Membership

[Guest Visitor]

Well, I will become a member as soon as my GMRS license is received but I do not see what the yearly fee is anywhere on this site. Secondly there does not seem to be any repeaters in Cookville, TN. There's one 70 miles away of which I might get lucky to hit but you have to get permission to use. Again I haven't a clue of how to do this. The second question is this. If I should chose to put up a cheap inexpensive repeater at my home in a hill can you somehow link repeaters to obtain greater blanket coverage. Personally I wish more people in TN would put these repeater up to cover the entire state since tonados are often and many people are left with nothing when this happens. If there is anyone out there that can answer these question please let me know what can and can't be done, why and how. Thanks

[SteveShannon]

There’s no fee, but if you decide you want to support the site there’s a Premium level membership for $50/year that has some benefits.

Repeaters can be linked in to a nationwide network, but the hardware is in very short supply right now.

On this site, once you have a login, the repeater listings include a function that helps you request access.  The repeater listings have a separate login than the forums, which is sometimes confusing to people.

[kmcdonaugh]

2 hours ago, Sshannon said:

There’s no fee, but if you decide you want to support the site there’s a Premium level membership for $50/year that has some benefits.

Repeaters can be linked in to a nationwide network, but the hardware is in very short supply right now.

On this site, once you have a login, the repeater listings include a function that helps you request access.  The repeater listings have a separate login than the forums, which is sometimes confusing to people.

Are the premium memberships worth it? I've looked at it, and I'm not sure I would use any of the features the premium membership offers. That is why I always have held off.

[WRUU653]

Looks like there is one on Renegade Mountain (Crab Orchard 700) that is linked. It's a bit away from you but looks to have good coverage and is open. There is one closer that is a members only.  As @Sshannon mentioned you will have more access to request repeater access once you get your license and log in.  Also when looking at the repeater map click the gear in the upper left corner to show offline and stale repeaters. You may see some that arn't shown and are active. 

 

[SteveShannon]

24 minutes ago, kmcdonaugh said:

Are the premium memberships worth it? I've looked at it, and I'm not sure I would use any of the features the premium membership offers. That is why I always have held off.

I wanted to support @rdunajewski, the owner, so for me I guess it was, at least once. 

[Lscott]

3 hours ago, Guest Visitor said:

Well, I will become a member as soon as my GMRS license is received but I do not see what the yearly fee is anywhere on this site. Secondly there does not seem to be any repeaters in Cookville, TN. There's one 70 miles away of which I might get lucky to hit but you have to get permission to use. Again I haven't a clue of how to do this. The second question is this. If I should chose to put up a cheap inexpensive repeater at my home in a hill can you somehow link repeaters to obtain greater blanket coverage. Personally I wish more people in TN would put these repeater up to cover the entire state since tonados are often and many people are left with nothing when this happens. If there is anyone out there that can answer these question please let me know what can and can't be done, why and how. Thanks

That's something you have to determine for yourself.

I had a similar situation with "radioreference.com". I asked for some opinions here about paying the membership fee. After some helpful comments I decided it might be worth it so I paid for a two year membership. There were some features and data I wanted to use, and could have found elsewhere with a lot more effort, so I'm giving it a try since it did save me time and trouble.

[gortex2]

I think alot of folks are coming to GMRS thinking its something it is not. Its not an emergency radio system nor is there predetermined repeaters all over for folks to use. There are alot of private repeaters and alot of open ones. I hate to compare to ham radio but I think many people think they can get a license and just use repeaters and they are all over. A "garage" repeater is great to help your area but very few large footprint repeaters are free to build and maintain. 

Anyway welcome to GMRS, but manage expectations. 

[kmcdonaugh]

1 minute ago, gortex2 said:

I think alot of folks are coming to GMRS thinking its something it is not. Its not an emergency radio system nor is there predetermined repeaters all over for folks to use. There are alot of private repeaters and alot of open ones. I hate to compare to ham radio but I think many people think they can get a license and just use repeaters and they are all over. A "garage" repeater is great to help your area but very few large footprint repeaters are free to build and maintain. 

Anyway welcome to GMRS, but manage expectations. 

You are completely right. A repeater that will give good range will have a cost associated. And those costs add up. Repeater, cable, tower rental, space in shelter for repeater, paying someone to climb the tower for install, maintenance. Not to mention most of these sites do not have any backup generator and if they do they may only last for an hour. But once you add up these costs it gets very expensive. And I just can't imagine a whole lot of people taking the time and paying the money out of pocket to get GMRS repeaters up the way ham is. Most of the GMRS repeaters that do have really good range, usually belong to some sort of club

[Lscott]

44 minutes ago, kmcdonaugh said:

Most of the GMRS repeaters that do have really good range, usually belong to some sort of club

Or the owner knows somebody who can get them cheap/free access with utilities. They might even work at the business site and have more or less unrestricted acess.

A lot of the Ham repeaters get cheap free access by pushing their "emergency response" angle. A few have some affiliation through a government agency like DHS, which the site own gets impressed with al lets them have the space. 

There are many other angles repeater owners get premium site locations.