Raybestos

Thank You for the input!

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Hi Marc! Not trying to be contrary, although I do have a knack for it at times, but consider the following scenario. Your wife (or any GMRS licensee's wife) is about to take your (or their) kids to visit her parents, four hours away. Your job won't let you off to make this trip with them. She has a GMRS mobile in her car and operates under your license, as your kids occasionally do, also. She has packed enough GMRS ht's to allow one for herself and each of the kids. The kids love exploring the expansive farm their grandparents own and the radios provide a measure of convenience and safety while they are away from the house. You (or any licensee) see what she is doing. You go out to the car and disconnect the microphone from her mobile radio. You also collect all of the GMRS ht's she packed and replace them with non-licensed FRS radios you had laying around from the days before you took the plunge and got into GMRS. She is walking to the car to be sure everything is packed before getting the kids ready to get in the car. She encounters you, walking towards the house; a mobile mic and several GMRS ht's burdening your arms. The dialog that follows goes something like this: Wife: "Where are you going with my mobile mic and the GMRS ht's????" Licensee: "You will be four hours away and 95.1705(f)(2) says "The licensee must maintain access to and control over all stations authorized under its license." Being 4 hours away is definitely not maintaining "access to and control over" the licensee's station. Sorry, but I am not risking the sanctity of my license by trusting you guys with GMRS radios while you are four hours away." Being this is a family-oriented site, I will not go further with the dialog which followed. Yes, this is a reduction to absurdity, but there are some people out there in the world who practice absurdity and practice it often. Going back and reading the original poster's comment, his mom will be using ht's and simplex to communicate with family. I doubt anyone will notice or know if they are using GMRS or FRS since all frequencies are shared, except for repeater inputs. In fact, if they don't use call signs or have a license, I doubt anyone would care on simplex. The only way anyone would probably care is if his mom finds she enjoys chatting on repeaters in the area. In most areas I am aware of, if on a repeater, all the owner(s) cares about is that you are using a valid call sign not pirated from someone without their permission. I know the repeater that I am part owner of, that is all we care about. Of course, there are some really an-l owners out there, too. In my state, there is one guy who I understand, wants to know your name and call, and the names, Unit numbers, and their relation to you, of anyone operating under your call, before granting permission to use his repeaters. In another part of the state, the owner wants to know what make and models of radios you will be using. My group, we just want you to ID and generally follow the rules. Any discrepancies regarding relation to people using your call sign or type of equipment is between you and the FCC, as if they care.

There is a smaller linked system with at least one machine in range of me. If they dropped the linking, I would much more want to join them so I could use their repeaters as stand-alones, rather than listen to the blather from another part of the state.

FWIW, this thing has made my life so much better. https://www.buytwowayradios.com/xlt-rpc-k1-uf.html I am not a computer geek of any sort. I despise them and yes, I know they make us being here, possible. These cables make programming any radio that I don't have RT Systems software for, so much more do-able.

You are right! As a Tech Plus (no longer issued but used to be Technician with 5 WPM code), I finally got my 13 WPM code test behind me. Unfortunately, I had not studied the then current General question pool and failed the written test. I studied the then current General manual and found a VE group about an hour away that was doing testing. Passed the General written test and the VE asked if I wanted to try for Advanced. I hadn't really studied for Advanced but what the hey? Why not? Had I missed one more question, I would have failed, but as it was, I left the session with an Advanced CSCE (Certificate Successful Completion of Element). My plan was to get the 20 WPM code under my belt, then get the Extra written. The FCC had other plans. They dropped Morse for all license classes requiring Morse to 5 WPM. At the same time, they streamlined it to three license classes, Technician, General, and Extra. Some months later they dropped the Morse requirement entirely. I recall the hostility toward Extras who passed only the 5 WPM test, and later, the "No Code Extras". That was one reason I held on to my Advanced for so long. There was no way to have Advanced without having passed 13 WPM and the hostile old pharts knew that. The hostility towards 5 WPM and No Code Extras is wrong. Even if a person studied, practiced, and used, Morse at 30 WPM, there is and has been no vehicle for Morse testing since around the year 2000.

I agree! The three stand-alones, left up and running as such, would probably be an even greater service to their local areas; allowing for three separate conversations to take place at once time, rather than just one.

I know people get tired of hearing it, but Technician is a breeze and General is not really that bad, either. I understand, many are not radio geeks like most of us hams, but all it takes is a little study for a week or few to pass it. I will share a Deep dark secret with you and anyone else that is interested. You don't have to know all of the stuff in the manual, just enough to pass the test. Yeah, Extra is a bit of a b-word, but it can be done, too! I recommend the Gordon West license manuals. He takes what is essentially boring, dry, material and makes it so you can remember it, using humour and other devices. Remember studying boring stuff like history, English, and all, in high school? Studying for a ham license is very close to that, except it is something you already have a little bit of interest in. No more Morse code test. No more drawing schematic diagrams of specific oscillator circuits. It is all multiple choice, and as you did in high school, you will hit questions where common sense and process of elimination will get you through it. For instance: "Profanity is allowed on ham radio: A) At any time. B ) After 10 PM. C) Before 12:00 Noon. D) At no time. Obviously, the answer would be "D". I have always been mathematically bewildered. When I decided it was time to upgrade from Advanced to Extra a dozen or so years ago, I bought a Gordon West "Extra" license manual. I promptly lost it and didn't see it for about a year. About a year later, I happened upon that manual. I looked at it and a little voice inside told me to find out when the next VE testing session would be in my area. It was one week from that day. I studied like crazy. Got to taking lots of online mock tests and trying to learn from my mistakes. The best I made on any of those tests was like a 70-something, failing all of them. Then I decided to actually study the math formulas using Gordon West's book. I was actually learning to make them work, the day before the test. The day of the test, I stopped by Starbucks and got a large iced mocha with extra espresso to keep the brain synapses firing. Brought an extra $14 for a second VE test in case I failed the first one. I took the test and for the life of me, there were a lot of questions I wasn't sure if I got right or wrong. That was one of those tests that do happen, where nothing much seems like what you studied. That is the reason for the extra money, in case you fail the first. Odds are, a second test will be more familiar. After I handed in my test, the examiner asked which I wanted first, the good news or the bad news. I told him I was braced for the bad news and to go with it. He said that if I hadn't missed two questions, I would have had a perfect score. There is stuff on the Technician test that I am not interested in, never really grasped, and never will. But like I said, all you need is enough to pass the test.

For the most part. As SteveShannon correctly noted, there is a small portion of 10m open to Technician. For the 75m and 40m stuff that I mentioned, yes, you need at least a General.

That is the stuff nightmares are made of. I fully expect to wake up screaming, then whimpering, tonight; after reading that. Gee, thanks.

You make a good point. SHTF can take many forms and cover everything from a neighborhood, to the whole country, even the world. If there were a widespread cellular outage lasting days or weeks, I imagine CB radios would start flying off the shelves in affected areas. Believe it or not, they can still get your voice out, and bring others' voices in, just as they did in the 1970's. Something that helps you find a working or stocked gas pump in time of shortage, is as valuable today as it was in 1973. Just knowing you have the means contact another person and ask them to send help; in the event of a vehicular breakdown, collision, or perhaps being targeted by a hostile person or groups of people, could mean a lot. When I talk of ham radio, it is not because I think hams are the greatest, the best, or anything; but the fact that there are a lot more ham repeaters in most places than GMRS, and they usually have greater range, makes it worth mentioning. Although most hams do not participate in it, hams have a neat thing going for them called the National Traffic System or NTS. This consists of long established nets, usually on 75 meters and 40 meters, that handle message "traffic" in the form of brief formatted messages, known as "Radiograms". These nets meet daily or nightly and handle traffic coming into or going out of a given area, coming from or going to another area. Frequently, these messages reach the final recipient in a day or two. In the event of a situation like 9-11, health and welfare messages to loved ones who had no other means of knowing the status of a friend or family member in a disaster area can mean so much. Learning how to format, copy, and relay these messages is an integral part of these hf (shortwave) nets. In an area with a GMRS repeater with good coverage, as with CB, being able to communicate with others and knowing you are not totally alone can be a huge comfort.

Because those on the linked system have no idea about anyone they may be denying access to/interfering with, nor do they give a flip. They have their noisy little toy that lets them pretend they are hams by talking unnaturally long distances, using the same technology that facilitates most long distance calla, VOIP. That is all that matters to them.

I hold my own, too. There was that one time in the bus station restroom when some creepy guy offered to hold it for me. I told him "no thanks".

You would need to set the R-CTCSS and the T-CTCSS to the tone your group is using. Let's say they are using 173.8, for instance. This applies to any of the analog tones. Be sure to "Confirm" by hitting the "Menu" button after the tone is selected on each Menu choice (R-CTCSS and T-CTCSS). If you select a digital tone, then you would put whatever tone your group is using in "R-DCS" and in "T-DCS". For instance, if your group is using "D311N", you would put that tone in both "R-DCS" and "T-DCS". As with analog, be sure to "Confirm" or set the tone in memory by hitting the "Menu" button after selecting the tone for each Menu item. Hope this helps.

Hi Marc! I agree with you about satellite/voting receivers to fill in reception gaps for mobiles and ht's on large footprint repeaters. That really adds no additional interference issue and requires no additional use of scarce bandwidth. I see no harm with that.