WRKC935

Couple things to point out. dBi and dBd are two different values. dBi is going to be 2.5dB less than dBd. Because the dBd "d" stands for dipole. Which has 2.5dB of gain above a isotropic radiator. Which is the 'i' in dBi. I don't own the Comet that others have talked about. The circles I run in and company I keep gets me DB-408's and DB-420's for my stuff. Those of course are the 2K dollar antenna's you mentioned. But a guy in Columbus put one up on his repeater and it was a night and day difference between the 6dBi antenna he got with the repeater and that one. It probably added 5 to 10 miles of range or better to his repeater, all other things being the same. No change in mount height. Now, be aware that you can have too much gain if you have a lot of height. The realized gain in an antenna is accomplished in moving the radiation pattern. Think about it like a 100 watt lightbulb. If the light is going all directions, at all angles, no specific direction or angle gets any more light then another. To create gain, an antenna take the unused light radiating up and down and points in to the horizon. The more this is done, the higher the gain. When you get the gain high enough, there isn't much radiation down. So with a bunch of height, you overshoot the signal where you want it to go. Mind you it requires a LOT of height. But if you are on a mountain, and get a super high gain antenna, the valley below will NOT see much if any signal. Just be aware of that.

Yep, understood. Went back and read your rules. Obviously I am NOT welcome.

And I am trying to start arguments. Right.

Never said there was a club. Situation was just a repeater that someone was charging access fee's for. Point is that if you are putting the money in your pocket and spending it on yourself, then you are profiting. If there is a 'club' that is established as you are indicating, and what I said applies, then it's embezzlement, because you are taking CLUB money and spending it on yourself. Either way YOU are profiting. Don't forget that a club needs to keep books for their money too. And all that stuff you mentioned has receipts that go into a ledger. And if the yearly income minus the years receipts don't equal the bank account then the money went somewhere. And if you are the only one handling the money, then it's on YOU to explain it. If you can't, then it's still a problem, legally. We're not discussing forensic accounting here. This is as simple as balancing a checkbook. I realize they don't teach that in school anymore. But it's not that difficult of a concept to grasp.

There you go again, trying to talk as if you know,,, when clearly it seems you DON'T. We OWN THE SITE. The tower, property, building, all of it. So ALL costs are the responsibility of the owner / business. Yes, it's now an LLC. That I donate a LOT of time to which pays my way to have access. I wired it, installed the generators, battery plants, provided thousands of feet of cable. Every repeater at the site in use outside the two county owned repeaters. That I support via the business I work for. There are no 'free' tower sites any more. At least not around here. Everything and every place that at one time was accessible because the engineer for the station, or the owners of the site were friendly to ham radio have all sold off or have put their sites under commercial tower management and they all want over a 1000 a month in rent. A civil engineering study done before you can even get a contract written and require one of their 'approved' tower contractors to do the work or installing the antenna and line. And of course since the new TIA-222 standard just went to I from H, most towers don't pass and you are responsible to have the tower reinforced to meet the standard with your additional loading. Cell companies don't care, A tower serves hundreds or possibly thousands of users. They are making lots of money and they see it as a business expense. When it's hobby radio, ham, GMRS or whatever, the numbers keep them off the towers.

Now, remember that this is coming from a guy that has an open repeater that covers 7 counties and REFUSES to take money because it's too much of a PITA to do so. YOU sir have NO idea what running a repeater actually costs. Outside of the 20 bucks a month your electric bill went up with your garage repeater that has a 5 mile range. Tower SITE.... 48K purchase price. Another 30K in electrical, roof, materials. 300 bucks a month in electric bill 200 a month in property taxes. A 300 dollar LIGHT BULB that has to be changed every 2 years. We change it ourselves or that would be a 3300 dollar light bulb. 300 for the bulb, 3000 to climb up and change it. Although at some point we will need to invest in a powered rope ascender that will 'pull' one of us up the tower when we are too old to physically climb the 230 foot ladder to access the light. Think battery drill powered winch. SO, paying 25 bucks a year, or even 10 bucks a month to access a repeater that has coverage in 7 counties is a STEAL as opposed to just the electric bill.

Not really. As mentioned, it's easy to show if you are putting any dues money in a specific account and only using that money for the repeater. But, for the sake of numbers. Lets say you have 50 users that all pay 20 bucks a month. That's $1000 a month. You are just dumping all that money in your personal bank account. You can show a 100 dollar a month electric bill at the site. You can show a 100 dollar a month site rent. And you can show two service calls from a radio shop at 500 dollars a trip for the last 12 months. So the 'dues' income is 12K. You have receipts for $3400 bucks for the last 12 months. If you don't have a minimum of $8600 in your bank account, you are profiting from the repeater. Because YOU spent the money for something outside of the repeater upkeep and maintenance. And again, I am speaking based on the RULEs / REGULATIONS as written, not what's being enforced. But, first thing is a file from the FCC, probably for MORE than what you are taking in per year in dues. Second is the FCC informing the IRS of the 12K per year, and operations of a for profit business. Now if you have all your ducks in a row and are claiming that as income, and depreciating the repeater, line, duplexer. Writing off the electric bill, maintenance costs and all the rest, then it's a business anyway. So no one is gonna do that. So the IRS smacks you. If you aren't doing all the business stuff, then the state will what their share too. And may come at you for operating a business without a license, insurance, or whatever other laws they have on the books. So we are back to, I put up a repeater. Everyone with a license is allowed to use the repeater WITHOUT paying a fee, dues or any of that. I put it up for my private use and ALLOW others to access it. Then when it's questioned, it's my repeater, for my needs and others are ALLOWED to use it. No business intent at all. Because the county is a tenant on our tower, we had to establish a business, move the ownership of the tower to the business, and all that stuff. It was a PITA. But the tower owner gained a tenant by doing all of it. Since he dislikes ham clubs as much as I do, so we don't even claim it's a club house.

No, not really. I have direct access to 12 radios from my desk sitting here. Mind you they are remote controlled via a dispatch console system and are at the tower. I am actually looking to add to the setup since I don't have 10 or 6 meters covered currently on individual radios. But the Yeasu 847 I can connect to via Remote Hams does offer me access to those bands. Not looking at 220 at this point, but I do have 900Mhz on analog, DMR and P25

Oh, he's just trying to start another argument with me. I swear if I said he was intelligent and handsome he would figure out a way to protest the statement. But he ain't and and I wouldn't, so we will miss at least THAT discussion.

Well, if you are operating on someone's repeater, and have been 'told' (documented) to NOT use their repeater, then the complaint is malicious interference with the repeater. Which is one of the few things that the FCC will in fact look into. But the repeater owner needs to have documented proof that you have been informed that the repeater is for private use, which is also legal under GMRS, and you are still interfering with the repeater. Randy mentioned that there are FEW enforcement actions in the GMRS service. But those that do exist are for interference. Now here's the rub. If you are contacted by the FCC about interfering with someone's private repeater and you tell them it's a paid repeater. Then, since they are doing an investigation, they MIGHT look into that. If the owner has his documentation together and can prove it's either a club machine and he collects 'club dues' or he can show that the money collected is ONLY for the maintenance of the repeater, he's in the clear. If not, then he might get a notice too. But YOU are getting a notice if it goes that far. Regardless of what he's going or not doing legally, you are interfering with his repeater. Interference is one of those really broad regulations that most anything fits into. Broken radios that are transmitting off frequency is interference. Putting up a repeater on the same frequency as another one in your town when there are other pairs open. Again, interference. This one needs a bit more to it, like the new repeater owner needs to KNOW there is another repeater there, or at minimum your repeater needs to be well documented as preexisting the new one. And your not gonna get any assistance with this if your repeater is on your garage and talks 2 miles. But a high profile machine that is documented and public, yeah, the FCC is gonna be on their side of it. But, in this case, being told, with documented notice (first class mail with signed receipt) that you are interfering with the operations of a private repeater can get the FCC's attention. But it's gonna need to be more than a telephone call to the FCC office to get the ball rolling. But if the repeater in question is well used by other's and they are paying their fee, and you aren't. It's not difficult for the owner to request the membership file complaints, and actually get part of them to do so. If you get multiple complaints from multiple license holders, you are going to get a letter from the FCC about your actions.

Only thing I can say is it wasn't well hidden if it was that easy to find.

Don't worry about it. But you really should do a search on a topic or question before making a post. People do come up with new questions every day. But, there are also some things that have indeed been beat to death.

You can do a not for profit and not be a registered 50x. The 'trick' is that anything you take in you keep record of. You put those funds in a specific account that's only for repeater maintenance and you don't pull / spend that money for anything outside of that. If you do that, and it gets questioned. You have records of the incoming and outgoing money and it's a mute point. If you are just dropping the money in your personal account or similar and spending money out of that account then you REALLY need to be careful about tracking what's coming in and what's going out. And if you aren't doing any of that, then if it's looked at, they will consider it for profit. But the first thing that would have to happen is someone get mad and file a complaint on you / the repeater owner. Now this does happen when someone gets told to get off a private / pay to play repeater. The user gets his feelings hurt and calls the FCC to inform on the repeater owner. Now, is that gonna bring the FCC to their door. Who knows. At this point, the FCC has said that they will ONLY respond to INTERFERENCE related complaints. Of course, this ain't that. So again, who knows. But is it legal to 'charge' for access to a repeater? And the answer is, it depends on what you are charging for. IF it's 'CLUB DUES' then yes 100%. If it's actual access and there is no club, then all the stuff above applies, records and such. And to have a 50x you about need a club or organization to have that tax status. Personally I just don't bother with fee's or due's because it's a pain in the ass. Trying to NOT piss off people while running a wide area coverage repeater is not worth my time. If someone hands me some money to support the repeater, I put it towards the electric bill, or tools, or other stuff for the repeater. And honestly, I have has the repeater on since 2021 or so, and the grant total of donated money has been 90 bucks. So again, not worth the hassle.

Wow, we doing THIS AGAIN?!?!?!! Fixed stations are communicating with other fixed stations. Linking aside. If you have a repeater at a remote location, and a base station at your house, when you are talking on the REPEATER, that's fixed station operation. If you go to a simplex channel and talk to a mobile or portable radio, then you are operating fixed BASE. So ONE radio can operate in BOTH manners depending on how you are communicating. The other situation is simplex between two base stations. Both are 'fixed' or not mobile / portable. Reason for this is to NOT create unneeded interference on the frequency by operating at a power level above the minimum required to maintain reliable communications. Repeaters and other base stations have added range due to their elevated antenna systems over a mobile or portable and of course have antenna's with more gain as well. This isn't anything new... commercial has had this same regulation for years. The difference is in part 90 commercial they refer to the radio as a CONTROL STATION. It's still a 'base radio'. This is also how you get the maximum antenna height regulations for fixed base operations.

Yes, PLEASE USE ITm, as often as you like. If you hear me in there, say hello. All are welcome to the machine. If you can get into the Columbus 575, again, use that one too. We want people to use these repeaters. And don't forget about the Morrow 550, it's open as well. I have put a good bit of time and effort into getting the repeater on the air, and really do what others to use it. That's why it got built. The comment about the folks that build 'big repeaters' wasn't a knock. I am one of those guys. The 675 talks from as far Northwest as Mechanicsburg, West to London, South to Lancaster and East to Zanesville. It's got a big footprint. Yeah, I have a couple radios at the house if the wife wants to get in contact, but she just always calls my phone. So please, feel free. And anyone else reading this in the Central Ohio area, get in there. You ARE certainly welcome. I got spooled up because we have people that want to do nothing but complain. And it drives off new guys, or makes them question if they should be using other peoples equipment. And the truth is that's why it's there to begin with. If I just wanted to chat with my wife, I have several other methods to do that with. First is the obvious cell phone. Everyone's got one of those. Then there is the IP phone system at the house that I have a softphone application on my phone for. Runs across an encrypted data link from my cell phone via a VPN tunnel to the house and then allows her to call me at my 'extension' number like calling another phone on a business phone system. Then there's email and text, and voice message texts, and CB radio and the list goes on. Now in truth. Having a repeater that has that sort of coverage, and not leaving it fully open to all licensed users, to me, that's BS. Make no mistake, it talks a long way, and it would be very difficult for someone else to use that pair. So if I built that out, and then denyed anyone else the ability to use that repeater, that would make me an A-hole in my eyes. That's the one thing about the garage repeaters, you can have one or two in every town, on the same pair, and they don't interfere with each other since the coverage is small. Mine ain't that at all.