gortex2

This ^^^^ is what many dont understand about having a good coverage repeater. Some of us pay alot of $$$ out of our pockets to have this stuff on the air.

As @OffRoaderX pointed out alot of what works for someone may not work for you. I can at least give you some data from my time in the Concord area each year, specifically CMS. We had a 35; MH with a GMRS repeater in it. I ran a GR1225 on low power for multiple years. LMR400 (25') out of the duplexer to a Laird FG4503 Fiberglass antenna on my flagpole mount. From Turn 4 parking lot (640' ASL) I could get 3-4 miles to the North up 29. On a portable I had no issues talking to the repeater from the Walmart 2 Miles north. On the mobile it would drop out around parkway. To the south I could only get about 2 miles on mobile. We had one year where we were early and I setup on the South side of the track. It was around 725' there. I had no issues with a portable further south and still had perfect comms on my portable to the north to the Walmart. So height helped in that area. I will also say all comms were on my XTL2500 (at the time) and my APX portable or HT1250LS portable. Sadly since COVID we have not been setup in the camper at that track. We spent 3 weeks on the track for about 5 years and used the repeater a alot when on site. With all the other comms on site I was actually surprised at how well it did work. Im in your area quite a bit still but dont seem to hear alot on GMRS when I'm in the area. I have not had time to try the 675 repeater there. Maybe this weekend when I'm down. Could go for some nice Brickhouse Pizza and a cold frosty beverage right now...

Location is what matters. Do you have a tower site ? Tall building ? A home repeater in that area will not cover 20-30 miles.

And on ham you can use DMR, P25, Fusion, IDAS etc..... That you can't use on GMRS

No. GMRS is not about that. Thats what Ham is for.

So been here done that. As said 48v charger is ideal, but not required. It can be done with a 12v charger one battery at a time. We have charged strings sitting in a warehouse like this. One battery each day. While I've never tried to charge all 4 at once as long as the charger is truly isolated from ground I would think it would work. The issue is many of the cheap old charger the 12V negative lead it grounded to the chassis which is also plugged into the wall.

The travel tone is 141.3. Its up to the repeater owner if he/she wants to enable the travel tone and allow folks to use it. Long before GMRS became ham lite GMRS users had used different PL tones to keep the channel clear at home. For decades we had a base radio at home and the only people we would hear is a parent calling base. At 2 in the AM we really didn't want joe calling testing his radio. It was used way different then that folks seem to use it for now. As others said its costly to put up and maintain repeaters. That's why none of mine are listed. None are open for use other than family and close friends. That was the intent. I use GMRS for other stuff on jeep rides and off road and all comms are CSQ then. So the KISS method of standard tone is already there if folks want to use it. Many do not for multiple reasons. I enabled it for a week on one of my sites. After 3 days of two guys rag chewing for hours on end I disabled it.

Sorry no. Its was @WRFP399 His repeater is here - https://mygmrs.com/repeater/4893 One of his posts on battery stuff is here -

There was a guy on here from Alaska with a RT97 on a side of a mountain with solar. Do some digging he had an in depth posting about it.

Yes. The XTS was never intended to be public with FPP. The flash was for FED stuff. The XTS is limited with what you can and cannot change and will depend on how the radios was setup with CPS. To be honest I never saw any value in it. The APX does allow much more flexibility with FPP.

sounds like you need quality cables from radio to duplexer. Shouldn't be long at all.

yes

Send Rich a message. Sure he can fix it.

My $70,000 F250 has 18 miles on it when I blew in 2 mounts. My F1150 had 100 miles on it when I dropped 6 mounts in it. If done right its worth doing and in the end will get done anyway. Enjoy the proper install and dont worry about it.

I assume you are logged into the main sit account ? Its different than the forum. I am not logged in and I removed all my repeaters so I can't go back in and look but I thought under your profile is said something like "my repeaters" or similar ?

use a portable

I run the FTM400. Really wanted a second one but didn't get it in time. Its a solid radio. Most likely grab a FTM300 for my second jeep. I only use it on HAM stuff so no need for mods.

You wont find any Part 90 radios that work with a mac. Only hobby stuff.

And we bicker about ID again.....But lets help folks use non part 95 radios over and over.... Regardless if you like it or not there are hundreds of repeaters out there if not more with no ID on them. Midland is selling alot of the repeater bundles..none of which ID

No requirement to ID. Search the site and 100's of arguments over it. As long as you ID your good. You need RX Audio, COR (carrier relay) and ground from the receive radio (467.xxx). On TX radio you need TX Audio (Mic High), Ground and PTT. On the Motorola COR to PTT, RX Audio to TX audio and Ground to Ground. Should be similar on this radio. Many controllers incorporate ID, audio processing and other features.

I would search for the service manual. If I remember right they have a 9pin on the back for accessory stuff. If so I'd just make a back to back cable. No need for a controller to be honest.

So just as reference the GR1225 does not have a self contained duplexer. Yes it can be mounted inside the case but its not always there. Many makes of repeaters have a location to install the duplexer inside but many used ones don't have it. As reference the motorola quantar will program fine with Windows 10 and is a rock solid repeater. I still have a windows XP computer I use for my GR1225 repeaters I still have on the air. You can pick them up for $25 on the used market all day long. As said in the other post look at the midland or Retivas if you want a basic home repeater. The GR1225 on high power wont last. I run all my 45 watt units at 25 watts to make them last.

You cannot use digital on GMRS. Analog only per the rules. There are alot of good repeaters out there. The GR1225 while a decent unit will burn up if you run it on high power. No there isn't support but for a $500 unit and a little online you can be on the air pretty quick. With that said also know your environment and what you expect from the repeater. If your installing this at home in a town and not on a mountain you may not get what you want. The midland repeater package is a good unit for a home repeater as long as you can get the antenna up in the air. If all you have is portables its ideal. Vertex, Motorola, Bridgecom, Uniden, Daniels, Maxon, ICOM all make good repeaters. Antenna system is where a repeater shines.

Whats you application ? That normally drives power. Many think power is king but its really what antenna you have.

Bronco is like a jeep. Fiberglass roof so not many options for mounting. The antenna from RRR is very similar to the Laird B4502NS. They are supposed to be wideband but I found tuning them with a VNA can help a bit. In the end I'd probably swap the UHF out to a Laird B4505CNS which is a 5/8 wave antenna. However with that said I run a 1/4 wave UHF in a similar location on my jeep and can get over a couple miles in the mountains but not in the valley. UHF is line of site. All I car about 90% of the time is the jeep in front of me or behind me so its not a huge deal. When I use my repeaters I can hit them with a handheld so dont need a great setup to use mobile. Kudos on a good radio setup in the bronco.