tweiss3

You could try rotating your setup as much as you can, even 35 degrees might help. That really isn't that much noise, now this is noise:

The thing the FT8900 had that made it desirable is the inclusion of 6m and 10m.

That is ground wave, not NVIS. NVIS at 10m is almost non-existent. You need the right atmospheric conditions.

Free Starbucks/Timmies/Dunkin with every transmission? In all seriousness, why? My wife has found that the radios are helpful in some situations, and she isn't afraid to use them, but she has no interest to talking to anyone else out there.

Hunkered down? Drives me nuts, this isn't unusual snow for Ohio (northern), we get this every few years. Stop for the day, enjoy the fire in the fireplace, watch TV, clear the drive when it's over then go to work. Many people stayed home today though. D4 was quite variable, but that's cause the Cities are responsible for the highway, D3 was clear and dry, ODOT was on it. Radios still work just fine, I did have to clear the snow from the roof the car, the UHF whip disappeared, and the VHF whip was mostly hidden. Still checked into the morning net and listened to the plow crews getting back at it.

In a "field deployment" where you are likely working 10W, I wouldn't worry about the RF on the shield of the coax. In a permeant installation with higher power, yes you should use a common mode choke. I have a CMC from myantennas that I never installed, but I do have 10 clamp on that have greatly reduced the RF on the shield (you could definitely hear it on the surround sound when I was on HF).

This is my setup. Transformer is in the box, wire end goes in the master link, and eyelet goes on the stud with the wing nut. The wire is wound up in the chalk reel, attached to 40' of paracord. I just pull it all out, then toss the chalk reel over a branch and pull. The other side is just paracord, So I could get the other end up too, between two trees. Attach coax to the PL on the box and hook up the radio. It's been very effective in my testing, and worked better than the expensive Budipole.

PSK reporter is awesome, the list of digital modes you can be tracked in is huge. FT8/FT4 is reported very well, some of the other may not be reported in nearly as many places as others. All of these beacons/receivers are voluntary listening, so keep that in mind. You can also try http://websdr.org/ and see if you can actually hear yourself, but that is very limited on locations to "listen".

Could be a number of things. Could be that they want to align more with industry standard to blend in and get the Part 95 certification. Could be that the hardware is identical, but power dives off that far from the ham frequencies because it is out of the design frequencies and starts becoming really inefficient. Could be that the ham version never really put out 10W as claimed.

I've not messed with it, but does Kenwood OVCM act as promiscuous mode? I don't really see a need to use promiscuous mode after trying it at one point, if I'm really curious, I grab the scanner or an SDR, but I do see it as an option in Armada. Also, @PACNWComms, same to the Bridgecom purchase. At one point, they did replace my 878 to shut me up, but the thing still suffers horribly to frontend overload.

Those external speakers are designed to try to get louder than the internal speaker, so they will likely be "too loud", what about using a KES5 external speaker, the clarity improvement would be huge.

The "travelers tone" was something suggested in a magazine many years ago and never completely caught on. IRC, it was back when your GMRS license had to pick 2 frequencies, and you would choose one, and put the "traveler" as your second. You still occasionally find the 141.3 tone used for repeaters, and that tone is generally (not always) considered an open invitation when you come across it, such as the Gatlinburg repeater. As for "band plan", pick what works for your family around your intended operation area and move on. If you show up to an event, and they publish a frequency/channel/tone, use that, but in general, since it's all shared spectrum, operate as normal and if you find overwhelming interference, then move channels. I know some states have tried to make a standard known for "when lost call" frequency and tone choice, but it's based on FRS, and there isn't a massive monitoring network like the coast guard has to cover the entire coastline, so the chances of being in reach of someone else that will recognize the call and are in a position to "help" is very slim. You are better off using 911 text over satellite (now offered on almost any phone produced in the last 18 months), or having other alternative means (Garmin Inreach). To sum it up, use GMRS as best you can (and can train the family members), but don't depend on others infrastructure.

Yea, the Sentinel software makes it way easier. You don't have to understand exactly how the trunked systems work, but you do need to know what you intend to listen to. I need to remember to update the SD card on the Trucks SDS200 now that I think about it.

Anything you can program a single channel to. Make all 16 on the knob the same channel. Even better if there isn't a screen.

If you have to have both bands in a single antenna, I'd choose Larsen NMO2/70B, but you have to have the height available as it is 36" in length. I have used the Larsen NMO150/450/758 as well as the Larsen NMO2/70SH, but I stopped using them for UHF because they are a 1/4 wave 2m antenna which ends up being 3/4 wave for UHF and has way too much up tilt. I now use a dedicated 1/2 wave UHF antenna from PCTel (BMWU4002S) that claims its good for all of UHF, but is good enough for what I need.

If you really want to "chat" with friends that don't have ham or GMRS, then get your justification together, talk to a frequency coordinator and put up your money for a business band frequency/pair. Otherwise, stick within what your amateur license permits for "chats". Every bit of frequency from 2200 meters (135kHz) to exceeding 275GHz is allocated with the US and any other region/nation. There isn't anything "free", and operating in the "350 band" could likely get you a knock on the door from the military, not just the FCC. Heck, the shared 60M band is relatively new, and its secondary operation for only 5 exact frequencies. The only reason you are seeing 350-520 show up in Chinese radios is because it was in commercial radios that were sold to the Feds. Don't think because a radio can transmit somewhere, that you can find a justification to use that frequency now.

If I'm around, I enjoy storm watching and listening to Skywarn. I have reported to the net when it was applicable. More often than not, I'm not in a position to report anything. ARES in my area requires a bunch of the FEMA courses that I have not completed, plus minimum event time. I've helped with the marathon a few times, but I'm not officially an ARES member.

DMR Simplex doesn't show up on a scanners "close call". Also, alert tones, text messaging, location information and other data can be sent over DMR, not just voice communications.

As noted above, municipalities must make reasonable accomodations for antennas and equipment. That doesn't mean they can't require a permit or inspect it for electrical or building code. Nothing about having an amateur license bypasses a permit. Now the argument about what is reasonable will require lawyers and an expensive fight.

Yea, to put it in very simple boxes: Trunked radio has a handful of frequencies (channels) at a site, one way or the other, you have a "control channel" which assigns traffic to an available channel. When all channels are in use and you try to key up, you get bonked (the radio makes a bonk tone, different than the proceed-to-talk tone that you get when your voice traffic is granted). P25 is just an implementation of that, but there are other digital versions using DMR, NXDN and dPMR. There were also analog versions of trunking as well, like Motorola Type II (Viking16 is a currently compatible Kenwood option) where traffic could be analog or P25 digital, or LTR, where the control data was in the subaudible tone portion of the analog signal directing voice traffic to the correct channel.

I guess what do you want to know about them? Does trunking radio make sense to you, or are you stuck on how that is done?

You CANNOT use a standard watt meter to verify power output on DMR (or any TDMA mode). It doesn't show up accurately because it pulses every 30ms for each timeslot. Also, if it's overloaded by surrounding RF, it will bonk. DMR (in a repeater scenario) sends a ping to the repeater, and if it doesn't "hear back" from the repeater after I think 3 attempts or so, it says out of range.

Many of these cheep chinese radios and their software/drivers barely work on the intended system (windows), let alone a fast pace changing debian core. You may be out of luck if you have no access to windows.

Yes and no. The NX-5000 radios come with DES 4 key option out of the box, and those keys are software loaded. DMR Enhanced Encryption (ARC4) is an add on, but those are also software loaded. If you want AES, or more than 4 DES keys, you need the AE31k crypo module, then AES & DES are loaded via either hardware keyloader, or KPG-AE1 software. NX-3000 don't have anything out of the box. DMR EE is same as 5000, add on + software load. AES/DES need crypto and hardware or KPG-AE1 software. Kenwood VP8000 & VM8000 are entitlement based encryption, hardware is in the radio by default. AES/DES is keyloader or KPG-AE1, EE can either be done in programming software, or loaded via keyloader. I did have an issue with hardware loaded EE keys though.

Well, SouthEast Repeater Association (the TN coordination body) has recommended tones. 100.0 is the common, and if you are on the edge of TN middle and TN east, what you notice is on purpose......