Remember not all groups want other folks on their repeaters. This isn't ham radio. Some folks install repeaters for themselves only. I actually removed all my repeaters from this site for that exact reason. If its listed as open then send the request and wait. There are folks who come here, register a repeater and never come back. Thats part of the issue. Its been an issue for years. Others just are busy. I see messages here and there asking if my stuff is still online and I try to reply when i can to say its closed but life happens and I am sure many get lost in email land
Just wanted to share a repeater owners aspect.
So here's how linking works for repeaters.
Most repeater owners are going to make a decision regarding what they are going to link to if anything at all. They own the repeater and make that decision. Now a good number of owners will choose to not link at all. But the ones that do decide to link are gonna do what makes them happy. And the end users are typically NOT going to have any input on what the repeater is linked to.
One of the things that will get you in deep crap is creating a link to a repeater without the permission of the repeater owner. Yes, it's possible to do but I am not gonna sit here and explain how to do something that will get your NODE banned forever, get you possibly banned from this site. SO don't ask, cuz we ain't saying.
To the actual design of the system. The system is made up of node's and hubs. The hubs are either the wide area hubs, or state wide hubs. The wide area hubs on this system are the ones with a three digit ID number. The national hub being hub number 100. Midwest is 169 and so on. Anyone can connect to those hubs that has a valid node with an issued ID. Or you can connect to state hubs (what I do) for your local state or a state that has one. Now these hubs are privately owned. So some level of permission MAY be required to connect to those state wide hubs. That is for you to work out.
If there are no local repeaters that are connected to the system, or you are wanting to connect to ta different local system than the repeater owner that is local to you is connected to you can obviously put up your own repeater and do as you like. At least as long as the hub you are connecting to allows you to connect to it. Again, that's for you to work out with that hub owner.
In addition, individual repeaters can be linked together via the system. Again, with permission. You can set your node to connect to another node. That node can be anywhere. So a node in California can connect to a node in Ohio, or New York, or another node in California. The sky's the limit for that sort of thing.
And putting up a repeater is NOT difficult. And there are a number of us here that can assist with that effort if you ask. Some of us, like me, are commercial radio tech's and do this sort of work all the time. Other's are really good with the specific configuration of the node software and are a wealth of information wihen it comes to that.
