wayoverthere

Wideband vs narrowband refers to how much spectrum the transmitted signal uses; 20 or 25kHz for wideband, vs 12.5kHz for narrowband. narrowband signals is how the handhelds only FRS channels can squeeze in between the repeater inputs in the 467.xxx range (467.550 and 467.575, with a FRS channel wedged in at 467.5675, etc). As @KAF6045mentions, the big issue is when the settings don't match between stations (one set wideband, the other narrow). When both match, the difference between wide and narrowband in practical use isn't huge.

It may be that the network operators have assigned them a user id of sorts on the network, based, as @Sshannonmentions, on which node on the network they connect through

I found the Broadnet channel to be pretty active, since it was tied in with their linked repeaters. I haven't used zello much in awhile though.

Depending on the type and the power it needs to handle, it CAN be built in, especially with UHF. The higher frequencies need less space compared to VHF, while higher power generally means larger in either case. This thread has a look at the internals of the rt97: https://forums.mygmrs.com/topic/3314-retevis-rt97-heat-dissipation/

This is where a duplexer comes into play. The low port goes to the transmitter connector, the high port to the receive connector, and the middle port to the antenna's one connector. I won't guess if this one is good or bad, but here is an example for visual... https://www.buytwowayradios.com/xlt-dp-gmrs-50.html

No disagreement, just a couple things to add... The first, the tone mode column will need to be "dtcs" The second, same again for tone mode, and also need to set the cross mode...can use "dtcs->" for testing with no Rx tone, or "dtcs->dtcs" to use both tones. https://chirp.danplanet.com/projects/chirp/wiki/MemoryEditorColumns

I mean...if they can make it last by dialing it down, it some kind of progress, right? ?

You're on the right track. It's not uncommon for both tones to be the same, but until it's confirmed working, I would go with 'tone' (which just sends a transmit tone, and uses normal.squelch for receive) vs tonesql (which uses the same tone for both transmit and receive). On that group on 18, it is possible they're using tones within their group, so wouldn't hear another user using no tones on transmit or receive.

Yeah, I've hit that limit a couple times lately too...I think @Sshannonmentioned running into the reaction limit not too long ago too.

I kind of suspected it wasn't 100% indicative, since I hit some spots on the sequence that weren't coming up in a gmrs license search...that's why I went for raw grant numbers too.

As a quick addition to this, I licensed up in July of 2019 for a family trip, and received a WRDT callsign. I did a quick check of ULS just now and found the sequence is up to WRWF, and there were 1,390 GMRS licenses with a grant date in the past week alone.

The growth of licenses (and site users) would seem to say yes. One of the ham clubs in my area even added a gmrs repeater, likely to give the hams a way to communicate with non-ham family.

Honestly, I think there may still be one in my area still doing something similar but digitally. MotoTrbo, with one talkgroup per subscribing business perhaps? Agreed on not being all that useful with front panel programmable and the availability of tone scanning nowadays. The two tone arrangement is probably just more aimed at a universal access/open repeater initiative kind of mindset. There's a network here on the ham side that uses separate tones in to dictate if the audio is forwarded to the network of repeaters, or just locally on that machine, and just one tone on the output

One possibility is controlling access, and the ability to "boot" someone without affecting others. Another would be if there's different input and output tones, you could segregate traffic without having to hear each other.

You may be correct on that. With the two together though, it's...worrying. ?

I'll give Btech credit for addressing one of the biggest usage complaints (ability to add additional tx channels), and it looks like they've introduced a few new features and accessories, like an adapter to use accessories with the k1 plug. That said, on the surface, it appears to be all firmware tweaks, without addressing those hardware shortcomings. I hope I'm wrong on that, and like Marc, wish buyers the best of luck. That warning about not using high power unless necessary would seem to point to not, though....more of a band-aid to get around the issues with the first version.

first question: yes, that's correct. i'll share a real world example from the ham side (on 70cm, which is nearly identical, signal wise, to gmrs), with the caveat that i don't do much (if any) simplex on GMRS, as the family has ZERO interest. using my base setup (which is a pair of mobiles and a base antenna in the closet) chatting with someone who lives in the next town up the highway via the local repeater, which is 23 miles from me. discover he's in town shopping at the moment, talking in on his mobile from a shopping center 25 miles from the repeater, and just 6.5 miles from me. i switched over to the repeater input to see if i could hear him, but not much beyond an occasional burst of static. i can hear the repeater clearly on a handheld inside the house, and can talk in with no problem from outside in the yard, but going direct just over 6 miles apart was no go. second question: hard to say on "reasonable"...is it possible? absolutely. it's going to be very dependent on height, but it's a little bit of a stretch to assume radio towers. some may be one of the users here, with a 5 watt Retevis 'repeater in a box' on a 20' top rail mast, or mounted on a barn. dealing with the high level stuff we have in CA, i've talked into a gmrs repeater over 60 miles out from the 3rd floor of a hotel with a handheld, and managed 75ish to a ham repeater in the same area from a high spot in the hills (basically clear line of sight over the valley), but those repeaters i'm working with are on foothill ridges at 3000-4500 ft above sea level. obstructions are the biggest challenge for a largely line of sight signal like gmrs. here's a quick edit to the diagram in the first post illustrating my example (though i'm using gmrs frequencies in the diagram, illustrating hearing via the repeater was no problem, but listening on the repeater input, no luck.

There are cables/interface boxes made to link 2 handhelds together. The problem there would the radio doing the retransmittimlng part can overload the receiving radio due to it's close proximity. This would cause this shoulder height repeater to be to hear you from a shorter distance than if you were just going handheld to handheld...while some are worse than others, and some handle adjacent frequencies better than others, almost any radio will desense to a degree to protect the receiver from a strong signal nearby. You can see the same issue when transmitting from one handheld to another in close proximity;the receiving radio sees an incoming signal, but doesn't receive any audio. As @axorlovsaid, there isn't anything magical about it, at the most basic it's a receiving radio connected to a transmitting radio. In practice, better filters against adjacent frequencies in mobile and repeater receivers help make it possible, as do things like duplexers that separate the transmit from the receive. Does that help clarify?

I'll also mention the 'no ground plane' category for jeeps or less than stellar mounting situations...they have some 1/2 waves in the same price range And similar sizes, in black or silver, spring, polymer spring, or no spring. https://theantennafarm.com/shop-by-categories/shop-all/mobile-antennas/300-512-mhz-uhf/no-ground-plane-antennas/3236-laird-connectivity-bb4502ns-detail https://theantennafarm.com/shop-by-categories/shop-all/mobile-antennas/300-512-mhz-uhf/no-ground-plane-antennas/3231-laird-connectivity-b4502n-detail

Line of sight is a big aspect that's present in the illustrations, but not really a focus. Handheld to handheld, I believe the general number is around 5 miles for simplex. However, for an affective repeater, the antennas are usually placed higher, sometimes hundreds of feet up a tower, or out here they're on the mountain ridges at thousands of feet above the valley floor. This gives them a much further line of sight than at ground level. The second aspect is antennas; repeater antennas will generally focus the RF energy better outward rather than upward...the usual illustration for this is comparing it to squishing a ball into more of a donut around the antenna. At the extreme this can be a tradeoff if you have large elevation differences where you end up under or over the "beam". Out here with the high level repeater locations, I have reached repeaters from 60-70 mi out on a handheld.

One of my go to for aftermarket batteries has been cut rate batteries. Have them on a couple of my radios, and all good so far, along with one of their chargers for lithium batteries. They do offer a Nimh replacement battery for the tk370g. https://www.cutratebatteries.com/collections/kenwood-radio-batteries/products/kenwood-tk-370g-battery

No, the higher frequencies of gmrs don't "skip" like the lower frequencies of cb do. That said, some areas see occasional ducting (affects vhf more than UHF, where gmrs resides) that see signals going a bit further than expected. APRS.mennolink.org is a good one to get an idea what ducting conditions are like at a given time.

You might find the TCARC one useful as well. The discussion thread on their forum indicated they were able to reach it with a mobile out to greenfield or so, and i can reach it with 18 watts and a 1/4 wave no problem. On the ham side, 444.975 (I think it's flagged as w6slo) should be an active one, linked up the coast to Monterey/Salinas and into the central valley

my gmrs handheld (which mainly resides in my desk at work now) has a set of extra repeater channels in it for travel use as well, in addition to the base 30 and the local/semi-local stuff. on the ham side, have mine arranged similar; in area first, abbreviating as needed and most common first. i've been adding out of area stuff as needed, grouped by areas..i have blocks for monterey/SF Bay/East Bay area, central coast (SLO/Morro/Pismo/Paso Robles), further north (Santa Rosa/Sonoma), and some Seattle stuff in one of the radios (for a trip that fell through). the radios that have banks, i'll sort them into banks based on area. I'll move things in and out of the scan list as needed when i travel.

I don't have a ton of them around, so I have them by their names as listed, shortened as needed, or a "nickname"...Auberry, Central1, and TCARC-G (Tulare County Amateur Radio Club has a couple GMRS machines up)