How am I able to hear this?

[WRWI368]

First post here so I'm sorry if the answer is really obvious.

I'm picking up a conversation on GMRS 62 which is the 462.625 repeater between a guy in Bababoo, WI a guy in Maryland and a guy in Indiana. I'm kind of in the middle in Northern IL. There are no repeaters near me using that frequency according to repeaterbook.com. Can someone please explain to me how I'm able to hear their conversation.

I'm listening on a Baofeng UV-5R with a Signal Stick antenna.

Thanks for any help.

[SteveShannon]

38 minutes ago, WRWI368 said:

First post here so I'm sorry if the answer is really obvious.

I'm picking up a conversation on GMRS 62 which is the 462.625 repeater between a guy in Bababoo, WI a guy in Maryland and a guy in Indiana. I'm kind of in the middle in Northern IL. There are no repeaters near me using that frequency according to repeaterbook.com. Can someone please explain to me how I'm able to hear their conversation.

I'm listening on a Baofeng UV-5R with a Signal Stick antenna.

Thanks for any help.

Not every repeater is in Repeaterbook.  Check the repeater database here to see if any appear within range of you.

Also, are you always able to hear it or does it come and go?

 

[WRWI368]

9 minutes ago, Sshannon said:

Not every repeater is in Repeaterbook.  Check the repeater database here to see if any appear within range of you.

Also, are you always able to hear it or does it come and go?

 

And there we go, looks like I'm getting the Batavia repeater. I'm on the Northern edge of its estimated range. Yes, I can always hear it.

Thank you!

[WRWI368]

So looking at the information in the mygmrs database, did I enter it in Chirp correctly?

 

[marcspaz]

For the last two days there have been a bunch a metor showers that my amateur friends are bouncing signals off of to talk from Georgia to Alberta Canada using VHF and UHF signals. 

 

My money is on you hearing this propagation. 

[WRCQ487]

So you are hearing the Chain of lakes repeater which is a out 20 miles from you. A HT may be a stretch to reach it but a mobile or base unit would have no problem.  https://mygmrs.com/repeater/1710

 

It's part of a very large repeater link system. Most of the time it's just linked to other Wisconsin repeaters but a few times a week it links into Illinois, Indiana and Ohio with a few other repeater outside of those states. 

Also here's the linking map and if you click on the dots it will tell you which repeater it is. 

 

https://network.mygmrs.com/map

 

[WRWI368]

Thanks Jay,

I've got a request in to be able to use this repeater.

35 minutes ago, WRCQ487 said:

So you are hearing the Chain of lakes repeater which is a out 20 miles from you. A HT may be a stretch to reach it but a mobile or base unit would have no problem.  https://mygmrs.com/repeater/1710

 

It's part of a very large repeater link system. Most of the time it's just linked to other Wisconsin repeaters but a few times a week it links into Illinois, Indiana and Ohio with a few other repeater outside of those states. 

Also hers the linking map and if you click on the dots it will tell you which repeater it is. 

 

https://network.mygmrs.com/map

 

Great info Jay, thank you!

[WRQC527]

5 hours ago, WRWI368 said:

according to repeaterbook

Personally, I've found Repeaterbook to be one step above useless for GMRS repeaters. Filtering for California, it shows 38 repeaters. Compared to mygmrs, which when filtered for California shows over 100.

[WRCQ487]

36 minutes ago, WRWI368 said:

Thanks Jay,

I've got a request in to be able to use this repeater.

Great info Jay, thank you!

Awesome, hope to hear you out there soon. Also please be patient, that repeater owner works some crazy hours so please give him a week or two to reply to your request. 

[PA141]

There was a widespread tropospheric ducting event over the weekend.  I haven't looked into the details but it was covering areas of the northeast.

If you were not connecting to a linked repeater system, this is the likely source.

[PA141]

Glanced through a couple of ham radio tropo reports from the weekend.  Many of these were on UHF or higher frequencies, so GMRS reports would not be surprising.

CT -> FL & IA

ME -> IN, OH, WI, IL, NC, MI, NE, LA, SC, MO, KS, VA and Ontario, Canada.

For real radio geeks this would also include FM broadcast and TV signals from outside of your normal reception range.  Another subset of the scanner hobby.