wayoverthere

Took a gamble on a less expensive option...cable and programming software for $49 from the antenna farm. We'll see how it goes. Radio itself is a vx4207-6, 400-470mHz range

I'm curious how the vertex stuff does; the evx539's I tried for seem to have disappeared in UPS hands somewhere; I'm on the edge of pulling the trigger on a mobile. Edit: I went for it. Ordered a programming cable too.

This. The power draw simply sitting idle receiving (or programming) is pretty much negligible; it fluctuates betwen 0.1 and 0.0A on my alinco psu's digital readout. edit: was doing some other testing tonight (whether switching power supply is inducing noise on gmrs); for my alternate power, i dug up a couple 6v lantern batteries, and wired them in series, and my 50x1 powered up just fine, showed 13.3v (it seems to read voltage a little high, it usually shows 14.2v when the psu is set to its 'set 13.8v' mode, and a multimeter on the batteries in series showed around 12.15v) also corrected amp reading above...it fluctuates between 0.0 and 0.1A.

Does friend by chance have led drl and or taillights? I know I get some pretty bad interference on the cb from the drop-in led headlight bulbs I have in my truck, though I haven't noticed any interference from any of the others 3rd brake, dome, reverse, and tails).

your understanding is correct. The 50x1 will only transmit on low power on 1-7, and your choice of level on 15-22 and the 15-22 repeater inputs (gmrs 15-22 and Rept15-Rept22)channels. everything else, including 8-14 are receive only.

Took a quick look, this tyt looks quite similar https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07CY6CRZH/

Realistically, if you don't have pl tones input on the simplex (15-22) channels, you'll hear any traffic coming from the repeaters as well, since the receive side of the repeater channels 15-22 is the same as their simplex counterpart. Not exactly convenient to respond to something on that repeater, I admit, since when you come off scan it goes to whatever you were on prior to scanning

Miklor.com has a lot of good info on a variety of baofeng/btech models. The baofengs I have, I got the cable off of amazon at the same time, and it came with software, though chirp covers a lot of models as well (chirp.danplanet.com)

It was one of those "its time to replace it anyway" things, and I already had the replacements on hand...seemed like a good time to get some foolishness out of my system.

Are you testing with the radios close together? If so, it's possible that the transmitting radio is overloading the other, hence not hearing the audio come back from the repeater.

Pretty much. Setting both tone and tonesql, the repeater will hear you, and you'll only hear the repeater. If you set tone only, and leave tone sql blank, you're spot on, you can still talk to the repeater, and you'll hear the repeater and any other traffic on that channel.

Glad to help. It's definitely been a learning curve for me too. there's a ton of useful info here to digest (and helpful people) that's applicable to more than just gmrs, if the interest takes you that direction. One thing I will give btech credit for is at least getting instructions translated (or wholly rewritten) to reasonable English compared to what you get with the average baofeng stuff.

In simplified terms, tones act as a gate, signals without the key (correct time) don't get by. the 'tone' is the transmit tone, so the repeater hears you. ToneSql is for receiving; setting a code there (tone->tone) means you'll only hear signals with that tone. Leaving tonesql blank (tone->), you'll hear EVERYTHING on that frequency, repeater or not. The variety of radios and menus and various settings does make it a bit of a puzzle to figure out sometimes

his username is bluemax49ers. Looks like he's on Amazon as well. https://www.ebay.com/str/bluemax49ers

Glad to help!

Here's a little info specific to the gmrs v1 : https://www.miklor.com/BTGMRS/BTGMRS-FAQ.php#TransmitterReceiver And the main info page: https://www.miklor.com/BTGMRS/ Looks like the menu item you want will be named r-ctcs...that either needs to match the repeater's output tone, or be set to none/off to hear the repeater (the tones are effectively a filter; the MONI button bypasses that filter).

Photobucket is pretty bad now as well. As of late, I tend to use imgur.

this one is a cool alternative. i've always used the scadacore one, but that one does require some work to get the points right (either a lot of click and drag, or looking up coordinates).

Online is the main source. To my knowledge, the only repeater capable radios likely to be found in stores are the midland mobiles, I know Walmart and home depot list them online. I don't know of any handhelds they make that are repeater capable That said, do some reading, as they do have their own set of limitations (as most do).

Coming back for a second look, I start to wonder about details of the underlying situations. Is it a case of incorrect programming on the part of the op, that's being interpreted as a directed action? Someone that was trying to have a convo and activated tones to filter out the op? Some inexperienced user actions that annoyed someone? (Roger beeps? 'kerchunking' the repeater?) It doesn't change the tone of the original post, or that the op's only other post concerned using a ham radio for gmrs, but trying to see both sides and possible resolutions.

No offense, but no one is stopping you from using the service you paid to use, all 22 channels of it. They absolutely do have the option of deciding who uses their equipment (repeaters) though, for whatever valid or silly reason they may have. It was a harsh realization for me too, but gmrs isn't a hobbyist oriented service, it's primarily aimed at families and groups having comms within their groups with minimal technical knowledge needed, and outside this bubble we have here, it's pretty much how most people use it, as a utility among their group, and stick to their group....which means they'll generally have their tones set not to hear outsiders. I've had a total of one contact so far, as there's basically almost no hobbyist traffic here either. Also recently got booted from a gmrs group on Facebook, because one of their "instant ban" rules is no mention of other radio services (ham, cb, Murs, etc); guess I slipped and forgot which group I was replying to and supplied some info about online testing availability for ham tickets (in addition to that one, I'm in a couple gmrs groups and few ham groups as well).

Uhf is pretty line of sight, what is your antenna situation? That will have more effect (especially for receiving) than more power. The other issue in a big city environment is noise, and the tendency for the receiver to desense to avoid overload, it may not entirely be a problem of signal reaching, but also picking it out of the noise. If there is a repeater in range of both of you, maybe focus toward optimizing for that? Granted vhf and uhf behave a bit differently, but 5 watts on vhf can reach the space station when conditions are right https://www.qsl.net/ah6rh/am-radio/spacecomm/getting-started-iss.html

I will also agree with mbrun's take, speaking a 50x1 owner with a couple different repeaters in range on the the same frequency. It's kind of a pain not being able to save more tx entries, even if within bounds for gmrs. Midland are very plug and play, and generally well supported, but have their own limitations;if repeater access is desired, the xtalkers are likely out. The wouxun handheld is solid, and easy to set up. I have high hopes for their mobile to be similar, and the remote head is a bonus, but it's slightly pricy, and still a bit of an unknown. Among the 3 options, I think wouxun is the best. If you're willing to mix, you could do a Midland base and wouxun ht. Axorlov also raises a good point about the commercial options being good alternatives.

what are your mounting situation and clearance concerns like? Nagoya folds, midland doesn't, but depending where it's mounted that may not matter. both midlands i have have been decent (unity and 3db whips). i'd also wonder how well the tuning on that nagoya fits; amazon listing says they tune for 460, but what will the swr be like on the repeater channels? there's also the Nagoya NL-770g, intended for gmrs, but you'd need a nmo to uhf adapter with that one.

One of them, yes...I forget now if it was the one linked, or their other listing. I honestly debated for a bit on grabbing both pairs. And thank you...I'll see what I can figure out, but I may take you up on that.