SteveShannon

If you’re a ham and want to listen, but don’t have a DMR radio you can register with RadioID to get a Brandmeister ID and then log into Brandmeister and listen to any talk group using the Hoseline feature.

The net controller from Hawaii did come on and speak briefly about how Maui needs help, but he didn’t go into detail. I was their last check-in. I think I’ll go see if there are Hawaii related DMR talk groups I can monitor.

I’m listening to the California Hawaii Pacific net on 14.340 MHz. They’re just now doing check-ins. The net controller is in Hawaii but hasn’t been talking about Maui, at least while I’ve been listening.

Thanks for helping folks.

if you're a ham, you won't be able to help regular folks with radios. Apparently you assume that hams don’t have FRS or better yet GMRS radios, like “regular folks”.

How do you know you’re not transmitting any sound?

Please explain how having their radios MARS/CAP modded is necessary to coordinate with friends with personal radios.

Good luck in your quest. I read the title and thought it was about the new Kenwood handheld which has a very similar name TH D75A:

The GMRS Pro handheld radio is capable of sharing its GPS location with other GMRS Pro hand held radios. I think the OP is asking if there are mobile radios that are compatible with the location sharing feature. @FreqieRadio: Digital data, such as location data may only be transmitted by handheld portable according to the GMRS regulations: (d)Digital data.GMRS hand-held portable units may transmit digital data containing location information, or requesting location information from one or more other GMRS or FRS units, or containing a brief text message to another specific GMRS or FRS unit.

No, 65 is not the same as 165N. Unfortunately some of the manufacturers have included non-standard digital codes. Scroll all the way to the bottom of the list. About the “N”, that means normal. If you see an “I” it means that the bits of the code are inverted. There’s also a document “out there” that reveals equivalent codes. It has been attached to forum posts in the past. You might find it in the files section.

This should really be in the amateur radio forum rather than here, but I agree mostly with you. I think it’s a matter of training for all users. It’s a reflection of the fact that technician class opens up two bands to people with the least training. There are calling frequencies for digital modes and most DMR traffic is on UHF, rather than VHF, but people do make mistakes and sometimes our smart radios don’t always help. I had to turn off automatic mode detection on my FT5DR to avoid accidental transmissions using C4FM. It’s also indicative that people are misusing the 2 meter national calling frequency as an emergency frequency. If a person is going somewhere where they might need emergency communications they should probably get a PLB of some kind. For those interested in a discussion of simplex frequencies and digital modes, here is a page listing the simplex frequencies for digital voice modes: https://0x9900.com/dmr-or-c4fm-simplex-frequencies/

Good job!

PL was Motorola’s term for CTCSS, which is an analog tone that’s sent to open the squelch on the radio you’re trying to reach. It stands for Private Line, but it doesn’t mean your conversation won’t be heard. Look in your manual for CTCSS. There’s a similar feature called DPL for Digital Private Line. It’s commonly called DCS or DTCSS.

Welcome! I hope you enjoy it!

Try menu #19, sub channel display

Are those areas where they “shouldn’t be using it” frequencies that have already identified for use somehow, such as the National calling frequency 146.520, or do they violate the area band plan? If not, a person with a digital radio (Fusion, DMR, or D*Star) has just as much right to use the frequency as anyone else.

YES, assuming the repeater uses DCS, the “input tone” for the repeater is T-DCS on your radio, the tone that you must transmit. For the receive side you must either program the right receive tone or code OR tell your radio to not require a tone or code. That can be helpful when first starting. In that case your radio reproduces everything received on that frequency.

You referred to it as an antenna, but the rest of your question seems to indicate it might be a tower. I’ll answer it as if it is an antenna. My answer would be different for a tower. A picture of the antenna might help, but the things that come to mind first are as follows: First I would put an antenna analyzer on it to see if it’s resonant anywhere close to the GMRS range of frequencies. Channels 2-13 were VHF (30-300 MHz), not UHF (300-3000 MHz). The UHF channels may have been covered by antenna also, but most TV antennas were targeted at VHF. Second, TV antennas were designed to be 75 ohm. Most two way radio antennas are 50 ohm. That’s not a bad problem, but may require some ingenuity. Third, the structure of this antenna might be usable as a tower to raise a GMRS antenna. That might be a useful thing! Good luck!

There’s no GMRS repeater here. For 2 meter 146.940, 100 Hz tone, -0.600 MHz offset (146.340 xmit) is probably the most monitored channel. It can be reached beginning at about Dillon. Drive safely.

That’s what I did.

As a condition of buying this tower the guy insisted that I take a Mosley TA-33 antenna, no extra charge. Unfortunately, it exceeds the boom length that Rohn specifies for this tower, which is 10 feet as you said. I haven’t decided on anything else yet. I know I will probably also use it to support a wire antenna and possibly some side arms with VHF and UHF vertical antennas.

Yeah, but once I looked at it I knew I was going to buy it. The galvanizing and the tower is all in good shape and it was $400. I probably would never buy a new tower of the same model because they sell for several thousand dollars.

Those are good ideas. I agree about the base. My original plan when I bought this was to buy the base, dig the necessary hole, and pour the concrete. It was only after looking at all the boulders that are much larger than the block of concrete that I started pondering attaching directly to one. I like the mat foundation as well. That’s sort of what I was wondering if I could do. Rohn no longer makes this particular tower but another company took over manufacturing it, including all of the various pieces. They sell the bases and they also sell the tower sections, so if I wanted to purchase a new #7 section and #8 section to build a 64 foot tower I could. I think I can call them and ask questions, too. I might try that.

The more I look into this the better I understand (yes, it would have been better to understand all of this before buying my first tower, but that’s just how I’m wired, I guess. ) The way they built this series of towers was with a series of tapered eight foot sections numbered #1 through #8. #1 is the smallest, measuring 7 3/4”. Each section is about 2 inches wider than the one above it. Depending on which series of sections you bought, you could assemble them as a tower from 32 foot to 64 foot. That means you could assemble six of the eight foot sections in three different ways to form a 48 foot tower. The strength of the tower depends on whether you use the #1, #2, or #3 section as the top piece: Sections 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 could be assembled as a BX48. That’s the lightest 48 foot tower in the line. It can handle 120 pounds in thrust and a six square foot area antenna. But, if you use sections 2 through 7, with #2 as the top and the #7 as the bottom, you end up with a slightly larger (in girth) tower that’s 9+inches across at the top, the DBX 48. That’s capable of handling 240 pounds in thrust and 12 square feet. So, if you use the #3 section as the top and the #8 at the bottom, you end up with a tower that’s greater than 11 inches at the top and capable of handling 360 pounds of thrust (dead weight) and an area of 18 square feet. Another way to look at this is that I could assemble the sections to form an HDBX32, a DBx40, or a BX48. And it’s also important to realize that even though each section is eight feet long, because you lose four inches of overlap at each joint, the actual length of a BX48 assembled is about 46 feet. But however you assemble the pieces, you assemble them to a four foot long bottom section which is embedded into a block of reinforced concrete. The bottom section, whether it’s a #6 (in my case) or #7 or #8, is assembled to the base piece before the concrete is poured. It must be kept plumb so you have a vertical tower. Finally, the reason I replied to this particular previous post: my tower only has two bolt holes for each of the bottoms of the three legs. That’s all that the #6 section has when attaching to the base. Only the #7 and #8 sections have three bolt holes at the bottom of each leg where they bolt to the base. Based on the little bit of rust inside it, that third hole that is present on one of the legs was drilled after the galvanizing process. I will apply some kind of cold galvanizing treatment to it.

In researching this better I’ve discovered it’s a BX48, not the heavier duty HDBX48. That doesn’t bother me. It means that I am more limited in the antenna I mount. The HDBX48 was rated for an antenna that weighs 120 lbs and has an area of 6 square feet. The HDBX would have handled 360 lbs and 18 square feet.