What would have to happen for GMRS to include APRS?

[fremont]

In addition to the 144.390 "problem"

[WRYC373]

10 hours ago, WRYZ926 said:

It would be nice to have one set standard with GPS. It is the same with digital stuff on amateur radios, too many different systems that don't work together.

They wont Ham is propelled by Open Source mentality but GMRS because you have to buy certified radios is propelled by manufacturer R&D its just the way it is. They need to recoup their costs.

[gortex2]

Rules would need changed and someone would have to write software for commercial/hobby use. Most APRS programs are based on ham call signs for registration. Its for ham use. 

[Sshannon]

37 minutes ago, fremont said:

In addition to the 144.390 "problem"

What functionality of APRS are you wanting to have?

[RayP]

Why and for what possible good reason?  Once again, it sounds like someone wanting to turn GMRS, with its very limited bandwidth, into "ham radio lite".  Rather than additionally trashing our already scarce bandwidth, why not get a book, study it for a week or few, and get your Technician license?  Then play with gizmo gadgetry where there is adequate bandwidth and existing infrastructure for it until you heart is content

[gortex2]

Not to mention the advantage of APRS is the infrastructure. 144.390 is all over the county, albeit lacking in some areas but its the same. We can't get repeaters to work together where are you going to find one frequency in GMRS to use all over the county and not interfere with someone else. Use HAM radio if you want to use APRS

[kidphc]

Speaking of infrastructure. I wonder how many of millions $$$ cumulatively clubs have spent to set up digipeaters.

Just for the end user to have aprs functionality, not talking about the hobbies style with a Pico and baofeng. But rather an actual integrated ht or or mobile. There are no ht units sub $250, avg about $400+. Mobiles are the usually $300+. Higher then most gmrs users are willing to pay.

If the FCC was considering having aprs down the road, I don't think they would of specifically said, ok you get a little digital (thx garmin for lobbying for this, not aure how much you guys paid), but you can't use it on the repeaters. In fact, any radio that has the capability must not have the functionality on the repeater pairs for type certification.

This alone leads me to believe the FCCs attitude to be. You want it? We got a tech license for you to get, they have it.

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[Lscott]

1 hour ago, kidphc said:

This alone leads me to believe the FCCs attitude to be. You want it? We got a tech license for you to get, they have it.

Exactly. I'm puzzled why more people don't get their Tech Class license. My brother took me to a Ham swap that had testing. I never went to one before and was interested to see what they had for sale. Then he just said, out of the blue, I'll pay the testing fee if you just try it. I said OK and winged it. Walked out with a passing grade, no studying. That's how I got started in Ham Radio.

It seems more and more people want to add things to GMRS, that deviates further from the FCC's stated purpose for GMRS, as you put it trying to turn it in to a Ham-Lite type service. I think it just comes down to being lazy with excuses why they can't take a few minutes several times a week to study and take the test. They just want to pay the $35 fee, then go out and buy a cheap Chinese radio.  

[kidphc]

Exactly. I'm puzzled why more people don't get their Tech Class license. My brother took me to a Ham swap that had testing. I never went to one before and was interested to see what they had for sale. Then he just said, out of the blue, I'll pay the testing fee if you just try it. I said OK and winged it. Walked out with a passing grade, no studying. That's how I got started in Ham Radio.
It seems more and more people want to add things to GMRS, that deviates further from the FCC's stated purpose for GMRS, as you put it trying to turn it in to a Ham-Lite type service. I think it just comes down to being lazy with excuses why they can't take a few minutes several times a week to study and take the test. They just want to pay the $35 fee, then go out and buy a cheap Chinese radio.  

Well to be fair...

Having aprs like service for family is kinda a cool idea.

But omg, that would make gmrs so much worse. With the network being over congested with packets. Hmm, i want to update every 30 sec, so I can track everything. To loosing, a channel for a dedicated aprs frequency or worse having aprs packets on every channel.

The unaware don't realize that the amateur aprs frequency is lost to anything but aprs traffic, yes i know voice alert. As well as it is noisy as hell. With voice alert, any transmission basically halt traffic till it clears. Depending on the node, it can have a backup from 13 billion weather stations ¹/4 mile apart.

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[Lscott]

1 minute ago, kidphc said:

Having aprs like service for family is kinda a cool idea.

With the radio likely plugged into the cell phone to access the GPS info.

If not that then the extra expense of adding in the GPS RX into the radio. To save cost the GPS can be external. Some of the commercial radios have external accessible serial ports that allow such a connection. The ones I've seen the GPS RX is built in to the external speaker microphone, and those aren't cheap!!!

https://www.ebay.com/itm/155825555327?hash=item2447ed477f:g:z~kAAOSwxxdlKEkf&amdata=enc%3AAQAIAAAAwIkCHDaeNe%2Fh%2FRcoGuerCnQe3rUMV7MdYj4Cfpaa%2Bj8Pq2US4jQ4EH%2Bxcq%2BIRl7xRC3NtGYt4naNXWFAdiPHoH0ZOe0ADAn3JxujrwUhhfiKP6NnXQS%2FQm60n64jYURsCKJNB2sejsOY6cwGztfIU9NnM%2Frx%2Fznv2YybxJWcja9vP%2B0haJyWtzX%2BQzLbTgNESSx2gTyQx6YRqHrdo3rWGpdx%2BS4NeLIjw1saNZknmmQVxYzq%2Fcax0TneBcO4TYJjKg%3D%3D|tkp%3ABk9SR_zqobTxYg

 

KMC-47-48GPS.pdf

[Sshannon]

This is why I asked the OP what APRS functionality he wanted:  many people don’t even know what APRS is or how it works.  They may think they want APRS, when all they want to do is see where their wife is while she’s driving home.  That can be done with a Garmin Rhino, or even a GMRS Pro, but can also be done with a cell phone.  APRS isn’t necessary for that.

Or does he want weather stations or the ability to send a text message in the very least convenient way possible?

[kidphc]

With the radio likely plugged into the cell phone to access the GPS info.
If not that then the extra expense of adding in the GPS RX into the radio. To save cost the GPS can be external. Some of the commercial radios have external accessible serial ports that allow such a connection. The ones I've seen the GPS RX is built in to the external speaker microphone, and those aren't cheap!!!
https://www.ebay.com/itm/155825555327?hash=item2447ed477f:g:z~kAAOSwxxdlKEkf&amdata=enc%3AAQAIAAAAwIkCHDaeNe%2Fh%2FRcoGuerCnQe3rUMV7MdYj4Cfpaa%2Bj8Pq2US4jQ4EH%2Bxcq%2BIRl7xRC3NtGYt4naNXWFAdiPHoH0ZOe0ADAn3JxujrwUhhfiKP6NnXQS%2FQm60n64jYURsCKJNB2sejsOY6cwGztfIU9NnM%2Frx%2Fznv2YybxJWcja9vP%2B0haJyWtzX%2BQzLbTgNESSx2gTyQx6YRqHrdo3rWGpdx%2BS4NeLIjw1saNZknmmQVxYzq%2Fcax0TneBcO4TYJjKg%3D%3D|tkp%3ABk9SR_zqobTxYg
 
KMC-47-48GPS.pdf

To be honest I just use cell. With location tags, ie airtags and such. As well as the apps no need really.

Been trying out civtac app, to kinda have aprs like functionality.

Civilian version of atak. Which I think was designed to work with an mpu5 mimo radio. Nasty little rabbit hole. Thank god mpu5s are like $30k.

Quick overview of atak/civtak:

Atak video.


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[RayP]

50 minutes ago, Lscott said:

Exactly. I'm puzzled why more people don't get their Tech Class license. My brother took me to a Ham swap that had testing. I never went to one before and was interested to see what they had for sale. Then he just said, out of the blue, I'll pay the testing fee if you just try it. I said OK and winged it. Walked out with a passing grade, no studying. That's how I got started in Ham Radio.

It seems more and more people want to add things to GMRS, that deviates further from the FCC's stated purpose for GMRS, as you put it trying to turn it in to a Ham-Lite type service. I think it just comes down to being lazy with excuses why they can't take a few minutes several times a week to study and take the test. They just want to pay the $35 fee, then go out and buy a cheap Chinese radio.  

I do agree, and congratulations on testing AND passing your exam!

I recall in the late 90's, in my area, packet weenies had much of 2m simplex polluted with their noise makers.  No joke!  Depending on the day or week, there were times you struggled to find a simplex 2m channel to yak with friends on.  It seemed as though every simpex channel was occupied by that annoying "SCREEEEECH" every few seconds.  My friends and I had to use PL to keep from hearing that.  I wound up buying a PL decoder board for my radio and had one sent to a friend whose budget didn't allow him to purchase one.  At that time, many 2m transceivers could encode a PL but you had to buy the optional board for decode (radio silence). Some jerk even had one set up on 146.52, the nationwide simplex call channel.  Thankfully, that eventually died down, or they all figured out they could run their noise makers on the same channel and not interfere with one another.

[kidphc]

I do agree, and congratulations on testing AND passing your exam!
I recall in the late 90's, in my area, packet weenies had much of 2m simplex polluted with their noise makers.  No joke!  Depending on the day or week, there were times you struggled to find a simplex 2m channel to yak with friends on.  It seemed as though every simpex channel was occupied by that annoying "SCREEEEECH" every few seconds.  My friends and I had to use PL to keep from hearing that.  I wound up buying a PL decoder board for my radio and had one sent to a friend whose budget didn't allow him to purchase one.  At that time, many 2m transceivers could encode a PL but you had to buy the optional board for decode (radio silence). Some jerk even had one set up on 146.52, the nationwide simplex call channel.  Thankfully, that eventually died down, or they all figured out they could run their noise makers on the same channel and not interfere with one another.

I have some old radios like that.

I even have one that only way to set a pl. Was to crack open the case and flip dip switches.

Bet you have flash backs when an unaware user sets a tone on his aprs frequency which happens to be the voice alert tone, and you get the screech.

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[RayP]

Man, those DIP switches go back a way!  My wife's grandmother gave the wife her old IC2AT.  It was probably one of the first ht's that did not require crystals for frequency changes.  It had thumbwheel frequency selection on top and no PL encode or decode.  It did have a DTMF keypad on the front.  There were only a couple of repeaters you could use it on locally, but it was a cool piece of yesteryear technology.

[WRYS709]

Yes, preceeded by the Henry Radio Tempo 2 meter HT with thumb wheel frequency changing capability. 

[Lscott]

On 11/1/2023 at 11:09 AM, RayP said:

I do agree, and congratulations on testing AND passing your exam!

That was well over 20 years ago.

Later when the CW requirement was dropped I sat for the General and Extra exams at the same test session. I passed both on the first try. The wrinkled old VE examiner had a really sour look on his face when he told me the results as I was leaving. I guess he just didn't like people getting getting their Extra ticket without having to pass the hazing CW test anymore. Oh well, that was his problem.

[Sshannon]

41 minutes ago, Lscott said:

That was well over 20 years ago.

Later when the CW requirement was dropped I sat for the General and Extra exams at the same test session. I passed both on the first try. The wrinkled old VE examiner had a really sour look on his face when he told me the results as I was leaving. I guess he just didn't like people getting getting their Extra ticket without having to pass the hazing CW test anymore. Oh well, that was his problem.

Fortunately we’re not all like that. When I took my tests the VEs were very welcoming. 

[back4more70]

57 minutes ago, Sshannon said:

Fortunately we’re not all like that. When I took my tests the VEs were very welcoming. 

I passed my Technician exam while visiting Wyoming, and the VEs were delightful.  Then I passed my General exam in my town in California, and these dudes were severely uptight.  Must be a reflection on the locale haha

[WRXB215]

14 hours ago, back4more70 said:

these dudes were severely uptight

Makes you wonder why they were VEs in the first place. 

[Sshannon]

34 minutes ago, WRXB215 said:

Makes you wonder why they were VEs in the first place. 

Unfortunately, volunteers often stay beyond their “use by” date.  They might have been very cheerful and supportive when they first started.  There’s no excuse for it, but I see it all the time in my other hobby also.  We have people who are charged with mentoring participants in Rocketry.  Over the years they see people asking the same questions over and over and it becomes irritating.  They develop an attitude that young people expect things to be handed to them, or that they’re trying to proceed too fast, or that people rely too much on unofficial, unreliable, and unsafe sources of information*.  Over time the attitude becomes worse and worse.  

Unfortunately, the other attitude that some volunteers develop is “if I don’t do this there’s nobody else who will.”  That’s usually   incorrect, but I’ve seen it happen.  In truth, if they were to retire from their volunteer positions it would leave a vacancy for a more positive person to fill.  It’s not just age, but that’s sometimes part of it.

Last night we tested two people for ham radio.  One was a brand new candidate. He took his time, double checked his calculations, and went through every question twice. He passed his Technician test with flying colors, zero wrong.  We encouraged but didn’t pressure him to take his General exam.  He was concerned that it would be held against him if he didn’t pass but we assured him that wasn’t the case.  He took the exam and although he didn’t pass (he hadn’t studied for it either) he expressed appreciation for the experience.  I am sure he’ll be back and pass the General exam easily,  maybe even the Amateur Extra at the same time. The other candidate tested for Amateur Extra.  I know him and although he didn’t pass this time, he’ll be back too.  

 

*If you think that there’s bad advice about radios on YouTube you ought to see some of the homemade rocket motors that are little more than pipe bombs.

[Lscott]

27 minutes ago, Sshannon said:

*If you think that there’s bad advice about radios on YouTube you ought to see some of the homemade rocket motors that are little more than pipe bombs.

I know all about that! When I was in middle school and high school I played around with chemistry as a hobby. My younger brother was into model  rockets. Those "D" series motors were expensive as a kid to buy. He asked me if I could "refill" them to save some money. Well I came up with a mixture to try out, no it wasn't home made gun powder. All I can say is the rocket "launched" in pieces, bits of cardboard tube, balsa wood and plastic all over the ground.

He wasn't happy and NEVER asked me to try to refill one of his used motors again. I had no problem with that either.

[Sshannon]

10 minutes ago, Lscott said:

I know all about that! When I was in middle school and high school I played around with chemistry as a hobby. My younger brother was into model  rockets. Those "D" series motors were expensive as a kid to buy. He asked me if I could "refill" them to save some money. Well I came up with a mixture to try out, no it wasn't home made gun powder. All I can say is the rocket "launched" in pieces, bits of cardboard tube, balsa wood and plastic all over the ground.

He wasn't happy and NEVER asked me to try to refill one of his used motors again. I had no problem with that either.

We regularly allow the launching of Research motors and I’ve seen many in the M, N, and O impulse range.  Our organization doesn’t allow certain mixtures, including homemade black powder motors, but there are people on YouTube and other places who have attempted K impulse black powder motors, often with catastrophic effects.

[Lscott]

4 minutes ago, Sshannon said:

We regularly allow the launching of Research motors and I’ve seen many in the M, N, and O impulse range.  Our organization doesn’t allow certain mixtures, including homemade black powder motors, but there are people on YouTube and other places who have attempted K impulse black powder motors, often with catastrophic effects.

There are materials you can very easily purchase at the drug, hardware and grocery stores to make "stuff." Some of it is VERY friction sensitive when mixed. For obvious reasons I won't mention what those are and the end results can be catastrophic. I leaned that the hard way from experience.

[fremont]

Lots of off-grid outdoor enthusiast GMRS users who would benefit from APRS (e.g., knowing the location of their party, allowing SAR to find them). I personally think APRS (or a variant) finds its way into GMRS.

[Sshannon]

14 minutes ago, fremont said:

Lots of off-grid outdoor enthusiast GMRS users who would benefit from APRS (e.g., knowing the location of their party, allowing SAR to find them). I personally think APRS (or a variant) finds its way into GMRS.

Garmin Rhino GMRS radios already do this.  

https://www.amazon.com/Garmin-010-01958-20-Rino-Handheld-Units/dp/B0741JFPLM/ref=asc_df_B0741JFPLM/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=241981125544&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=12003066143149905668&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=t&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9021317&hvtargid=pla-569512211442&psc=1

I believe the GMRS Pro radios do also.