NEW TO GMRS- NEED SOME HELP

[riosrr]

Hello Everyone,

 

 Im new to GMRS, have my license, call sign and radio. For the life of me cant figure out how to input tones or get on a repeater. I'm open to all suggestions and instructions. I have a set of three btech V1 radios and was hoping to have family members have direct comm. Guess I have a lot to learn, so firstly I do understand that there is a channel mode and frequency mode. ON the channel mode it displays REPT or GMRS do both radios have to be on the same REPT and GMRS setting? Well there it is in a nutshell, I'm a total newb. Hope you guys got a few laughs out of my questions, now on to the learning.

 

Respectfully,

WRDX435

[BoxCar]

Welcome to the group first of all. There are a lot of people with a lot more knowledge about the subject than I, but my first question is if you purchased a programming cable with your radios? The cable will make things a lot easier to do once the answers begin to come in. The second thing is to go to chirp.danplanet.com and down CHIRP. This is the programming software that will allow you to input all the necessary numbers to get your radios fully functional and allow you to copy the configuration "code plug" to the other radios you have.

 

1.  

[riosrr]

yes i have the cable and have already downloaded chirp, so I need to create a code or link for the radios?

[wayoverthere]

(Relative newbie here as well)

On the Rept vs gmrs, are you talking about menu settings or channels? If this is channels, yes, both radios would need to be set the same to have a chance of communicating.

The regular gmrs channels, the radio transmits and receives on the same frequency, for talking direct to another radio.

Repeater channels, it listens on one frequency, but transmits on a different one (5mhz higher, if I remember right...not enough coffee yet this morning), with repeaters set up to listen on the higher frequency, and retransmit on the lower one. On these, you don't talk user to user, you're going through the repeater as an intermediary (usually with tones required for the repeater to "listen" to your transmission).

Chirp will help with the settings; I'll leave that explanation to someone more familiar with that radio, and suggest searching the forum as well....there's a wealth of information, and the v-1's have been well discussed, so the answers may already be here

[BoxCar]

Channel mode and frequency modes are the same thing. The difference is in what is displayed. Channel mode shows the channel number while frequency mode would show the frequency for the channel. GMRS repeaters operate with frequency pairs with the pair being 5 MHz apart. A 462 MHz frequency is paired with the 467 MHz frequency, The different tones are used to to enable the receiver (input) side to open up and listen to the signal on its input frequency and then key the output or transmit side of the repeater. The tones are also referred to as privacy codes. The repeater listings often refer to the "travel tone" which is 141.3 and needs to be enabled on your transmit frequency in order to access the repeater's receiver.

[wvanbrink]

For theV1.

 

GMRS channels = one radio direct to another. What is referred to as simplex meaning transmit and receive is done on the same frequency.

 

REPT channels = Radio to repeater to another radio. In your case if all 3 radios are set to a repeater channel then they transmit on one frequency and receive on another. They'll only work if you have a repeater nearby on that frequency/channel.

 

I use Chirp but honestly don't find it is needed for the V1. If you are going to use repeaters just learn how to set the Tones on the radio and move on. I would advise setting both the transmit CTCSS and receive CTCSS so that your radios filter out transmissions without the tone. We have a fair amount of FRS activity in our area and so the receive Tone really helps.