since radio has non removable antenna, you will have best luck outside and way up high. When i played with these radios I climbed up onto the roof and could get local repeater, but sounded tinny and cheap. took them back and got much better radio with removable antenna.
Keith, refer to your user guide and look at the chart on page 4.
To do what you want with those radios, you need to set the correct tone in order for the repeater to "hear" you and relay your signal.
Setting the tone on your radios is done by inputting the corresponding code from that chart. It looks like your repeater frequencies are already entered into the radio for you, and you should be able to select your tone from a menu.
Check the repeater map and scroll it around. The repeater I linked to might be the closest one to you, though there are some a little further south near Tampa. That repeater would be on your channel 20R (462.675Mhz) and set the tone code to 22 (141.3Mhz)
Welcome to the forums and welcome to the world of GMRS.
If I were you, the first thing that I would do, especially easy to accomplish since you have two radios, is to get together with a friend or whoever and do some testing to ensure that both of your radios are working properly. Do this while separated by some distance, a hundred feet or more would be great.
Try various frequencies in both the FRS and the GMRS, using simplex (non-repeater) channels in the case of GMRS.
Also do some tests where each radio is set to an identical CTCSS frequency or DCS tone to ensure that that particular functionality is working properly, as you'll almost certainly need it when working through a repeater system.
If all of those tests end with positive results, then check the main portion of this site (not the forums) for repeaters in your geographic area and contact the owners for permission to use their machines.
If you get the okay, then you're on the air, so to speak.
And yes, you're correct that digital voice modes of operation are not permitted on neither the FRS nor the GMRS, although I do on rare occasion hear digital transmissions on a GMRS channel here in New York.
I don't know where you're located and thus don't know how much GMRS activity you may have available to you. It may be quite quiet or it may be quite busy. This does seem, at least from all that I've read, to vary quite a bit by locale. And in some areas, there seem to be few to no GMRS repeaters.
Please be aware that the range claims made by the various manufacturers of (especially) FRS radios tend to be rather overstated, and that's putting it mildly. Unless you and the person with whom you're communicating are both on mountain tops with true line-of-sight between the two of you, don't expect great distance.
Personally, I feel that this is an area where the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) should step in and set some legal guidelines governing advertising claims, sort of like they did many years ago with regard to power output claims made by manufacturers of hi-fi power amplifiers.
Antenna heights and terrain have a great effect on UHF communications.
And here, in case you haven't seen them, are three Wikipedia links that may be of use to you.
Family Radio Service https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Radio_Service
General Mobile Radio Service https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Mobile_Radio_Service
brownk89 reacted to Logan5 in MS350R Set Up For Repeater Use
