LAMBSONB60

I also get how many might not like some kind of membership fee for use....but as the sole financier of my own solar site @8800 ft in a remote area of New Mexico to help some 100+ families who have no cell service or other means of communication I didn't feel bad at all about asking for an annual donation that worked out about 9-12$\month....I have some $13K of my own in this site & must maintain batteries & all site maint on my own....Most who ask for some fee I will say are most likely just trying to cover their installation\operational costs....for the few who might be doing it for a profit motive...well I will leave judgment on that to others although I personally do not agree with trying to operate as a for-profit enterprise...so I practice what I preach..& "donations" to me for my site use are optional, not mandatory. And even like this nearly all who use it have tried to donate something to help so I still have some faith in human nature

JohnE there gave a good place for your Heliax connectors. I've used them before & have nothing but good to say. SPD641, How long of a run do you have? Ecoflex 15 & Aircocomm are 2 coax (Aircomm uses air cell dielectric) with fabulous loss numbers @ 100 meters Not as low as Heliax but for the cost I have no complaints. If you have a 200'+ run then I suppose I'd go for the Heliax as well... Just curious mainly..this for a repeater?

All respondents have great input & info here so I won't presume to pre-empt anything said, merely add a little.A more pricey addition to the bubble pack and\or Chinese radios mentioned is the Garmin GPS+GMRS combos out there. Ebay tends to have the best prices & these aren't cheap but the added fun or the GPS, location tracking between like-unit (can locate within a few feet where Bubba is each time he transmits..and he - you) & now even one with built in 5 or 6MP geotracking camera...cool stuff & repeater capable (again except for the oddball reversed TX\RX freqs or using DCS Vs CTCSS for the enable) I do have a couple 1 Watt Moto units that I recently tried with a local solar power repeater here in southern AZ...I found I had to be high enough with relatively few LOS obstructions to hit it from >2mi but on the RX side it performed marvelously some 15+ mi from the repeater which I think is set @ ~15W on the TX side. My own experiments getting ready to find a home for 2 home-built repeaters have shown that if I forgo using a duplexer & use the two Moto GM300 mobiles tied together with two 5+dB gain omnis that I boosted the RX performance some 30% with the little 1watt as my test radio by adding a GAsFET 25dB gain .7dB noise figure pre-amp @ the RX antenna...and the non-LOS (line of sight) performance was upped a good 40-45% over the previous barebones configuration...despite the added expense of a second coax & antenna I'm thinking I'm going to go this was....it does make those little bubble radios a lot more useful when a repeater is needed & available Anyhow, 1st time posting in the forum although I've been in the GMRS world 20+ yrs off\on. Howdy to you all... If anyone in the Tucson or Oro Valley area has a nice high tower or Mt Lemmon spot that I could access I'd love to give one of these repeaters a home...solar powered so no need for AC off a pole.. I've got a son\daughter-in-law in Sac so maybe I'll talk to you on a repeater out there sometime as I visit frequently... Cheers Al-WQRS220