PACNWComms

I only fly quad-copters for pleasure, and to get video and pictures of the area immediately around me. For me, if it becomes work, then the pleasure often fades very quickly. I was about to get into the Part 107, but work intervened. One of my radio warehouses became a swarming drone test building. Large fans were installed, curtains to contain parts of the building hung, and the sprinkler system was re-tooled to allow it to "rain" when wanted in various parts of the building. This is a three story building that looks like an Amazon fulfillment center (there are several in the area, and I think that was part of the idea [security through obscurity]). Great video by the way. Great to see yours following you down the road.Great video quality and stability.

Welcome OP, and glad to see others learn new things radio related. As for troublemakers, we are probably all in that list somewhere at some time, to include here in online forums. You will find a lot of information along with opinion, just look into the source a bit and you will figure out whom to trust. Good luck in here and with radio, whether that be amateur, GMRS, or CB (US AM [ok now also FM] 1970's "Convoy" style).

I voted "No" as having a dual band VHF/UHF antenna on the corner of my vehicles, I get lots of notice from people that are either amateur and/or GMRS radio users at many stop lights. The antenna is enough of a "beacon" and all interactions have been cordial so far. Very different from when I drive my plain white Chevy Tahoe work vehicle, that looks way too much like an un-marked State Patrol vehicle at times. Everyone slows down, gets out of my way, as the antenna configuration is very similar. So is the winch mount on the front bumper. I ask for company logos on the side doors often, and my employer owns the vehicles (they are not leased which could be a valid excuse for some), as corporate does not wish to "junk up" company vehicles with stickers.

I know some companies within the oil industry that tried to go cheaper, buying Hytera radios instead of Motorola DMR gear, and now they can't send broken radios in for repair, nor purchase replacements from Hytera. In recent conversations with some of my former co-workers in that industry, they even bought some of the Hikvision IP cameras that are also banned in this FCC release as well. Hikvision cameras often get rebranded as many other vendor's product, which makes them harder to identify unless you have the product in hand to look deeper.

Note, Grainger is making this right, as they should have checked these batteries as well before they were sold. IMPRES batteries are "smart" batteries that work with "smart" IMPRES style chargers, but when every battery has the same chip and serial number, it confuses the charger, hence odd charging/discharging/cycling actions taking place.

For those that enjoy using the Motorola XPR3xxx/7xxx/e series radios, here is one cautionary note. I had a group that wanted to buy new Motorola batteries but did not like the price or the delivery time, about 3-5 months wait to get them. So, instead they purchased two dozen batteries, what they thought were Motorola PMNN4409AR 7.4V Lithium-Ion batteries. They purchased these through Grainger, as someone in the group had a construction company and an account with them. Knowing that I often use a XPR7550e radio for GMRS, and working with radios for years, they asked me why the batteries often did not take a charge. Or the charger acted odd when the batteries were placed into them (single cup Motorola IMPRES charger and 6-bank versions). Users in this group said some batteries would charge, but maybe not charge all the way the next day. This was a group that was interested in starting their own community emergency response type of team. On a whim, I asked if the serial numbers were all the same on the batteries? they said they did not recall seeing serial numbers. I told them to look closer. They gathered half of the batteries and checked them. They all had the same serial number. Luckily, the person with the Grainger account was a good customer, and they will be checking this from whomever they purchased these from as well. Motorola batteries should all have a unique serial number.

Nice. Bought a Motorola XPR7550e after using an older XPR6550 for a while, but that needed to be hex edited due to the band split. I have many other radios I could use, with an Anytone 878 Plus being one of them. The only good thing that seems to add though is VHF capability. The XPR7550e also comprises the bulk of what I often support for work, so using a 7550e for GMRS just seems natural. Nice to see others going with a high-end radio that is very selective and sensitive RF wise.

My cheapest solution in the past for me was to use two Motorola CDM-1250 mobiles, and repeater interface "cable" from online auction sites. Using cheap magnet mount antennas and placing onto a desk was a cheap solution. These then ended up getting expensive after placing everything into a Pelican case, adding in Optima deep cycle marine batteries, Comprod antennas, high end tripod mounts for the antennas, and coax.

That is an option. Although, I must admit, I am very biased again all 5xxx series Kenwood radios. I used to be an engineer within the JVC/Kenwood Group.....and my current employer has NX53xx radios as part of a confined space radio project. I prefer Motorola (or in reality Harris military) radios over Kenwood/EFJohnson/Viking with only a few exceptions for several reasons. Kenwood has tried to do too much via software in the 5xxx line of radios, and you must be very careful hardware/software wise, that you get what you want when you buy the radio. Many municipalities for example could not afford P25, but grant money only flows for P25 capable radios. So, Kenwood said they would offer P25 as an add on option at a later date. When that time came, the radios needed to be sent back for an additional hardware module, so they could then be software updated for P25 capability. Kenwood and other parts of the "Group" hired to many Microsoft software engineers that thought you could update everything like a laptop computer, and most lacked any radio, dispatch, telephony, or even amateur radio experience. Majke sure you get what you want on the "NX" path, or you may get burned, more so if you buy hundreds at a time. (Might apply or not, this is a GMRS forum after all, if you only get one or two used units at a huge discounted price).

Definitely high end and will cover VHF and UHF,.....I just received 13 of these for work. Christmas came early, along with three APX8000XE handhelds. What did not show up was batteries, single chargers, antennas, belt clips, and the six bank charger for the APX8000XE's as Motorola is making the expensive items first. My employer does not pay on purchase orders until all line items arrive, they may get paid six month's from now at this rate.

That's funny. More like me thinking out loud. Even though I maintain a large radio network, I myself rarely even carry a radio unless I am troubleshooting. Many users are firefighters with speaker mics and holsters.....which would be radiating into the thigh or waistline, great joke. I do have some paranoid security workers too, former cops that had X-band radar on their lap in previous lives.....they think everything will make them sterile.

Many of "my" portable radios used in the professional environment are issued with remote speaker mics, and belt hosters.....so the exposure of RF to the head is minimized, as the radio is further away from a user's head. To me, this means exposure levels for users that operate the radio for work and use it in that regard, police, firefighters, medics and similar users, do not get enough exposure to have FCC RF exposure limits exceeded. It is probably buried deep inside of this link's information somewhere. https://www.fcc.gov/general/radio-frequency-safety-0 However, I do also often demonstrate that there is power in handheld radios by keying up 800 MHz P25 radios near bathroom paper towel dispensers, where they then dispense paper towels when I key the radio. For office workers using UHF Trbo based radios instead, many Plantronics headsets and earpieces go "off mute" when a Trbo UHF radio is keyed near them. The user may not get a headache, but I do not recommend keying the radio for long periods of time (the Timeout Timer is set to default of 60 seconds) and show that it is a good thing to use a remote speaker mic. They do transmit more than a cell phone, and some users are still scared of those in 2022. Occupational use to me means someone who is not using it for a hobby, on a workday basis of 5/5/90 model transmit/receive/standby, five days a week, and 8-12 hours per day. Where a hobbyist may be using it a lot more, or considerably less (depending on how much into the hobby the person is).....I know a lot of people that just listen, and never talk back or radio check anyone. Those types will not get as much exposure. then you have the "rag chewers"......on the other end of the spectrum. If anyone finds out what the FCC really means on this, it would be nice to know the details, I just do not have the patience for digging.

Excellent point. This made me check some of my radio gear, with the XPR6550 radio label on the left and the newer XPR7550e label on the right. Occupational Use to Satisfy FCC RF Exposure Limits. The XPR6550 is considerably older than the XPR7550e in this case, but had the same type of label, whereas the older XTS1500 did not have a label like this. Not shown is also the APX4000 that does have the occupational use label, like the two Motorola Trbo radios, so it might have been ten years or so for this tag to be present (at least for Motorola manufactured radios, do not have any other brand next to me right now to verify).

Good to know, I like my current DB-20G and may get another one at the $85 price point. Thank you all for sharing the deals going on.

This reminded me one of my own Garmin Rino units, and the field repairs many of us did when the antennas did come off in the field (using them in Afghanistan to keep track of team members, with the caveat that location polling was turned off/radio was turned off when we did not want to be sending data). this was a check and balance to the AN/PSM-11 GPS before the newer DAGR series came out. Many Garmin Rino's that had broken antennas, 120 and 530 models, often ended up with a retrofitted longer antenna. In my case, I just jammed the rubber cover with black Permatex and sealed it back up. Then when the rubber itself broke, it got the heat shrink with polyolefin sealant fix. Part of the failure on these is that many of us pulled the radios out of a molle case by its radio antenna, so the cover would pull off eventually. Do not pull radios out of pouches by the antenna. Somewhere online someone may have posted a Garmin Rino with a longer antenna fitted, but I could not find one myself. Better than throwing the unit away and new models come so fast support from Garmin often ends after 2-3 years.

Note on 100/500 series Garmin Rino's and texting notes, from the Garmin site. Note the firmware of the device, as some will not be able to send notes/text messages. Sending a Text Message Using a Rino 100 or Rino 500 Series Text messages, known as Notes, can be sent from one compatible Rino device to another compatible Rino device*. In order for the notes to be sent properly all Rino's that are supposed to receive the message must be on the same Channel and Code. To send a Note to another Rino user using a Rino 100 or Rino 500 series: Press Page to reach the Map page Select the icon of the user you wish to message with the thumb stick Press and hold the thumb stick until a menu appears Select Send Note Edit a new note or select from the saved notes in the list below Select Send If there is no option to send notes, ensure that the device firmware is up to date by downloading and running the WebUpdater program. *Rino 120 devices were manufactured with two different versions of software. The devices with software 3.90 or less do not offer the Notes feature. Users with software 3.90 or less will not be able to update to the 5.XX software that does offer the Notes feature.

+1 on what Sshannon said, willing to test. I have Rino 120 and 530 units that work together as they are both Garmin products but have yet to have another model that texts to test out. They work well for texting, because a short data burst often gets through where voice will not be clear. I'm just glad that Garmin cracked that egg with the FCC years ago, text and location data for showing position on a map, can be useful.

In my part of the Pacific Northwest, flaggers often still do use FRS as well. Which has also thrown off some Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) types that push for the use of FRS for neighborhood emergency response. In some larger cities, this prompted many corporations to purchase the now older Motorola 900 MHz ISM band DTR series radios (DTR410/550/650). However, even with the DTR series radios, most are defaulted to the channels/TalkGroups/Privacy code (hopset) settings as shipped from the factory. I still hear tugboats from a nearby river, schools and construction crews now using both FRS and DTR series radios, to include the swearing, personal information, and jabber expected by those types of end users. For the flagging crews though, it is nice to be able to hear how long the backup will be, or when traffic is being allowed in a specific direction. It beats hearing the little kids pressing the "call" button over and over or asking "hellol" on FRS....lol.

If the frequency hopping is like the DTR410/550/650 series radios, the end user programming the radio is only picking the hopset via a unique code entered into each radio. Radios with the same hopset code in them can talk to one another on that channel. The frequencies are the same but the hopset itself changes. A radio going from hopset frequency 1,6,2,4,9,3 cannot talk to a radio with hopset frequency sequence 6,2,3,1,9,4 for example. What I find interesting with the DTR series is that they were often sold as an alternative to FRS/GMRs radios for business use (DTR410/550/650 in 900 MHz ISM band in the United States), but many people kept the default hopset codes that came from the factory. I hear tugboats and construction crews on the default setting often in my part of the Pacific Northwest where UHF comms have been saturated with cheap radios and many users.