coryb27

Two people have already given you the answer to your question: One or more repeaters, possibly connected together using simplex links.  This will give you wide-area coverage without the need for iffy message relaying. A single well placed repeater could easily cover 300 to 400 square miles.  Motorola GR1225s are available for around $500 (make sure the finals are good) and MTR2000s for not much more. Personally, I'd go with the MTR2000. You can also build your own out of a pair of half decent HTs.
 
If you do decide to build out a repeater network DO NOT BUY THE MIDLAND RADIOS. They only do narrow-band and for best performance, you will want to take advantage of the GMRS rules and use wide-band for your repeaters.

You are obviously making an assumption based on a collection of multiple posts I have made... and your assumption is wrong.
 
Actually, the radio in question is rated for a 10% duty cycle; 6 minutes transmit, 54 minutes receive.  And I mentioned using the radio in extreme use conditions as a cheap/easy means of detecting if the radio will stay within its maximum deviation.  If they can have a 20 minute conversation and not hear any deviation, the radios are performing very well.  If they don't get the full 6 minutes of transmit before hearing a deviation, then there is a problem.
 
I said that BTechs are junk because I have owned several mobile radios that failed within days/hours of ownership.  I never mentioned the models, how I used them or what their duty cycle is rated for.
 
Just to be sure there is no confusion....
 
I had two UV-50x2's which are rated for 100% duty cycle to build poor man repeaters (also has all remote control features built into it for remote management).  I was only using them as mobile ham radios with light-duty use.  They both broke extremely quickly while used, literally, for initial testing and configuration.  Both radios had less than 20 minutes of total transmit time.
 
The reason I think the handhelds are junk is because they are built with cheap plastic that has basically zero impact resistance.  Also the transmit audio quality is terrible.  For the same price as the BTech, I can buy something like an iCom or another mainstream, amazing performer that is also durable.  The fact that the BTech units drifted a bit after the duty cycle was exceeded was never a consideration in my opinion of the handhelds.
 
If you had good luck... God bless you.  I haven't.  I think after using radio's for work, recreation, and working in Electronics and IT for 27+ years, I'm pretty well experienced enough to develop a opinion on what is junk.  You are welcome to disagree and have your own opinions based on your experiences, but please don't put words in my mouth.

I never even looked at the Tech test and passed on the first try. I am taking my General soon and was able to pass the test without studying.
 
Here is a good resource to prep for the Amateur Tech test  https://www.eham.net/exams/

I never even looked at the Tech test and passed on the first try. I am taking my General soon and was able to pass the test without studying.
 
Here is a good resource to prep for the Amateur Tech test  https://www.eham.net/exams/

One visit from a FCC field officer and your $24 dollar radio may end up costing you $2400... 

Rick,
 
Don't expect to many people to admit to breaking the law on an internet forum. Here is my thoughts, the Baofeng and its many knock offs are junk. The radios sound like crap, cause adjacent channel interference and preform poorly in the real world. Now I know all the Baofeng fans will come in out in full force to defend this junk and I will never know why. Even the beloved Btec GMRSV1 fails to maintain its frequency stability if you TX long enough to exceed the 5% duty cycle. You get what you pay for with radio gear, if you buy a 20 dollar radio its going to work like a 20 dollar radio. I have several users on my repeaters that use them and to be honest I plan to start revoking permission because of the poor audio and signal quality.
 
Corey

Corey, yur just mean.
 
Some of the Chinese junk is good junk, and some of it is bad junk.
 
Hmmm, I have some of the good junk and some of the bad (American labeled , you know who I mean) junk.
 
Yup, yur just mean.
 
Thank you for being honest and politically incorrect. !!,
 
Keith T

I owned 2 Baofeng ham radios for a combined total of 2 weeks. I wouldn't give one to someone I don't like, because its too cruel.
 
Do yourself a favor and forget they exist.
 
Just my opinion.

Rick,
 
Don't expect to many people to admit to breaking the law on an internet forum. Here is my thoughts, the Baofeng and its many knock offs are junk. The radios sound like crap, cause adjacent channel interference and preform poorly in the real world. Now I know all the Baofeng fans will come in out in full force to defend this junk and I will never know why. Even the beloved Btec GMRSV1 fails to maintain its frequency stability if you TX long enough to exceed the 5% duty cycle. You get what you pay for with radio gear, if you buy a 20 dollar radio its going to work like a 20 dollar radio. I have several users on my repeaters that use them and to be honest I plan to start revoking permission because of the poor audio and signal quality.
 
Corey

Rick,
 
Don't expect to many people to admit to breaking the law on an internet forum. Here is my thoughts, the Baofeng and its many knock offs are junk. The radios sound like crap, cause adjacent channel interference and preform poorly in the real world. Now I know all the Baofeng fans will come in out in full force to defend this junk and I will never know why. Even the beloved Btec GMRSV1 fails to maintain its frequency stability if you TX long enough to exceed the 5% duty cycle. You get what you pay for with radio gear, if you buy a 20 dollar radio its going to work like a 20 dollar radio. I have several users on my repeaters that use them and to be honest I plan to start revoking permission because of the poor audio and signal quality.
 
Corey

Taking the lack of understanding of the rules out of the picture for a second... I think it's being discussed in GMRS groups because of channel sharing with FRS.  I also think there is a lot of confusion due to the name "Family Radio Service".  The name implies that it is for use by families, not businesses. 
 
Lets be honest... most people live by the concept of "when all else fails, read the directions."  If purpose and rules are occasionally misinterpreted by the people trying to understand by reading them... you can imagine that people who don't, would be exponentially more confused.
 
Just a thought anyway.

at 138 miles  apart I would say co-channel would be more of a given.

Food for thought.
 
https://www.wired.com/2007/06/w-wifi-record-2/
 
I have done long range wifi with a set of $3000 ubiquity air fiber dual dish +45db gain set up, 41 miles is as far as I got. Internet is the best option over a 100 miles. You can't dispute the science of a link this long, telcos used huge feed horns 20' wide, 200' in the air and 6" wave guide with over a million in infrastructure to build and maintain a single microwave links 100 miles. The FCC won't licence a path that long. I link several sites together using cellular internet, at 15 bucks a site it will take years to over come the cost of a WIFI or microwave link. Don't waste your money, trust the science, 160 mile link cost effectively is a total pipe dream..... If you do the math the aiming of a link 160 miles apart would need to have an accuracy of .005 of an inch or roughly the width of a human hair, good luck maintaining that with wind and interference along the path.

I might add that GMRS has tolerances as far as frequency that are far lower then most HAM gear. With GMRS being smack in the middle of the part 90 portion of the band it is important to maintain some type of standard as to not cause interference to the adjacent service. Requiring a type accepted and certified transmitter is the best way to do this. Posted this again just to be clear, I am a HAM but use part 90 gear for UHF and VHF. If the chart below posts you will see that typical HAM banded gear can allow error rates as high as 10ppm, With GMRS being a wide band service in the middle of the narrow banded part part 90 service its important to use certified transmitters. I have had plenty of HAM gear on my Aeroflex 2975, very little would pass 2.5ppm tolerance. 
 
http://mwgmrs.com/mygmrs/error.jpg

I might add that GMRS has tolerances as far as frequency that are far lower then most HAM gear. With GMRS being smack in the middle of the part 90 portion of the band it is important to maintain some type of standard as to not cause interference to the adjacent service. Requiring a type accepted and certified transmitter is the best way to do this.

Motorola gear is a pain to get programming software for but not impossible. I can take a week or longer to navigate Motorola's process but in the end you will have legal software and you can get the entitlement for wideband operation for free after some quick online training. I use Motorola for the options alone, in the truck I run handheld control heads and a long range Bluetooth speaker mic so I can use the trucks radio well in restaurants our friends houses. The same mic is also on my base paired with a desktop mic, its nice being able to go anywhere in the house and just carry a small mic that allows the use of the base. This gear is a little pricey but can be found used on ebay reasonable, its all comes down to personal preference.
 
Bluetooth Mic that can be attached to most of the newer Motorola XPR radios including portables.
 
http://mwgmrs.com/mygmrs/handmic.jpg
 
This is the handheld control head, it is also the speaker and mic, 4 years old an not a single issue.
 
http://mwgmrs.com/mygmrs/truck1.jpg
 
Radio Head unit is installed under the back seat.
 
http://mwgmrs.com/mygmrs/truck2.jpg
 
The control head cable comes thru the map pocket allowing it to tuck away nicely out of sight.
 
http://mwgmrs.com/mygmrs/truck4.jpg
 
Simple 1/4 wave gives great performance, i am able to hit repeaters 30 miles away and simplex 10 miles easy in the freeway.
 
http://mwgmrs.com/mygmrs/truck3.jpg

Lets just go for the APX 8000 4 Bands in 1 Radio: 7/800 MHz, VHF and UHF even includes P25.
 
For the guy that had everything
 
​Its only a second mortgage away!

I had assumed the first couple of responses had adequately addressed the original post. But, that seems to not be the case. So, I will give it a try... 
#1) GMRS and Amateur radio are two completely separate services with different applications, users and purposes. In particular, the US Amateur Radio service is based on International agreements:
#2) As the FCC made clear in its response to the 2014 petition, allowing non-certified radios to be used in the GMRS "would allow for the proliferation of home-built, non-standardized transmitters in the GMRS, with no practicable way for the Commission to monitor and enforce regulatory compliance for these devices." Further, allowing licensed amateurs to operate non-certified equipment in the GMRS would provide special privileges for users of one service operating in another, completely unrelated, service. This would be an extremely slippery slope, one any regulatory agency would want to avoid.
 
#3) Amateur Radio and GMRS each have their place in the world. I believe the FCC made the right decision. Blurring the boundary between the two would not result in any real benefit for anyone and might cause a lot of problems for both services.
 
#4) If you really want/must use ham gear on GMRS, go ahead, nobody is really going to stop you. Take responsibility for your action and operate accordingly. Just do not expect the FCC to officially condone your actions.

Hello and welcome, not sure about your location, I have a wide area repeater in IL, follow the link in my signature below for more details.

I might add that GMRS has tolerances as far as frequency that are far lower then most HAM gear. With GMRS being smack in the middle of the part 90 portion of the band it is important to maintain some type of standard as to not cause interference to the adjacent service. Requiring a type accepted and certified transmitter is the best way to do this.

I might add that GMRS has tolerances as far as frequency that are far lower then most HAM gear. With GMRS being smack in the middle of the part 90 portion of the band it is important to maintain some type of standard as to not cause interference to the adjacent service. Requiring a type accepted and certified transmitter is the best way to do this.

I might add that GMRS has tolerances as far as frequency that are far lower then most HAM gear. With GMRS being smack in the middle of the part 90 portion of the band it is important to maintain some type of standard as to not cause interference to the adjacent service. Requiring a type accepted and certified transmitter is the best way to do this.

I might add that GMRS has tolerances as far as frequency that are far lower then most HAM gear. With GMRS being smack in the middle of the part 90 portion of the band it is important to maintain some type of standard as to not cause interference to the adjacent service. Requiring a type accepted and certified transmitter is the best way to do this.

GMRS is for families. No test, covers your whole family. No tinkering, grab a pre programmed radio and go.
 
The downside is that the FCC limits the equipment that can be used to prevent people from plugging numbers into a radio and causing interference.
 
There would be a lot more confusing regulations to follow if the FCC started putting all kinds of equipment exceptions for various other services, which then creates more problems than it was trying to solve for a family jist grabbing a set of radios and going.
 
My wife and kids are not interested in Amateur radio. This allows us all to communicate with few issues.

Why does every new license holder want to setup a repeater? I would like to shed a little light on some of the important things to consider if you recently got your GMRS license and now want your own repeater.
 
First thing to consider, are there any open well placed repeaters in your area that you are able to use? I can assure you most repeater owners want people to use there repeater. Owning several repeaters I can assure you all are welcome and encouraged to use my machines.
 
Do you have access to a location to host your repeater? If your answer is your garage roof you should reconsider. Your garage roof will give you about the same coverage as simplex. Unless you’re on top of a mountain and all your users are at the bottom you will never be happy with this setup.
 
GMRS is not as popular as one would like to think, unless your repeater covers 20 miles or more you may find you only have 1 or 2 users in the area. Unless you already have a group of friends together you may want to consider this before spending money on a decent well positioned site to install your repeater.
 
So you found a nice high site and the price is right, all you need to do is get the repeater installed, sounds simple right? Some thigs to consider first and foremost are the costs because they can add up quickly. Are you on a commercial tower that requires a license and bonded climber? If so this could be by far your largest expense depending on your area. I have spent $600 to $1200 on a climber; I have had quotes as high as $2500 depending on the amount of work and heights involved.  Keep in mind commercial sites require certified mounts, hard line cable, cable clamps, engineered grounding solutions and commercial grade antennas. No tower owner is going to let you install a comet antenna and 200’ of braided shield coax.
 
This brings me to my next point, the antenna. Because of the costs involved with climbers you will want to expend your budget on the antenna. Remember a $2000 repeater on a $200 antenna is going to work about as good as a $200 repeater.  Whereas a $200 repeater on a $2000 antenna is going to work like a $2000 repeater. On my first repeater I was gifted use of a 150’ tower, I installed a DB-420 on the top and 160’ of 7/8 hardline. Total cost of equipment for the antenna install was $2500, with the climbers labor coming in at an additional $800. This left me with enough to purchase an old Motorola R100 repeater running at 25W. To my surprise it had 30 miles of coverage, all due to the cash spent on the antenna and waiting for a decent spot.
 
Things happen, more so if you have an antenna 200’ in the air with a conductive cable connected to sensitive electronics. Antenna issues, feedline issues, repeater issues all cost money and I promise at some point you will have issues that need repair and require your money!
 
It is my opinion that the GMRS community does not need another 2 to 5 miles repeater as it just becomes background noise. What use is a public listed repeater if somebody in a mobile can’t use it 5 miles away while moving or the portable coverage is only a mile? If after reading this you are still going to build a repeater for your garage more power to you, just don’t expect 20 people to show up if it only reaches a mile.
 
As the owner of several GMRS and Commercial repeaters I can attest to the amount of money and effort go into my repeaters. I have only touched on the basics, if you add in any kind of testing services, duplexer tuning, addition of a combiner channel to an existing tower system, RF engineering, rent and insurance your costs can sky rocket. The best advice I can give any new licensee is to try and use the available systems in the area. Take the time to learn a little about what you’re doing and to assess the usability of the service before investing in a repeater for the sole reason of saying you own one.