with ground and a simple 1/4 wave antenna will work initially. I'll rely on the height of the RV for range, but could eventually add a crank up marine mount to elevate it more. Since we don't use our TV when camping (would have deleted TV when we bought it new but not an option) I've considered using the crank up TV antenna for some sort of mount. At any rate.. the weather is just starting to improve so I've yet to crawl around on the roof. I'm thinking of mounting the Kenwood in the radio/stereo slot since we don't use that either. Lots of options on where to mount the Kenwood (basement compartment, etc.) Yup, we dry camp and the rare times we want any music or radio we get it from our devices and bluetooth or Sirius/XM App. Question is: can I plug the Kenwood external speaker port into my existing outside stereo speaker(s) that are under the awning? Or will it be a mismatch? If that's not feasible, is there a water/weather proof external speaker available? We spend 90+% of our time outside and it'd be nice to have the Kenwood either scanning or on a set channel we use in the Jeep or S x S while someone is in camp. If someone can link me back to the RV thread I'd appreciate that as well.
  13. I buy from UR all the time. They can/will program 16 channels for you allowing you to skip the 8 - 15 and have them insert the repeater channels instead for your 16 total. You still might have to program some but if you have the repeater tones they'll put them in as well as key assignments.
  14. Which adapters or pigtail will I need with the SureCom SWR to check mobile radio SWR? It looks like it comes with SMA adapters but nothing for mobile. Thanks.
  15. I tried to post the YouTube video but wouldn't come through here. It's in there with 3/8" hole in an F150 I think. Search 3/8 NMO Install by SevenFortyOne.
  16. YouTube search 3/8 NMO Mount The NMO I use are 3/8" - 3/4" range. I always do 3/8" hole.
  17. Guess I could have tried restore to factory but they were quick to request it back. Only PF1 "SCAN" not working was my issue. It's on it's way to BTWR now.
  18. When programming an 880 V1 after I'd previously programmed a V2 last year, the software picked up on the version difference, gave me a note V1 will not support all the features as V2", to which I simply said OK and carried on. The rest of it went smoothly and no glitches.
  19. Beating the dead horse. My latest long shot. Going for 70 miles as soon as the snow melts and we get access. 46.8 miles. 30w/1/4 wave NMO - gonna pull an SWR on it tomorrow just for snicks.. seems to be working just fine. Edit: Just got info on the repeater gear (approx 6500' elevation): "Hytera 40 watt commercial machine, fed into a low mounted (7 ft from the ground) 3db 4 foot fiberglass pole antenna, pondering at moving it to the high gain antenna mounted at 22 feet."
  20. Had my first issue with 805G. PF1 (Scan) stopped working. Manually set to Scan, looked for it in software but nothing made it work. Contacted BTWR, where I bought it and since it's within the 1 year warranty, they sent me an RMA and off it went for replacement. Great service and much appreciated.
  21. Made a 50mi LOS hit on our local repeater from the Jeep. Not 100% it was LOS (still have to visit the repeater site to know) but either way quite a shot with 30w Kenwood 8180. Could barely see the mountaintop and the repeater is not on top. FWIW.
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