mbrun

I was just looking through Part 95 looking for such a GMRS exclusion. I found only two references to store and forward (e.g. Simplex Repeater). Both were prohibitions in non-GMRS services. FRS and MURs. One is 95.2733. The other is 95.987.d. Since repeaters are allowed in GMRS, and since there is no express exclusion of S&F devices in 95e, I conclude they are legal for use, but only when using the 462 main channel frequencies. BTW, I too own the Argent Data SR1. Nice little box. Actually bought it to facility one-man simplex radio testing. It is programmed to give my callsign both in CW and in Voice. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Yes, that is correct. BTWR has however gotten Wouxun to change that on the newer KG-905G radio. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Good Day John. axorlov is correct, you could do that with a human dispatcher that relays/echos the messages. That human effort and associated echo would certainly get old. If you desire a duplex repeater setup you have several options. First option is to purchase a purpose-built repeater, perhaps an all-in-one unit. There is an affordable fixed purpose unit like that sold right here on the myGMRS site ideal for just the scenario you describe. There are also higher priced commercial units available. Second option is purchase a pair of standard mobile radios, plus duplexer, antenna and controller and assemble one yourself. If you consider this option, the Wouxun KG-1000G has features that simplify this a tad over say a pair of MXT-400. The beauty of this arrangement is then have the option to use the component radios independently when repeater operation is not required. Third option is doing the same as above but instead some HTs. Some of have done this. I suspect you will find this works but will have the lowest performance of all your options. Plus your talk time will be limited. The beauty of the all-in one is that you could you can perhaps hoist the repeater and antenna high into a tree (or use a push-up mast you take with you) to get some serious elevation. Elevation pays more in range dividends than any legal GMRS power will practically get you. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Perfect. Thanks! Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Good Day Sean. There is nothing that requires the use of phonetics when giving your call sign which I believe you are already concluded. Just announcing your callsign normally is fine. Now, to your specific question. Do I use the NATO phonetic alphabet or just state it use normal alphanumerics. Here it depends. When I am giving it while participating in a GMRS or amateur net and when I otherwise want the recipient to clearly understand and copy it correctly I use phonetics. However, when I am in conversations with people that already know me, recognize my voice on the radio, and when I am just announcing for compliance reasons I simply use alphanumerics. All nets that I participate in expressly request to give it alphanumerically first, then follow it up phonetically. Thereafter alphanumerically is fine. Hope this helps. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

I have the same Midland antenna you do. It has been checked with both the same meter you are using as well as a NanoVNA. My readings showed the antenna tuning optimized for the repeater channels, exactly what I would have hoped. All your readings look good in my book. I would not expend anymore time trying to improve them. Nothing you do is going to get you any more range in practice. Now, with regards to the subtle differences, those can be tough to track down to find out exactly why. It could be a characteristic of your specific piece fo cable. How well you connector mates to the coax or connector to your radio, reflections from a nearby surface, the connection between the antenna and NMO mount and other things. I recently did some tests that necessitated putting an adapter in the antenna line. That adapter caused the SWR to change from a nice smooth curve to a slightly higher one that also exhibited repeating humps in the SWR pattern as displayed on a NanoVNA. Others may have experiences to share also. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Nice observation. Don’t let the SWR power reading mislead you. I have that same meter. The readings I get when using that meter with an antenna will at times appear as though less power is being put out and at times more power is being put out. However, when I replace the antenna with a purely resistive dummy load, that same meter has shown consistently that power of all my radios to be within a 1-5% of what the manufacturer’s rating is. One time I was using the meter with a 5-watt HT. Radio measured 4.9+ watts into the dummy load but about 8.9 watts into an antenna. Wow, big difference. Bottom line, don’t trust the power readings you get with that meter while using an antenna. Give the readings you obtain while using a dummy load more weight. After all, that is how the factory determines power too. Just a little nugget of experience for you. Hope it helps. Regards, Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

I got into GMRS nearly 20 years ago for simplex. I use is around the home, out in the neighborhood, while camping, traveling and during family events. I purchased by first repeater capable GMRS radio about a year ago to expand the range when traveling in and around town, ultimately for the capability to communicate with home. I enjoy radio as a hobby also. As such I enjoy talking radio on the radio with other enthusiasts. I have one local that I simplex with and others I connect with by way of the repeaters. My primary channel on the base radio is a simplex channel. You will regularly find that radio monitoring it and scanning all the local repeaters. Nowadays I never leave the home without a radio, even when just taking my walk. If I am out traveling about and using the radio talking to others my better half can often hear me and knows where I am at, leading to the ability to estimate when I will be home. And yes, we use the cell phone too. Now more than ever I think of radio as an alternate means of communication in case of emergency. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Yes I would consider a 6dBi antenna a high gain antenna as far as mobile antennas are concerned. Some base antennas though may reach 9, 12 and above. What is acceptable in SWR varies in what equipment you are using. Some pre-tuned antenna companies advertise their antennas to only be <1.7:1, while I have read on this forum someone assert that one of the GMRS radio manufacturers won’t warrant their products if connected to an antenna system greater than 1.5:1. As a radio owner you want to get it as low as you practically can, while also realizing that minute changes mean little in the grand scheme of things. An SWR of anything other than 1:1 means power is being reflected back from the antenna to your radio. A small amount is OK. A large amount of reflected power could damage it. A high SWR also means you are unnecessarily wasting power in your coax as it bounces back and forth from one end of your cable to another. No, a 2:1 SWR is not terrible, but it still translates into 11% of the power sent to the antenna being reflected back to your radio. Whereas a 1.5:1 translates only to 4% and a 3:1 translates to 25% power reflection. Here is a document worth reading: http://www.arrl.org/files/file/Technology/tis/info/pdf/q1106037.pdf. If you have a radio capable of operating at high power but your SWR is not optimal, yes it is wise to operate the radio at lower power. Doing so ensures that the outputs of your radio are not subjected to voltages and more heat than they are rated for. Personally I strive for <1.5:1. I consider myself blessed if I get less than that, and I back the power down if it is above that. Oh, and by the way, a low SWR does not mean your antenna is radiating optimally, it only means you antenna system is not presenting a lot of reflected power back to the output of your radio. A bad antenna with a poor impedance match will present beautifully to your radio if you lengthen the cable enough. Hope this helps. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Nice job tracking it down. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Good Day. Yes, the angle of the antenna relative to the ground plane will affect the antennas radiation pattern and its impedance. As far uniform horizontal coverage is concerned, the more vertical the better. However, when using a low gain antenna the angle is not as critical as it would be with a high gain antenna. Low-gain antenna radiation patterns are closer to that of a fat-donut. If your SWR is within an acceptable range I would put your radio and antenna to the test. If it does what you need it to do, leave it be. If not you will need to experiment a bit until you find the placement, orientation and mounting that works for you. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Good Day. All of the Wouxun models support this. Handheld and mobile units alike. These include the KG-805G, KG-905G, KG-1000G. Regards, Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

That is an unnecessary annoyance and shortcoming of the current crop of radios which are all based on some form of amateur radio. I personally am lobbying the importers/manufacturers to change this. The issue you are experience is based on the fact that Menu and Enter are the same key. Once you are in a function menu, do not hit menu again unless you want the current displayed value to become the new value. Instead hit Exit if you do not want to change to the current selection, even if you did not yourself change it. While the Midland radios fall short in flexibility, one think they have going for them is simplicity. Midland requires the user to interact with one or two menu items to deal with codes whereas Wouxun and others require you to interact with 4. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Good Day. Repeaters almost always require you to encode a CTCSS or DCS code into your transmit signal to get into and use the repeater. Use of a code on the receive side of your radio is customary, but always discretionary. Most repeaters in my experience transmit back a code as well, which may or may not be the same as it requires you to use to get into the repeater. If it does transmit a code it is purely for your benefit. It allows you to set that code in your receiver so you have the reasonable ability to exclude all other signals on that frequency from opening squelch on your radio so you only hear that repeater. But since it is possible that other repeaters and even simplex users within radio range of you may use the same frequency, setting the Rx code in your radio helps you control which radios you hear. If you did not put in the code, you would hear all radios transmitting on the frequency nearby you. And if you keyed up in response to them, they may not hear you. I hope that helps. Regards. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Got it. Looks like you have some investigating to do. NEC requires the main grounding conductor to go directly from the buss bar in your electrical panel to your service entrance ground rod so I would expect the rod to be near your main electrical panel, or near your meter. The rod may not be visible above grade as time and dirt may have covered it. I believe I observed a conduit going down from your meter into the earth. It is possible, although unlikely, that this conduit runs from the meter all the way to your utility power pole or ground mounted transformer. If is stops below grade as I would expect it does, it is possible that the grounding conductor runs from your electrical panel back to and thru the meter box down through the conduit into the earth were it is then terminated to the rod below grade. An electrician may be needed for a consult on this if you cannot locate it. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Pardon my ignorance. For clarity, when you refer to head unit, are you referring to the removable, remotely installable, control panel that comes with the KG-1000, or are you referring to some attribute of the Jeep? Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Your ideal situation looks something like this. Ground Rod at the base of your antenna mast. The antenna mast connected directly to that ground rod. Ground Rod outside near where your feed-line enters the premises. Lighting arrester installed near this point and connected directly to that local ground rod. Ground Rod near your electrical service entrance. That rod connected to the grounding bus bar inside your main electrical service panel using the NEC prescribed grounding conductor size for your service size. A copper bonding conductor interconnecting all three grounding rods together. The size of the bonding conductor should not be less in size than the NEC prescribed size required from your electrical panel to the main electrical grounding conductor. Larger is OK. This bonding conductor is needed to keep all three grounding rods at nearly constant potential despite climatic changes in soil conductivity. Hope that helps.

Yes, it is entirely possible. However, just about every distributed application that is not signed with a security certificate from one the big security companies (VeriSign, DigiSign, etc.) will be flagged as a threat. The version I have is not signed either. In my case Norton AV scanned it, indicated very few of its customers use that file but ultimately reported no threats found. Guess we won’t know for certain until the trojan horse within shows its ugly head. Hmmm. It is a shame Wouxon does not take the necessary steps to get it signed so as to eliminate the guessing game. A signed application does not mean it does not contain a threat, but it does mean that if there is a threat we know whom the responsible party is. I believe if a signed application has been modified after it has be signed originally by the author, the AV software will again flag it as a threat. Viruses are regularly propagated by modifying unsigned files that are freely distributed on the internet. I have have had cases were the software I am actively writing was flagged as well before it was signed. I too had to talk similar steps. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

From the sounds of it everything is 100% new. Different antenna, different mast material, different mast height, feed-line changes. Perhaps even a different location? A lot of variables now to investigate. Is the Ed-Fong antenna perched fully on top of the mast or beside it? If it is beside the mast the metal mast itself would affect it where as the PVC would not have. What was the SWR of the antenna alone before putting it up? What was it with just a short jumper between the meter and antenna. What was it mounted to when you measured it and at what elevation above the ground? What was it when on the ground and attached to just 1 section of metal mast. Is the antenna now at is higher elevation located near something that the previous antenna was not? Has there been some damage/deformation of the cable? Are all the connections tight? Have the connections been exposed to rain before they where sealed and made moisture tight? There are so many factors that could contribute to the current value. It would be good to know what you started with and which factors caused the change. I recently installed an antenna. I started by measuring the antenna while located 6’ of the ground on a homemade tripod and PVC pole. I then made measurements after every change I made so I could see the effect of each action so I could take remedial action if saw something I did not like. BTW, I am using a NanoVNA H4 to make my measurements. Hope some of this helps. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Isn’t it amazing how quality customer service endears a company to its customers? Nowadays it really takes guts and intentionality to do this, especially when faced with a customer a company might rather not deal with. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Great. I think then could probably work out a scenario where your GMRS repeater antenna up top and then side-mount a dual-band amateur antenna lower on the tower. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

I would not let the permit scare you away. Just because you need a permit does not mean you are not eligible for increased height. They probably just want make sure your elevation stays within the safe range for you distance you are from the air field. In the event that you remain limited in height you can purchase multi-band antennas so that a single stick could perhaps serve you well. Recently learned that Diamond has a custom service available. A local GMRSr and ham reported this to me just two weeks ago as a result of a purchase he made for a dual-service repeater system he is installing. If you cannot mount the antennas on the same tower and with vertical separation between them, then horizontal separation is likely what you will need. The more separation you can achieve the less transmissions from one of your radios will de-sense the radios served by on the other. You could perhaps put both UHF services (70cm and GMRS) on the same custom antenna but you would need to use external band pass filters and diplexers to split the band between the different radios. I would expect that if done well you would lessen your potential for UHF de-sense issue. You are in a good position to do some experimentation on your property to get a good sense for how things would perform before you commit to any high-dollar equipment. You may also be able to reach out to a local ham club. They may have members that might enjoy some field-day-like experiments at your home. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Never hurts to check with an ohm meter on the lowest range setting. You should have infinity ohms as measured between center conductor and shield at both ends of cable. You should have near zero ohms when measuring continuity of the center conductor end to end and similarly near zero ohms for the shield. While the ohm meter is an appropriate level-1 test for the cable, the ohm meter is DC, where as RF is AC and AC resistance (impedance) is affected frequency and many other factors. A pinch, a sharp bend or deformation of the cable, a scrap on the outside surface of the center conductor, a poor solder connection, a less then optimal crimp connection are all candidates for altering the impedance of the feed-line and thus the SWR of the antenna. Absent more sophisticated test equipment, some knowledge and a little trial and error and patience is ultimately required. I cannot tell you how many times I have seen the numbers change based on changing a connector, swapping jumpers or the adapters used for the measurement. Sometimes something as simple as disconnecting, reconnecting and tightening the connection can yield positive results. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

The 805G Radio has published rated sensitivity of <.2uV (-121dBm) for 12dB SINAD, and a selectivity of 65dB. I found and downloaded the information from the Wouxun.com website last summer. Within the last week I was using a signal generator to determine the level at which the 805 broke squelch when squelch has set a 1. It started to open at -125dBm and was open solid at -123dBm. But, in all fairness, my meter is not calibrated so it could be off a few dB. Of course this does not mean that this is the level at which 12dB SINAD is reached. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM

Good Day. The 905 is not capable of FM or NOAA. I believe the KG-UV9G is capable of both. On the UV9P (the model the G version is based on) you do have to program in the NOAA frequencies manually however. Not a big deal as it is no different that entering in any other frequency. Michael WRHS965 KE8PLM