Mikeam

For me like with my CB when traveling I set my mobile unit on scan as it then scans all frequencies. If we are in the woods with our Jeeps I still prefer the scan set  up because if someone wants to talk to me and they key up I will hear them and be able to respond. This system on the CB has helped me avoid long freeway delays dur to accidents etc.!! I am sure the same will happen with my usage of GMRS with CB on trips.

Wrong on both counts. I have several seats of RT Software and there are some very serious bugs in those seats which manipulate linked tables of DMR zones and groups that can completely corrupt a codeplug. Having said that I will continue using RT Systems software, avoiding those features which corrupt memory. 
As far as Chirp goes although it is free, it is no sketchier than any other software I’ve used and the developer is very responsive. I’ll continue using it as well. 
As far as triggering malware detection software I’ve seen false positives on several different CPS programs by various antivirus programs. The reason is heuristic detection. It works by watching for snippets of software that resemble malware. Programs intended to program radios match that pattern, even though they don’t have actual malware embedded. That has been discussed before; it’s not new. 

Go with RT Systems software. Yes it costs a little, but it just works flawlessly. Chirp is free, sketchy software for radios you don't care if you brick. 👍

So my newbie question is about tones. Some repeater sites state only one tone say 141.3 tone in no tone out given another repeater will show tone 141.3 in and tone 141.3 out or another tone, So I look at Chirp for the Btech GMRS V1 and I am not sure where to put the second tone number? Attached is an example of one tone but not the second one?

I am just curious, from the knowledgable, if this were say an illegal DMR use of the frequency, would a DMR radio capable of receiving/transmitting on this frequency, such as the Radioddity RD-5R, be used to listen and decode this transmission; in an attempt to track down the users?

I have had great service and support from Buy Two Way Radios!!

5.0000

First, welcome in to the world of radio. It's a lot of fun, you can meet some very interesting people, and as you have already seen, the airwaves (especially repeaters), can be infested with troublemakers. The moderator on the roundtable you were on made the mistake of engaging the troublemaker by issuing "several warnings to stop acting up". This rarely works, the reason being that troublemakers are difficult to locate and they thrive on the attention. They love disrupting communications, and the more people complain, the more they do it. The only way to get them to stop is to ignore them completely, and not even mention the fact that they are making trouble. This comes hard to a lot of people. I've heard troublemakers on roundtables and nets for years on both amateur radio and GMRS, and as a moderator (net control) for some of them myself, it frustrates me to no end when people (especially moderators who should know better) engage them and try to talk them out of making trouble. Taking repeaters off the air when they are being jammed is a necessary evil with linked repeater systems to protect the rest of the users from jammers. Finding troublemakers is a very painstaking, time-consuming process, and it's only possible when the troublemaker is transmitting. And once they're located, there is not much, probably nothing, the FCC or anyone else will do unless it involves jamming of critical communications like law enforcement, emergency services, commercial users, etc. Don't give up though. Listen in, chime in when you can. It's always great when new people get involved. By the way, here's a fun fact, 62 years ago, I was born in the city you live in.

Each employee, including you, would be required to have their own GMRS license and comply with all the regulations including the ID one. As a business owner you can't get a license for your business, that was eliminated with the rule changes in 2017,  and hand out radios to your employees.
If that's too much to deal with then just go and buy a bunch of FRS radios. Most of the same regulations apply that you see for GMRS. The big differences are the radios are limited to 2 watts on most channels, no repeater access and no ID/license requirements. 

How will passing the ham test make the GMRS Pro useful?

Fortunately the owners around me do well with coordinating.  However, I can see getting kind of PO'ed if after 10-15 years of smooth operation, someone puts up a new repeater and starts causing harmful interference. 

Hey there, I was thinking about this while sitting at work. Obviously half watt radios are not going to get very far, and an "emergency amatuer radio" that Transmits 100 watts on GMRS frequency is going to reach much farther. And line of sight has the biggest factor when it comes to the GMRS channels especially. But let's say a clear highway, completely straight, or even a field completely flat, was to he utilized.
How far does that Half Watt Walmart FRS Radio transmit? 1 mile? 3 miles for the horizon? 35 miles to a mountain? How far does the 25 watt go? 50? How much does it matter for How much juice you're getting? It's not like amatuer where you get 1500 watts. Does 5-50 really change alot?

Hi Steve,
Thanks for the suggestion! I was kicking around the idea of a way to allow users to support by going ad-free for a little less per year, but without the extra features just like you describe. I will mull it over but I'm interested in feedback from other members.
 

As reference Radio Reference is $30 a year. Others I belong to are $50 a year for download or limited access. Some sites use points systems to allow you to view or download certain items based on how many points. I think that's complicated. I think 2 levels would make things better with a basic package with no adds and maybe limited downloads to a premium package that lets you download other data (maybe base codeplugs, firmware, etc). 
I hate to say this as I run multiple sites also but it costs to do this stuff and most want everything for free. 

i have the KG-1000's set up for a repeater and pretty happy with their performance, I'm making contacts with mobile's 60 miles out.. I'm, setting on a hillside  about 500' overlooking the Indian Wells Valley using a Tram 1182 on 30' mast.  I also cleaned up my mobile Duplexer with my Nano, the factory tune wasn't very good.  i am concerned about the duty cycle on these KG-1000G  radios,  they get very hot after about 15 mins of continuous use.  I plan to use these as mobile's so I actually have two Maxon 8402A radios on order, they create a repeater much like the KG-1000  but better because they are commercial radios and have a 100% duty cycle. They are also a little cheaper then the KG-1000 radios.  If you decide to go with the Maxon's be prepared to wait about 60 days, they are on back order.   I'm also using EchoStaton with a RIGblasger for my ID Controller.  IMO, this is the best way to go for creating an I'D controller on your repeater.  I have mine set up for Voice I.D. with a time and temp stamp.  EchoStation has a lot of flexibility and the software is very cheap, only  $19 bucks.   RIGblaster ties it into the radios via  the Mic ports.   Very easy to set up.   

I can't really answer the tuning question. I'm not familiar with that antenna... though the adjustment sounds like it would be okay. 
 
I can tell you that there is nothing to be concerned about with the camera tripod mount.  I used to do it all the time and performance was not impacted. If you take it outside, just make sure you hang a sandbag from it so the wind doesn't blow it over.

You can't put the number in both unless you set it to cross, which really isn't needed. 
 
If you only want to hear repeater traffic, just set the type to TSQL and add the number to the ToneSQL field.  If you want to be able to hear everyone on the channel, including simplex operators, set the type to Tone and put the number in the Tone field.

If you just stick it in a tripod and don't use guys, in low/zero wind it will hold about 5 lbs max at full extension.  It will not hold much weight at all.  In fact, I was up on Flagpole Knob when some 40 mph winds came through and damn near folded it in half.
Now, if its guyed with a good tripod, It will easily hold 25-30 lbs.  I use 3 tiers of guys with one set at the top 5 inches.  The guys keep the mast straight under the load for max weight capacity.  I have had my 10' vertical in 80-90 mph winds.  The top of the antenna was moving all over, the the mast didn't budge. 
The two heaviest loads I have run while fully extended is (1.) a mono-band 20m hex beam with thrust bearings and a rotor at the base, and (2.) a 10' tall 2m repeater antenna, 20m dipole and an 80m inverted V with a balun and choke.  That second setup was in a massive overnight snow storm we had during Winter Field Day a few years ago.
 

I think the difference in relation to hinge is just hinge location changes between models, the height in relation to the cowl seems pretty similar.
That said, I also agree that the proximity of the body is probably the biggest issue. Tried a base setup clamped to a metal rack (about halfway up, to clear the ceiling...3.5:1 swr. Moved it to a tripod in the closet, away from the rack and anything else metal...1.1:1 on the same frequencies.
I believe @marcspaziis using lip mounts on the edge of his jeeps' hoods with good results

You can try enabling through the option menu window.

copied your settings, now name shows on display.  thank you

Are you close enough to the repeater to reach it? Can you hear traffic on the repeater at all? I don't know your radio but if the repeater requires tones make sure you have the correct TX tone selected on your radio. You might want to leave the RX tone off until you are sure you can open up the repeater. If the tones are correct do you hear a squelch tail when you transmit? If you are not opening the repeater and everything else is correct you might try moving closer to the repeater and see if you can open it. Try all this on both radios. Will the radios talk to each other on simplex? You could try the Talk Around feature if your radio has it to see if the radios will communicate to each other. try getting some distance between the radios if you can. I imagine someone else will correct me or add anything I didn't know or think of. Let us know what happens.

The repeater is on .550. You'll need to check your radio manual for which repeater channel has the .550. (Judging by the skimpy manual I found, you may have multiple repeater "channels" on .550 -- so you could have multiple repeaters using the same frequency but with different tones).
Your radio will transmit on 467.550, using a transmit tone of 136.5 (you can leave the receive tone OFF until you confirm the repeater is accessed). Your radio will receive on 462.550.
If you have both units configured for repeater mode, then they are both transmitting on a 467. frequency and listening on a 462. frequency -- so naturally, they can't talk to each other. To do that you need to go to a simplex (non-repeater) channel where they transmit and receive on the same frequency.
 
PS: Posting the same thing in multiple forums just results in split responses and overhead of finding information.
 

You probably meant amperes or amps in the part of your quote I underlined and bolded.  For my 100 watt amateur radio transmitter I have a 30 amp 13.8vdc power supply.  At full power the current is around 23 amps I think.  For a 50 watt transmitter you probably need at least a 15-25 amp power supply just so you’re not running the power supply at full power output.  Watts out can never exceed watts in.
A car’s electrical system puts out 13.8 volts when the car is running in order to charge the battery.  When the car is turned off the voltage of the battery drops down to somewhere around 12.7 or 12.8 volts DC.  I routinely charge several sealed lead acid batteries and they are all very close to 12.7 or 12.8 volts when I need to use them (charged and sitting around for a few weeks on a shelf).
You may not get 100% of the power from your mobile radio when it’s strictly on battery, but you probably will never know the difference.  
As far as wattage, it depends on the capacity of the battery, but nearly any of them will put out many amps of current.  8 amps at 12 volts is nearly 100 watts, . You only need that while transmitting. Receiving takes much less power.

As the shop owner, I wanted to follow up on what happened on this scenario. We used Tessco for shipping the CommScope base station antennas rather than taking on inventory of these antennas. They are very large, and the freight is very expensive, so it doesn't make sense to ship them to us, have to store them, then ship them again to the customer. You may be familiar with this as being called "drop shipping" where the item gets shipped directly to the customer.
In this customer's case, we received his order and sent the information to our sales rep at Tessco. Days went by, and we never heard confirmation that they received the order and couldn't reach the rep. I tried to find a regional manager to contact, but still couldn't get ahold of anyone.
Now being a week later, I escalated to their generic sales and support team, and explained the issue. They replied with the retail cost of the item, and a shipping charge of about $700. If we placed the order, we would have lost about $400 due to the super-high shipping quote and the non-discounted cost of the antenna that we already had negotiated with a sales manager in the past.
So unfortunately, we had to cancel the order and refund the customer. I sent a message to him apologizing and explaining the scenario above to show why we couldn't fulfill this order, because of course it looks unprofessional if you don't understand the details of what happened.
Needless to say, I pulled all products that we ship from Tessco and informed them I was done with their company do to this colossal issue. Almost a month later, none of the people I reached out to ever contacted me except their main support rep. Never again.