WRPD719

I just stopped by the authentic Portillos in Moreno Valley* Monday night and delighted to one of their dipped Italian Beef with Sweet Peppers sandwiches (and a Maxwell Street Polish)!
Just brings back so many memories...
*Riverside County, about 75 miles from my home.

There is no practical way to ground to the soil, but that's ok. Important is to have all your radio equipment grounded to the same ground bus. Your radio, power supply, etc will be at the same "ground" potential, which will be different from the real ground potential. But it is not a big deal. And connect this grounding bus to the building ground, to keep AC protection, as code requires.

You both are 100% correct I believe. 
I just learned that there is a difference between Normal and Inverted DCS tones!  That was my problem.  I had the Rx tone set to an Inverted DCS when the repeater I am trying to hear is on normal DCS.  As soon as I changed it I was about to hear the repeater with the Rx Tone input.
The other thing I think is confusing is that a lot of these repeaters I should be able to hear directly are linked together at times.   For example I believe I hear both people on the ChainOLakes repeater and the Frankfurt Indiana repeater (both on 625) talking to each other.  One minute someone says they are in southern Wisconsin and the next someone is talking about being in Indiana on a Mobile.  It seems unlikely that those people are talking to each other on the same repeater over 200 mile span on GMRS hear in the flat plains.
Thanks again for the help.

When your radio is lighting up, but not putting out any sound, it is likely due to the receive tone doing what it's supposed to do. It is filtering out radio traffic that does not transmit the selected tone. That traffic could be coming from one of the repeaters you are trying to listen to, or it could be coming from some other source. It could be simplex (radio to radio) traffic that is not from a repeater. It could also be from a different repeater than you think you're listening to. If you set a receive tone to match a particular repeater, you will only hear that repeater or other traffic that is using the same tone.
I suspect what you're experiencing is the radio working normally. My suspicion is that what you thought was traffic from the repeater you programmed the radio for, was actually coming from somewhere else.

What does “duty cycle” mean?
 
I bring up duty cycle every time I hear somebody talking about making a repeater out of cheap Chinese mobiles and worse any type of handhelds. Duty cycle is the maximum time an amplifier may transmit within a five minute interval, expressed as a percentage, to avoid overheating. Suppose a mobile amplifier is rated at 30% duty cycle. This means that it may transmit for no longer than 1.5 minutes and must remain off for not less than 3.5 minutes. Some people forget that a repeater is transmitting for 2 or more people, duty cycle will be reached quickly if you get into conversation. More people in the conversation just amplifies the issue.
 
Once a radio reaches it's thermal design limits it will no longer be able to adequately cool the output transistors. Even if a radio is not hot to the touch the transistors are, in part because of the inefficient transfer of heat to the units housing or internal heat sink. The longer you exceed the duty cycle the more heat builds on the transistors, surrounding electronics and heat sink effecting it's ability to remain on frequency without spurious emissions. Exceed duty cycle long enough and you will need a new transmitter or radio.
 
I have tested a few Baofang and TYT radios on my service monitor without great results. All of the radios started deviating outside of the allotted channel bandwidth after simulated conversation at 50% duty cycle, the longer I allowed this the worse if got. Testing was done using an Aeroflex 2975 IFR recently back from the calibration lab. 
 
GMRS is a tiny sliver of spectrum surrounded by the commercial land mobile part 90 service. It is important that any repeaters that are built or re-purposed are held to the highest standards and operated as to not cause any interference inside or outside of our allocated spectrum. I wont get into the part 90/95 debate but i do stand firm that non certified import equipment has no place on GMRS. 

Yo BugKiller, in my opinion the only dumb question is the one not asked. I'm still a noobie, as well, so we are all learning as we go.
That said, the length of my rat-tail (aka-counterpoise) was just random. I just tried to match it to the length of the antenna.
It seems to work very well, I've even had it coiled around the belt clip to keep it from dangling and it still works great.
Don't be afraid to explore and experiment with your gear, it'll teach you alot, along with many here that have lots of knowledge to share.
73 

Hey Scott:
What radio?
Which repeater?
Luckily they have an authentic Portillo’s about 35 miles south of me in Orange County!

If your radio shows receive but you don't hear anything, then the repeater is either transmitting a different tone, or no tone at all.
The purpose of the Rx tone is to keep you from hearing other traffic on that same channel, which could be either a different repeater, or simplex traffic (on the repeater output channel, which is shared with simplex GMRS and FRS users).  But you don't *need* to program in the Rx tone; you will hear the repeater just fine without it (as you have seen).
Does that make sense?