WRQC527

Your friend is wise. Remember though, while your immediate family is covered by your license, everyone in your party who isn't covered by your GMRS license needs their own license. But if you are using amateur radio to keep in contact with other people in your party, everyone needs their own amateur radio license. No free lunch for your immediate family. Not everyone wants to take a test. That's the beauty of GMRS. You don't have to know much. You just need $35 for a license, and maybe $30 for a radio.

I never noticed before. He has three hands. Or at least three arms. I can't see the third hand.

Technically you're not connecting to anything when you communicate through a repeater, linked or otherwise. It's more like you're accessing it, if you will. The repeaters are what are networked, so when you transmit into a networked repeater, your transmission is coming out of whatever repeaters or nodes are networked with it. And folks accessing those repeaters are doing the same thing, so you can hear them. No need for any extra work on your part.

I'm convinced that the reason some people want this kind of thing to pass is that they refuse to differentiate between a radio that doesn't take your eyes off the road and a smart phone that requires you to often look away and type. Therefore, their logic is "If I can't use my device, no one can." Followed immediately by "nerny nerny nerny".

Coconino County in Arizona tried this about ten years ago. Enough amateur radio operators and truckers got together and pushed to eventually get the law changed to exempt mobile radios. Also, here in California, we've been dealing with hands-free laws that are vague about mobile radios and loosely-interpreted by law enforcement, and at one point a memo was issued to the California Highway Patrol that said mounted radios with wired hand microphones are not considered wireless devices. It's all very convoluted across the country, and even from one city or county to another. But in the 12 years I've been an amateur radio operator, I've never had law enforcement give me a second (or first) look when I'm using my radios, even when they're right next to or behind me. Only one friend of mine was pulled over, and the officer let him go when he realized it was a ham radio micophone he was holding.

The funny thing is that if you enter this young man's name into the Google search engine, you can come up with a lot more information than just his address. Where he went to school, who his fellow students were, when he graduated, where he works, when he started, what his job title is, his baseball stats, his college activities, other business he's involved with, I mean this guy's life is an open book. And that was with about two minutes of searching. I'm not saying it's cool to put every GMRS license on a publicly accessible map without at least asking them, but let's be real... all someone needs is your name.

From all the information I've read over the last few minutes, it appears that whatever offer DX Engineering made was rejected. Who knows, maybe they or someone else might finally work something out, but for now whatever is left of MFJ after next month will be a shell of its former self. It's going to be a bunch of MFJ-branded imports.

Maybe MFJ can be "parted out" to save the brands. All those different companies under one umbrella must be hard to manage as a whole and still stay profitable.

Direct to the battery with fuses is widely spoken of as very effective, because it's most likely the cleanest power you'll get. Some radio manufacturers put fuses on both the positive and negative leads as well, rather than just one. Putting a switch in the curcuit is a good idea so you can completely remove power from the radio. Some radios draw current even when they're turned off. I found this out when my QYT KT8900 killed my go box AGM battery in about a week, so far down it wouldn't charge. I also have an inline filter that I built. I've included the link below. It filters out almost all alternator noise. http://www.sanantoniohams.org/tips/whine.htm

I'm not sure how the FCC communicates your new license to you these days, it's been a couple of years since I got mine, and several years since I got my amateur call, but you can check daily on their site: https://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/UlsSearch/searchGmrs.jsp Just type in your FRN and click on the search button, and if your license has been issued, it will show up. The FCC database normally updates once a day, overnight, so check in the morning.

Thanks Steve, yes there's not a huge cost difference, and I probably won't roll the dice on the cheapest coax. Some budget coax is definitely budget for a reason. I make do with my RG-8X when I need to set up a temporary base antenna. Obviously not ideal.

I'm curious if anyone here has experience with Bolton400 coax. I'm looking to upgrade to 50 feet of an LMR400-type coax. I don't want to cheap out, and $1.20 a foot seems a little too good to be true, but this coax gets decent ratings. I know there's other brands out there, but for a budget like mine, and maybe some other folks out here, I want to keep the cost down. https://www.amazon.com/Bolton400-Cable-Coaxial-Commercial-Installations/dp/B07YBJRBW7/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8&th=1

My Quantar lets you talk over the IDer but if you interrupt it before it gets the entire ID out, it will keep trying every minute or so until it IDs completely. Once it IDs completely it won't ID again for ten minutes.

Is it just me or does this entire thread remind anyone else of the final scene from the movie "Burn After Reading"?

I think you should work "moral turpitude" back in somehow, because after reading his comments, it is rather fitting.

I have to admit, I had to look that one up because I had no idea what moral turpitude was, but now that I know I don't want anyone saying I had it when they do my obituary.

Actually, I said dang hard instead of impossible so as to leave myself an out because I know some fool will spend the rest of today, all day tomorrow, and probably well into the weekend trying to find some American-made radio just to prove me wrong, and he probably would find some obscure used radio like a BK on Ebay that someone hacked. You know who those people are, you rail on them all the time.

I find it mildly amusing that the Patriot Radio Frequency link shows a big-ole American flag, the American eagle, an excerpt from the United States Constitution, and a Chinese radio. I get that it's dang hard to find radios made right here in good-ole 'Murica, but it seems a little ironic.

There's a little-known FCC regulation concerning a kosher license. It's so little-known, in fact, that no one knows about it.

Can you post a screen shot from Chirp of your settings?

Anyone with $35 for a license and maybe $150 for a good handheld (or halfway-decent mobile radio and antenna) gets all the functionality of analog amateur radio UHF equipment (radios, repeaters, etc) without the drama of testing. It stands to reason that GMRS is growing fast. Hard licensing numbers are tough to come by, but it does appear that GMRS is getting more popular, especially after the FCC cut the price of admission in half.

See folks? We didn't need 4 days, 83 replies, and bunches of hostility to communicate that, the mostest simplestest of answers.

So... 4 days and 83 replies later, are Midland radios good?

I build all my antennas for HF and VHF. Pretty darn good ones actually.