dosw

Marine VHF is a little more complex than just frequencies assigned to channel numbers, 1w/25w, narrowband. There are digital modes, data packets for location, and other fun new things that only an actual Marine VHF radio built in, say, the past 15 years would support. Antennas are another problem. It's not hard to find a 2m/70cm antenna because of how the wavelengths line up. But Marine VHF is far enough above the 2m range, and GMRS, being slightly above the 70cm frequency range... they just don't line up as well, and antennas that do both justice aren't really a thing. Two radios, two antennas: You'll be happier.

Find out who outfits police cruisers in your area. Often it's a company (not an in house technician).

If Starlink or any other "infrastructure as a service" can be set to avoid aiding a foreign military's drones, it can be regulated for others, too. That's not necessarily a bad thing under the conditions in which we live today. In the late 1930s and early 1940s shortwave was critical as a means of wireless communication in Europe. That need doesn't exist in the same form today. But it will continue to present itself somehow. The conduit is RF. How we use it; digital modes, and such, that will evolve. Every day life is more and more connected to cell towers and satellites -- to infrastructure. Extraordinary life will continue to have occasional needs for alternatives. I'm not a prepper, by the way. I just recognize that the disruptive technologies we carry in our pockets improve a lot of things, but rely more heavily than ever on infrastructure that is not infallible.

Listening to 385 is totally optional, by the way. Too bad about the bleed-over, though. But the likelihood of the FCC policing that is almost nil.

Here's the occasional reminder that 70cm is used to reach the ISS 263 miles up in the sky, and often at orbits that place it 1000 miles away, while still within line of sight. And the radios people are using? 5w handhelds with a Yagi antenna, often, as that is the easiest to deal with out in the field. 2w to go 80 miles is totally sufficient if there's line of sight, no obstructions, just like 5w is sufficient for hitting the ISS repeater 250-1000 miles away. <edit, adding to my post> ....in fact, Voyager 1, the most distant man-made object in space, nearly a full light-day away, transmits at 23 watts:

There's truth to that, too. Like, if you have 2m why would you want 70cm? ...truthfully their propagation is similar enough that there's some redundancy, right? If you have 10m why do you need 20? and then you get into a whole world of other possibilities. If you have a truck why would you also want a sedan?

.....rigger until 1-2 seconds AFTER they start tal....

This is in Surprise AZ, which is as close as I can find to where your profile says you're from. There are people talking on 28.385 but in very typical "amateur protocol" types of rag chewing. Identifying, talking about the weather, calm talk (not shouting over each other). Notable that I only hear half the conversation, but that could be all the SDR antenna is picking up. Anyway, 28.385MHz, normal conversation, within, probably, a 90 minute drive of you. Here's a link to that web SDR: http://38.18.68.3:8073/ And I found it on this site: https://rx-tx.info/map-sdr-points Now they're talking about a trip to Vegas. Super exciting! (just kidding)

Well, it's not; it's 10m misuse. But it sounds like CB-ers misuse of 10m. Here's what's weird about it, though: Not exactly freebanding; they didn't just pick a frequency on either side of CB and start hollering, they specifically went into the Tech-class section of 10m. They're using USB. Every time I hear SSB on CB/11m band it's always been LSB, which is "wrong" from an amateur radio perspective, but not precluded from proper CB use. However, here we are in the 10m band and they're talking like CBers, but on USB. However, I wonder this; if you shift down a few KHz and switch to LSB, or if you switch to AM mode instead, do you still hear them? If you shift a few KHz down do you hear the carrier tone? In other words, are they transmitting in AM? Since this is largely an exercise in curiosity, do you have access to a SDR? (software defined radio.) If you do, set it up with your 10m antenna and show us the spectrum around 28.385. USB, LSB, and AM have very distinctive appearances on an SDR's waterfall. If you have a TinySA you might also be able to hook it up to your 10m antenna and show us the waterfall in this vicinity, as well. But my TinySA isn't as sensitive as my SDR, so I would expect that you'll have better luck displaying a waterfall from an SDR. If you don't have your own SDR, is there an open SDR in your area? Check http://websdr.org/ . You might get lucky and be able to hear these people on a WebSDR in your area, which would also allow you to see the waterfall. Either way, you're not likely to be able to do anything about it. It's entirely possible they've got such bad equipment that you're just catching a harmonic.

There are a lot of reasons. Some of them are family-oriented: GMRS radios are compatible with FRS, so a GMRS user can have a solution that also works with non-licensed users. The GMRS license also covers family members. The GMRS license doesn't require study/test, so others who aren't interested in radio can also obtain a license and communicate. This is a direction we see with offroading clubs, for example; club members pay their $35, get their license, good to go; they can communicate with other offroading club members at events. Similar to "club use", it's also convenient for other outdoors activities. I can keep in touch with anyone I'm skiing with if they either have a GMRS license, OR have an FRS radio and are within the slightly shorter FRS range. Experimentation. Yes, that's supposed to be the domain of Amateur radio. But some people start with GMRS, get familiar with radio communications, and *then* move on to amateur. I'm in this category, too. I started with GMRS out of need of keeping in touch with my kids while skiing, and more broadly, with the others in our ski groups. But it became interesting enough to me to work toward my Amateur Tech. ...I'd love to get my General but haven't had time. However, even with a Tech license, I still use GMRS more than anything because it's the license that applies to my family as we do family sorts of things. And it's still the license that supports non-licensed friends with an FRS radio. I know that compatibility with FRS is, in many ways, an annoyance. But it's also part of what makes GMRS compelling.

Professionalism on the Amateur Radio bands; got it. Anyway, what modulation are they using? FM? AM? SSB? If SSB, are they using USB or LSB? All the SSB I hear in 11m/CB is always LSB, where the conventional Amateur practice would be to use USB above 10MHz. So that could be an indication that you're hearing some CB people freebanding. Of course AM would be another indicator. A long time ago 29.0-29.2 were considered the AM sub-band within 10m, because there was an abundance of repurposed equipment that favored that usage pattern. 28.385 is within the technician class license range. You would expect to hear SSB/USB (not LSB). So if you're hearing USB in that range, and they're being casual about their usage (not identifying, for example), you've probably just found some hams that aren't following the rules very well. If you're hearing a mode that isn't USB in that range, it's likely just some people who have radios and don't know anything about (or care about) the ARRL band plan. Possibly freebanding CBers, though putting a label on them doesn't really impact their behavior in any way. Curiosity may be plenty of motivation to know more, but at some point you have to make peace with the notion that there are people who have radios and use them in noncompliant ways.

Imagine we don't know what radio you have nor what you want to accomplish by deleting what is programmed into those channels. Then follow up in this thread with information that would make the question answerable.

Who is supposed to be hearing and replying? Are you transmitting directly to another radio on channel 1-22? Or are you trying to work a repeater?

Here's how bad it is for VHF: In my area it won't even pick up NOAA weather radio. NOAA is a little higher in the VHF band than 2m, but it's not going to be much different in terms of performance. And transmitting will be way out of its sweet spot.

35 miles is a lot to ask of any line-of-sight form of RF transmission. The simplest way to diagnose: Turn off all receive tones for your transmitting radio; leave it open to hear everything that happens. On your receiving radio, do the same thing; leave it open to hear everything that happens. On your transmitting radio set the transmit tone to that of the repeater. You and a friend drive to within 5 miles of the repeater. Your friend takes the receiving radio and walks a block away with it. You transmit to the repeater. Your friend should hear you coming through the repeater. You should hear the kerchunk when you stop transmitting. If you don't hear the kerchunk, the repeater isn't listening on your chosen frequency and tone. If you do hear the kerchunk, your friend should be able to report that he heard you. Now when you drive to your place 35 miles away, you'll repeat this experiment. Your friend, once again, should be a block away. If you don't hear a kerchunk, when you heard one before, you're out of range. Sorry, done. If you do hear the kerchunk, your friend should also hear you.

I recall that if you read back in the thread you will see I posted about the Larson NMO 2/70 which is a no-ground-plane antenna. That's possibly a better choice for your mounting options.

There's no such thing as a private GMRS network. And there's not one single local repeater (unless by coincidence there's exactly one in your area). Anybody with a GMRS license can put up a repeater on any of the eight repeater frequencies. None of the frequencies are private, none are owned by you, none are exempt from interference by others. All can be heard by anyone within range using a GMRS radio. So-called "privacy tones" do nothing for people who aren't using them. A person with no privacy tone configured can listen to anything you say, and can still stomp on your signal. Channels 1-7: 5w max, no repeaters Channels 8-14: 0.5w max, no repeaters, handheld ONLY. Channels 15-22: Up to 50w max, station to station OR repeater. Any channel in the 15-22 range might be a simplex channel for those using simplex, and might also be in use as the output frequency of a repeater owned by anyone with a license. Note: Most handheld radios transmit up to about 5w. A few go a little over, but without any real improvement in their range. So for your purposes, start by using a channel 1-7, simplex (handheld to handheld). If you find that your staff cannot communicate with each other across your property effectively, then you find a central location with good height, and put a repeater up with its antenna high on your property, and switch to using that repeater instead of a simplex channel. Use a low gain antenna; you're not covering a lot of distance, you're wanting signal propagation to be good within the property. The repeater should be centrally located, because it's the middle man between everyone. If person A at the west side of the property cannot communicate with person B at the east side, then putting the repeater at location B is useless. You would put the repeater between them, centrally located. Expect that anyone with a GMRS or FRS radio can listen to you. Expect that anyone with a GMRS or FRS radio that wants to commit a little mischief may figure out the CTCC or DCS tone you are using, and could pretty easily mess with you, repeater or not. If those issues are problematic you would be better served by selecting a system from a communications solutions vendor.

I trust that the several recommendations made here already are good choices. I have a Comet CA2x4SR NMO that works very well when it has a good ground plane below it. Without a good ground plane its SWR can be all over the place. I also have a Larson NMO 2/70. It's designed to work without a great ground plane. The gain is slightly less than the Comet, but I get very good signal reports from it, and that includes in the GMRS band. It works well mounted on the fender of my F150, which can be a challenging location.

One thing I've wondered (just in passing, to me it really doesn't matter): Are the quality repeater setups using type approved GMRS equipment?

It's called confabulation. It's more popularly referred to as AI hallucinations, but apparently confabulation more accurately describes how AI kind of fills in the gaps in what it can calculate with made up filler, which often misses the nuances. It will get better over time, but you don't have to look far to find examples that are annoying at best and dangerous at worst. The other day I asked AI what rounding strategies are commonly used for cash transactions in the absence of the penny. Gemini told me that rounding to the nearest .00 or .05 is the most common, and then spelled it out: .01 and .02 would become .00. .03 and .04 would become .05. And .05 through .07 would remain unchanged. .08 and .09 would round up to .10. I called out that .06 and .07 cannot remain unchanged, and it gave that familiar, "Nice catch! You're absolutely right!"

It depends. It's uncommon. It's not impossible. Let's assume the repeater's antenna is 200 feet above the prevailing elevation. And you are standing 5 feet above. In that case, one would expect, if there are no obstructions between, for the rante to be about 23 miles (20 miles for the 200 foot repeater, 3 miles for you at 5 feet). This is because, beyond 23 miles, the curvature of the earth becomes the obstruction between you. For there to be 60 miles of range, with you at 5 feet off the ground, the repeater's antenna would need to be 1800 feet above the terrain between you two. In a mountainous area, this is possible. As an example, I live at 5000 feet. The valley floor below is at 4200 feet. There is a repeater 57 miles away at 6500 feet. We can communicate easily, because for practical purposes I'm at 800 feet, and the repeater is at 1500 feet. We can communicate because the curvature of the earth does not interfere between us, nor are there other significant obstructions. We could actually be 94 miles apart and it would still be amost okay. So if you and the repeater you're talking about are on opposing hillsides or hilltops, and there's nothing between you, it's possible. If you don't have a combined total of about 1805 feet above the ground between you, you probably can't.

One thing people often overlook is *why* you see 2m/70cm combination radios a lot more often than other combinations. It turns out that 70cm is the 3rd harmonic of 2m. But the same cannot be said for 65cm (FRS/GMRS), which is too far from the MURS frequencies to be a useful harmonic spacing. The ramification is that it's not terribly difficult to have an antenna that is resonant and generally useful supporting a 2m/70cm radio, but it's rather hard to have an antenna that is good on both FRS and MURS. Sure, there are antennas like the Comet CA2X4SR. It has to make some design compromises, and turns out to work rather well, but for the most part 2m/70cm antennas are easier to produce and have fewer design compromises. The Comet needs a very good ground plane. And it's a big antenna. It's a lot harder in a handheld to do both frequencies well, in the same radio, with the same antenna. Of course there's the other aspect, too; the FCC has no motivation, no reason to offer FRS/MURS as an option. There's nothing intrinsically broken about the fact that currently they're separate services, and prohibited from being on the same type-approved radio. So the FCC isn't about to change it.

Thanks for providing that chart. Where did you find it? It looks like AF is pretty unfortunate. The rest, at least, are in the 5w max category. <edit> I found it: https://utahavalanchecenter.org/education/group-group-radio-channel-initiative

I have an RA87, and have been satisfied with it for the most part. Things to consider: Left side, and right side are each a distinct bank of memories. Single radio: When you are listening to left and right, the radio quickly flips back and forth internally to listen on both, and the one that receives traffic first wins. You can scan within both banks. Max output is 40w, but it's always a little below the max. This is true of almost any radio. It's a SOC radio; it will be more subject to interference than a superhet style radio (at 2x the cost, or more). It's a GMRS only radio. You can listen to other 70cm traffic, but you can only transmit on GMRS. The mic is lightweight, but works great. Good sound, lots of buttons that I never remember when switching between radios. The speaker is plenty loud. I have this mounted in a '95 Bronco with a 5.8L v8 and oversized exhaust. If I can hear it while I'm driving, it's plenty loud. Power levels are H/L through the faceplate. You can get to four or five levels of power through Chirp. Each channel can have a 6-letter label. It is Chirp compatible. I don't have a DB40G. I do have the following mobile radios to compare it to: Midland MXT275 - Lower featured, no channel labels, only one memory slot per channel, so only one repeater can be configured to 462.7000 at a time, for example. Only 15w. Much smaller. All controls are on the handset only. 1.5x the price. Wouxun KG-UV980P - Amateur radio (that can be set up for other services, in which case it's almost identical to the KG-1000G). 50w max. Dual super-het radios, so you can actually hear two conversations on two different frequencies at the same time (and when that happens, it's a little confusing). Quad band (11m/10m FM, 6m FM, 2m FM, 70cm/GMRS FM, plus you can listen to AM in the 11/10m bands). However, my experience is only with a 2m/70cm antenna that works adequately with GMRS; I haven't tinkered in 6m/10m yet. Excellent sound with speakers on both the main unit and the mic. More than 2x the price.

This speaks to your measurement tool being out of whack. If you have a 50 ohm dummy load, it's going to read a perfect 1.0:1 SWR while you measure power output. What comes between your radio and the tester, and between the tester and the dummy load? Either your testing device is bad, or the cable between the radio and the testing device, or the cable between the testing device and the dummy load is bad. In any of those cases, we can't trust the power output value until the reason for the SWR reading higher than 1:1 through a dummy load is known. Once you've been able to observe the SWR through a dummy load as being 1:1, then you can start looking at power again. You'll want to test each of the 462MHz frequencies, as well as each of the 467 repeater input frequencies, and take some notes. You absolutely WILL find that some of the frequencies get more power than others. That's just reality. The highest power you see should be <= 40w, and the lowest (in the high power setting) should probably not be much below 30w. But anything in that range is probably within the realm of "good enough" for a $159 radio. The next problem to tackle is why is your antenna system's SWR in the 1.5-1.6:1 SWR range. First we need to establish that your test equipment is accurate. If you fail to see 1:1 SWR with the dummy load, you can't proceed with testing your antenna system because you're already getting results that should be impossible with accurate test equipment. But if you are getting 1:1 with the dummy load, and 1.5-1.6:1 through the antenna system, where you are sure you used to get 1.0:1 or 1.2:1, something changed and you probably are interested in what changed. First, you may not be testing on the same frequency now that you tested on awhile back. SWR usually follows a curve; there will be some center frequency where it's better, and any frequency above or below that center will begin to be worse. So an antenna that gets a 1.0:1 at channel 19 may get a 1.2:1 at channel 15, for example, and maybe 1.5:1 on a repeater input. Another thing that can change is the connectors. If your connector isn't tight, or its solder points are becoming fatigued, your SWR could begin getting wonky. If you have water intrusion in your cabling, the SWR could go nuts. If you have water intrusion in the loading coil at the base of the antenna, that could also affect SWR. If you relocated your antenna from the center of the roof to the edge of the hood, your SWR will definitely climb. If you were sitting in front of your metal garage door with the door down, but a year ago the door was up, even that can change reflected signal, which changes SWR. If the antenna's set screw is loose, that could increase SWR. On the other hand, 1.5-1.6:1 SWR is in the range of "good enough." Unless it's getting worse, it may not be worth fussing over.