WRQC527

My guess is fan noise.

I'm no expert in hash that comes out of transmitters, but it may be a sound effect added by the repeater owner. It kinda sounds like a slide guitar note from one of the old western movies. My 2-meter repeater had a DVR linked to it that could play recorded messages and voice ID. Whether that can be superimposed with the Morse Code IDer I don't know. It also sounds like fan noise being picked up and mixed with the transmitted audio. Weird either way.

Backpacking with enough batteries to run a 15-watt radio isn't necessarily going to be lightweight. There are batteries called Lithium Iron Phospate that are very light compared to lead acid batteries, (around 3 pounds for a 12 Ah battery) but they are rather expensive, (about $125 for decent Bioenno ones) and you can get folding solar panels that may fit in a backpack, but again, they can be expensive, and maybe not lightweight. I tossed in a couple of links below so you can see what I'm talking about. I also threw in a link to a ham radio guy who does a lot of off-grid operating with solar and batteries. His content may be of some interest to you as well. https://powerwerx.com/bioenno-blf-1212a-12v-12ah-lithium-iron-pvc?gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQiA6vaqBhCbARIsACF9M6kk-nsK237NOX49JpP8CA--xoHNvAGrN9du6-N6nI_zdbj13rw7mCgaAk2fEALw_wcB https://energetechsolar.com/solar-panel-kit-120-watts-12v-18v-max-folding https://oh8stn.org/

UPS, FedEx, DHL, USPS and others deliver tens of thousands of packages a day. The vast majority are delivered without incident. But if they mess up one time for one person, that one person hates them for life and says they are the worst carrier ever. I find that odd.

To be fair, NOAA weather channels are VHF, in the vicinity of 162 Mhz. Not all radios are designed to be that wide-banded on receive. It looks like the designers of this radio mayhaps wanted to focus on making a good GMRS radio instead of a Swiss Army radio.

Ol' Randy's just trying to have a little fun. Bringing some much-needed levity and dare I say some common-sense knowledge and advice to the boards. Instead of posting six pages of FCC regulations and technical service bulletins for simple questions like how the PTT works or how many watts an HT can emit. But this is what we've become.

1. It's a sub-audible tone your radio transmits when you press the PTT button that tells the repeater to activate. Otherwise the repeater would activate every time anyone transmitted on the repeater input frequency even if they weren't trying to use the repeater. It's sort of like the security code on your credit card. Except without the fraud. 2. Yes.

I just spent some time looking for answers to your questions on various videos and review sites as well, including the radio manual. I couldn't fine any evidence that it can receive any frequencies other than GMRS. That's not to say it can't, but I'll be darned if I can find a shred of info. That said, I would assume it cannot unless you hear otherwise from a trusted source. Like Retevis.

Well this thread went into the toilet in a New York minute. What is a New York minute? Is there a conversion formula from standard minutes to New York minutes? I digress.

This applies so often here.

Thank you. I was hoping to find it in stock somewhere at that price.

Where?

I did need lunch, and yes, after about the first few replies, mine included, the thread went about a mile off topic. Carry on.

You guys go ahead and keep debating which GMRS HTs put out the most power. I'm going to lunch. Lemme know if you ever settle it. On second thought, no.

I don't know what you have in your HT collection, but every one of mine is limited to five watts.

If you get an HT, you're always limited to 5 watts. That may be good for walking around as long as you have reasonable line of sight to a repeater. You can even set it up mobile with a magnetic mount antenna. But if you're going to be out driving around much, in and out of handheld range, marginal line of sight, etc, you'll eventually wish you also had those extra watts. Also remember that once you permanently install a mobile, it's stuck with that vehicle. So you could make a mobile more versatile by making it moveable from one car to another. Like in a go-box or something. You may find you need both HTs and a mobile to fill your needs. Another solution is a mobile amplifier you can install in a vehicle so you can connect your handheld. But those cost as much as a mobile radio.

I've never used CB SSB but it's characteristics are similar to 10 meters. I and many others here are licensed for amateur radio and do HF. In my opinion it's not great for emergencies, because it's tricky to communicate locally. CW is no longer required for licensing, so to me it's more of a novelty and Ive never learned it. There's a large spectrum of amateur HF equipment ranging from the hundreds to well into the thousands of dollars. Like they say, ham is an acronym for "had alotta money".

Good to know. Can't assume these days.

Could be a she, we don't know that either.

That's the one.

One resource you might want to try is repeater-builder.com. I've used them as a source of information for maintaining my Motorola Quantar repeaters, which are obviously not the same, but there is other information on the site that is related to connecting radios for use as repeaters.

I like the FAQ idea. Also I like the idea that many other forums have of locking threads so they don't get revived months or years later.

I'm thinking that since this topic comes up so often by new GMRS licensees, an email should go out to every new registered user of this site explaining the distinction(s) between FRS/GMRS and amateur radio. Just a thought.

It goes by many terms. Unlocking, jailbreaking, etc. Generally it's a "do at your own risk" proposition. There's lots of how-to videos, including some made by regular contributors to these forums.

The current Icom IC-V86 2 meter handheld still sports a BNC antenna connector.