Amature bands VS. GMRS Range

[HHD1]

Here is what I assume is a no brainer question for some. 

Given all things the same as far as terrain, radio, wattage, etc...

Which would have more range in simplex, specifically HT comms, amateur bands or GMRS?  

The google machine is not giving me clear answers, plus I like bugging you fine people with my curiosities. 

[SteveShannon]

18 minutes ago, HHD1 said:

Here is what I assume is a no brainer question for some. 

Given all things the same as far as terrain, radio, wattage, etc...

Which would have more range in simplex, specifically HT comms, amateur bands or GMRS?  

The google machine is not giving me clear answers, plus I like bugging you fine people with my curiosities. 

High Frequency (HF) amateur bands have the greatest range, but propagation can vary.  Yesterday I was easily able to talk to a ham many hundreds of miles away (Butte, MT to Chelan, WA), but at the same time I could not hear a ham who was thirty miles away in Anaconda, MT because our signals were passing over each other’s heads. 
GMRS has no range advantage over amateur UHF.  Neither does amateur UHF have a range advantage over GMRS.  Their ranges are practically identical. But, there are many times more amateur repeaters than there are GMRS repeaters and unlike GMRS the amateur repeaters may be linked together in networks. On Saturday I used my 70 cm handheld and talked to a repeater 30-40 miles away which was linked to a worldwide net at the time.

[dosw]

Amateur radio spans almost the entirety of the RF spectrum, and LW, MW, and HF propagation are vastly different from VHF, UHF, and other much higher frequency band propagation.

 

GMRS uses 65cm, which is very close to amateur 70cm. For those, propagation will be virtually identical; UHF 70cm and UHF 65cm GMRS will be identical.

 

GMRS doesn't extend into VHF. Amateur radio has bands in 2m and 6m that can be described as VHF. VHF requires bigger antennas than UHF for similar gain characteristics. VHF suffers less from attenuation by foliage. But UHF is a little better at getting through walls. Both are "line of sight."

 

Amateur offers 10m (a lot like CB propagation -- pretty long range during periods of high sunspot activity, line of sight at other times).

Amateur offers 20m, 40m, 80m, 160m. These are the bands people use to talk all over the world, but they're subject to seasonal changes, day/night changes, sunspot activity, and so on. They achieve these long distances by bouncing the radio waves off the ionosphere -- layers in our atmosphere. Requires knowledge and good technique for knowing when to use which band. Very large antennas are common, and high power levels. Not entirely reliable.

 

You're probably asking about 2m/70cm amateur vs GMRS. And again, there, 70cm vs GMRS there's no practical propagation difference. 2m vs GMRS there can be some advantages to 2m if you have comparable gain antennas, which will be bigger. But the advantages are subtle.

 

The fine print: I skipped over the following amateur bands: 1.25m, which is less used, but close in propagation to 2m. I skipped 900MHz and GHz bands because they're uncommon for simplex over any distance. And I skipped LW/MW, as well as 17m, 15m, and 12m amateur. 17,15,12 are going to share characteristics of 10m and 20m, but are less common bands. LW and MW require much larger equipment and are relatively niche bands. 160m is pretty close to MW though. I also skipped over MURS, because its power requirements are more limited, despite propagation being similar to 2m. 30m is useful in the same way that 20 and 40m are useful, but less common. And 60m is relatively niche. I skipped CB because at 11m, its propagation is similar to 10m, but it's a dumpster fire of crazy traffic. However, people do use CB. It's limited to 4w for AM transmissions, and 12w for SSB transmissions.

[Bogieboy01]

Ameteur bands typically, due to the ionosphere being able to propogate the longer wavelength bands better than the UHF frequencies....with the right antennas and equipment you can communicate around the world on 5w with the 11m band....

 

*edit* can you tell i am studying to get a ham license?

[CaptainSarcastic]

There are amateur only frequencies at the UHF range (not just HF). That frequency range is 420mhz - 450mhz. It's also referred to as the 70cm band. It seems to have very similar characteristics to the GMRS band as far as propogation, etc.

[tweiss3]

As others have said, ham UHF vs GMRS, you won't notice a difference with HTs. VHF high (2m) will get a bit further under normal conditions. VHF low (6m, 50MHz) gets to the point that an adequate antenna is the issue for HTs. It will act the same as 2m without atmospheric propagation helping, but when propagation is open, there are thousands of stories of talking across the USA on only 5w.

[FishinGary]

HTs on the amateur bands are basically limited to VHF (6m, 2m, 1.25m) and UHF (70cm), so not really any different than GMRS (UHF). Mode (FM) and power levels are basically the same as well. It basically comes down to the things you already mentioned, like terrain, as well as antennas, availability of repeaters, etc. In my area there are a handful of GMRS repeaters, but there is at least one ham repeater in almost every city in my county alone. YMMV

[Socalgmrs]

36 minutes ago, HHD1 said:

Here is what I assume is a no brainer question for some. 

Given all things the same as far as terrain, radio, wattage, etc...

Which would have more range in simplex, specifically HT comms, amateur bands or GMRS?  

The google machine is not giving me clear answers, plus I like bugging you fine people with my curiosities. 

Simplex Or transmitting into a repeater is exactly the same.   Some research into bands and vhf and uhf is in order however lower frequencies like the 150s where murs is goes further if all other things are equal.  I know a 2w Murs HT goes about 2Xs as far as a 5w gmrs HT. 

[FishinGary]

8 minutes ago, SteveShannon said:

High Frequency (HF) amateur bands have the greatest range, but propagation can vary.  Yesterday I was easily able to talk to a ham many hundreds of miles away (Butte, MT to Chelan, WA), but at the same time I could not hear a ham who was thirty miles away in Anaconda, MT because our signals were passing over each other’s heads. 
GMRS has no range advantage over amateur UHF.  Neither does amateur UHF have a range advantage over GMRS.  Their ranges are practically identical. But, there are many times more amateur repeaters than there are GMRS repeaters and unlike GMRS the amateur repeaters may be linked together in networks. On Saturday I used my 70 cm handheld and talked to a repeater 30-40 miles away which was linked to a worldwide net at the time.

Skywave propagation is a trip. Just messing around with WSPR, the sweet spot for me, in terms of signal strength is roughly between 800-1500km. Anything farther away gets weaker with distance, anything closer just passes right overhead. Of course, there are tons of variables here, and I'm working QRP, too. 

[WRYZ926]

We have our 70cm repeater antennas and GMRS repeater antennas on the same tower. The 70cm antennas are higher but the actual range is the same for both GMRS and 70CM. We get between a 30-35 mile coverage radius with the usual dead spots due to local terrain.

Our 2m repeater antennas are at the same height as our 70cm antennas and we get a 80-85 mile coverage radius with it.

Those ranges are all with using 50 watt mobile radios and good mobile antennas with the proper ground plane. 

 

And before "some people" state how they get 200 + miles with their GMRS radios, they live in the most perfect ideal location across wide open and flat desert terrain. Real world range will be anywhere from 15 miles to 50 miles depending on what part of the country you lie in and what the local terrain is like.