Newbie Intro

[Murph62]

Hey All,

Just joined the group and looking to learn as much as I can. Call sign WRZQ354, just picked up 2 Baofeng UV-9G. Configured a few things in Chirp. This is a little more confusing than I thought it would be, but I am fairly technical and hope to be up to speed soon. I plan on looking at the repeater map here and hopefully find permissions and willing sole for a radio check.

One question I do have is when talking just between these 2 radios for family, do I need to program the channel for a tone or squelch or can I do without. I guess if i do use a tone I would want to program each radio with that programmed as a favorite(not sure if that is the right term)????

Glad I found this group.

Thanks All

Murph

[Sshannon]

3 minutes ago, Murph62 said:

Hey All,

Just joined the group and looking to learn as much as I can. Call sign WRZQ354, just picked up 2 Baofeng UV-9G. Configured a few things in Chirp. This is a little more confusing than I thought it would be, but I am fairly technical and hope to be up to speed soon. I plan on looking at the repeater map here and hopefully find permissions and willing sole for a radio check.

One question I do have is when talking just between these 2 radios for family, do I need to program the channel for a tone or squelch or can I do without. I guess if i do use a tone I would want to program each radio with that programmed as a favorite(not sure if that is the right term)????

Glad I found this group.

Thanks All

Murph

Hi Murph,

Welcome to the forums. 
You can have two way communications between you and your entire family without setting any tones. That’s easiest. 

[WRUU653]

Welcome @Murph62. You got it right. Simplex (radio to radio) doesn’t require tones but if you do have them set then you want both radios to be set the same. Tones can open squelch on repeaters so you can use them. They can also prevent you from hearing others that don’t have the same tones set. Others without them set will still hear you. 

[Murph62]

Thank you both. One more question, but this one about Chirp. I programmed 3 repeaters into Chirp. Should I have instead programmed these repeaters into the repeater lines? I think I screwed up.

 

[BoxCar]

yup.

[WRZD706]

Yep.  That is not quit right. It looks like you tried to program them over the simplex (radio to radio) channels GMRS 1, 2, and 3.  Undo that.

Program them in their corresponding pre-programed repeater channels (REPTR3, REPTR1, and REPTR5) and make sure that you have a +5 offset.  Once you confirm that works, change your "tone" to "TSQL" and make sure it works.  Then you will hear only the repeater on that channel and not simplex.

There are some really good youtubers that have videos that make this process super simple.

[WRXB215]

I'll second what @WRZD706 said and add that you may want to start with Tone instead of TSQL. This is a common method when first programming a radio for a repeater. That way you hear everything until you are sure you have everything else set up correctly. Then switch to TSQL to squelch out simplex signals.

See https://chirp.danplanet.com/projects/chirp/wiki/MemoryEditorColumns for more information on this.

[Sshannon]

37 minutes ago, Murph62 said:

Thank you both. One more question, but this one about Chirp. I programmed 3 repeaters into Chirp. Should I have instead programmed these repeaters into the repeater lines? I think I screwed up.

Yes.  Repeaters listen on the 467 MHz channels and retransmit simultaneously on the 462 MHz channels.  Transmitting while receiving is called “full duplex” and requires that they happen on slightly different frequencies.  So, a common repeater channel is 462.550.  You’ll hear people refer to that as the 550 repeater.  You would hear that at 462.550 MHz but to transmit to someone else listening to it you would need to transmit on 467.550 MHz.

For regular communications with your family on a push-to-talk radio, you take turns transmitting and receiving. You don’t do both simultaneously.  A single frequency is enough.  That’s called “simplex”.  

Unfortunately, the channels established for GMRS by regulation allow simplex communications on the same frequencies you receive full duplex transmissions from repeaters.  So 462.550 MHz appears in two different places in your channel list in Chirp.  But only one of them results in programming your radio to transmit on the higher frequency needed to use the repeater. So, in your case “COWFAR” will work to transmit into the repeater on channel 23 and REALFIN must be programmed on channel 24.

 

[WRUU653]

You may find this video helpful as well. It was put together by one of our regular contributors here @marcspaz

[Murph62]

Yep, thanks all. I kind of came to the newbe conclusion. So i reset the settings and started over. There is one repeater that has different input and output tones. Do i actually need to input the output tone?

[Sshannon]

12 minutes ago, Murph62 said:

Yep, thanks all. I kind of came to the newbe conclusion. So i reset the settings and started over. There is one repeater that has different input and output tones. Do i actually need to input the output tone?

Good question.  No, you do not need to use a receive tone.  If you don’t you will hear everything transmitted on that frequency.

That’s what WRXB215 was talking about when he recommended setting it to Tone instead of T-SQL.

[Adamdaj]

On 11/29/2023 at 11:46 AM, Murph62 said:

Hey All,

Just joined the group and looking to learn as much as I can. Call sign WRZQ354, just picked up 2 Baofeng UV-9G. Configured a few things in Chirp. This is a little more confusing than I thought it would be, but I am fairly technical and hope to be up to speed soon. I plan on looking at the repeater map here and hopefully find permissions and willing sole for a radio check.

One question I do have is when talking just between these 2 radios for family, do I need to program the channel for a tone or squelch or can I do without. I guess if i do use a tone I would want to program each radio with that programmed as a favorite(not sure if that is the right term)????

Glad I found this group.

Thanks All

Murph

Hope you and your family make use of your GMRS license, because you'll want to get accustomed to using radios, especially when cellular service and land lines are down. Not Just during crisis, because even normal conditions, a Cellular Phone will not work due to lack of towers. On High Power Channel on simplex you can expect a range from 3 miles to 5 miles on an HT and about 8 to 10 miles even more on Mobiles. That's depending on your surroundings and the antenna being used.

Take Care!

Don't stop asking questions, because that add tools to your Comm Plan.

[Murph62]

2 hours ago, Adamdaj said:

Hope you and your family make use of your GMRS license, because you'll want to get accustomed to using radios, especially when cellular service and land lines are down. Not Just during crisis, because even normal conditions, a Cellular Phone will not work due to lack of towers. On High Power Channel on simplex you can expect a range from 3 miles to 5 miles on an HT and about 8 to 10 miles even more on Mobiles. That's depending on your surroundings and the antenna being used.

Take Care!

Don't stop asking questions, because that add tools to your Comm Plan.

Thank you for this. Comms was lacking from my preps and needed to get up to speed. I actually connected and did a radio check to a repeater. Small steps. LOL