SteveShannon

Look, connecting your radio to any 12 volt source is unlikely to damage the radio, but connecting a 50 watt radio to a source that can is fused for 10 amps might fry the fuse. Not all 50 watt radios require more than 10 amps. Some are more efficient than others and get by with about 9 amps, others use as much as 11 amps. As far as that “jump pack” I don’t know anything about it.

It wouldn’t be user replaceable. It’s probably a surface mounted LED next to the edge of the LCD. And it might not have failed anyway. If possible return it for warranty service.

The only person well enough known to be upvoted or downvoted just because of “who they are” is Randy, and for the most part I don’t think many (if any) people have downvoted him because of that. SoCalGMRS gets downvoted because of how he treats others, not because of who he is. If he stopped treating others that way the downvotes would quickly cease. It’s that simple.

And certainly not in social media, the bastion of genteel behavior, patience, and selflessness.

Just get a Cat 5 or Cat 6 extension cable: https://a.co/d/fJtoY4p

And secret upvotes as well.

I believe that would not be permitted by the FCC’s interpretation of the regulations.

That’s really an expensive, inefficient, and possibly inadequate solution. First, it’s fuse limited to 10 amps DC at 12 volts, so it possibly won’t work for some 50 watt radios. Of course you could use it to power your radio by plugging a switch mode power supply into the AC outlet but then you’re accepting the inefficiency of the inverter to produce 120 volts AC and also the inefficiency of the switch mode power supply. So you lose several percent of the energy in the battery. Just get a decent LiFePo4 battery and put it in a plastic ammo box. Or buy a ready made one that isn’t designed around a 10 amp fuse.

So which was it, very manly or extremely manly?

Read and write from/to CSV files, import frequencies from external sources such as Repeaterbook; copy, paste, channels like working in a spreadsheet. RT Systems does all that too. Also, save a file with the OEM software, then change the frequency ranges of the radio and try to write the software to the radio, even though the channels you’ve programmed are well within the range you chose. It won’t work. It will with RT Systems and I bet it will with Chirp. The OEM software is worse than simple; it’s bad.

Showing respect for another person’s life is not weird. Now if you start fixating on it, that’s another story. One thing about the Anytone; if the call sign is just used for the splash screen that’s okay, but if you use the radio on DMR you’ll want/need to change the DMR ID to your own before transmitting.

Many people equate Morse Code and CW. Some of us protest that they are different when people use the terms interchangeably, sometimes because we are being pedantic. I’m guilty of that, but because you asked I hope you’ll forgive me for trying to explain it in a way that is hopefully interesting. I’m on the road, woke up early, and I think the difference is interesting. A radio signal, at its most basic form is just an electromagnetic wave at a particular frequency, with almost no bandwidth. The simplest transmitter is an oscillator driving electrical power of a single frequency into a wire. That single frequency of RF contains absolutely no information. It’s just there when it’s on and not there when it’s off. But because it concentrates all that RF power into a single frequency, it’s easily transmitted by a very simple device and easily received with yet another simple device. That is the “Continuous Wave” or CW, a pure frequency of a single frequency that can travel far with very little power. And although you hear tones at the transmitter and receiver ends, there is no actual audible tone being transmitted. The audible tone is created just for the convenience of the operators at the transmitter and receiver. Samuel F. B. Morse had already developed a way to use DC electricity to transmit messages on the telegraph by turning current on and off in the familiar pattern that’s now called Morse Code. By applying that same code to turn on and off the continuous wave the earliest actual form of radio communications was implemented. So to pedantic purists like myself there truly is a distinct difference between CW and Morse Code. One is the medium. The other is the encoding that allows us to communicate the message. But because CW is almost never used for anything other than conveying Morse Code, the two terms have become interchangeable for most people.

I don’t think you have to be a ham to use the NTS. You just need to know hams who can help you use NTS.

There’s always the National Traffic System. https://www.arrl.org/nts Volunteers relay messages from point to point every day. It doesn’t get much use these days but we have a daily net designed to accept and deliver traffic. There’s also WinLink, which many of us use and which works like email for hams.

I can’t speak for the Admiral, but to me choosing “Scan for Tones” from the menu seems automatic. I don’t know how much more automatic it could be.

Record it and post it here. Someone will decipher it. (Still not me )

It could be anything. What does the Morse code say?

Chirp does remarkably well for being non-commercial software. If it was available for all of my radios I might never have switched to RT Systems. And I will not say that RT Systems has worked perfectly. I’ve run across a few problems with RT Systems when programming DMR code plugs, which admittedly is an order of magnitude more complicated than typical analog radios. But their DMR calculator makes it much easier and when I have had a problem I have been very impressed by RT Systems willingness to thoroughly discuss and understand every issue that I have reported. Having RT Systems available for my db20g radios really made the difference for me though. I really like this radio and Chirp isn’t available for this radio.

I agree with Gil (wruu653). I’m curious what you disagree about. Do you disagree that the conditions of clauses must both be true (the literal and logical meaning word “and” at the end of the first clause), otherwise the repeater must transmit station identification? Do you disagree with our interpretation that the condition of the first clause is satisfied only if the people using the repeater are people using the license of the repeater owner? Literally “stations operating under the authority of the individual license under which it operates”. Do you disagree that the condition of the second clause is satisfied only if all people using the repeater follow the rules regarding identifying when they use the repeater? Or do you disagree on some other basis? Enhanced Content - Paragraph Tools URL https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/part-95#p-95.1751(c) Citation 47 CFR 95.1751(c) : c. Any GMRS repeater station is not required to transmit station identification if: (1) It retransmits only communications from GMRS stations operating under authority of the individual license under which it operates; and, (2) The GMRS stations whose communications are retransmitted are properly identified in accordance with this section.

Your repeater isn’t required to ID if and only if the only people who use it are people you have authorized to use your call sign and they identify correctly. If anyone with a different call sign uses your repeater, the repeater must be IDed. You can certainly do that manually and it definitely doesn’t have to be Morse code, but the repeater must be identified. Morse just happens to be built in for some controllers. Personally I prefer English language IDs also.

Welcome to the forum. Does the RICK controller have an ID function? The ID can be your call sign in Morse code if it’s easier. The RepeaterID breakout board can be used with the RepeaterID for use with “surplus repeaters” according to the website.

Okay, 55 years ago it was $20, then it was reduced to $4 (that was when I first considered getting a license because $20 was way too much!) The point is that the government has no problem reducing the cost of the license, even to zero.

Not really. CB licenses were $20 each 50 years ago when $20 was a lot of money. Then they lowered it to $4, perhaps hoping to entice more people to get legal.

Absolutely nothing prevents any person from simply buying a full power GMRS radio and using it unlicensed, thereby avoiding whatever gatekeeper challenge “programming a ham radio” might provide.

Yes, it’s possible. They’ve asked us for suggestions for simplifying regulations. Most (by far) of the people who use GMRS now don’t have licenses. One way to simplify this would be to combine FRS and GMRS into a single unlicensed service like FRS is today.