Why did you chose GMRS

[WSAN654]

What's the reason you chose GMRS over other options

price helps a lot of people and no test is a large reason.

Maybe you went to a Ham radio club and you felt you was the child there

My main reason was for safety at work and family which are both driving

Unfortunately the safety issue is a problem, so ham is going to work out better i would say, because there was a bad wreck just outside Seguin where a lady  and child came of the road and hit a building so she called for help on a repeater channel and no one would answer her even though there was people on there, so this lady has gone back to HAM, she has been a Radio operator for 20 years and she got GMRS because family did not want to do a ham license.

She has zero cellphone coverage 

people can panic and not use  the callsign and you could be ignoring a urgent message, the lady was ok but the 3 year old had a broken leg and collar bone.

If your HAM or GMRS you could save a life 

[WRXB215]

We have to keep in mind that the primary purpose of GMRS is for families and other small groups. Using repeaters is just a bonus. For everything else, HAM is the way to go.

[gortex2]

Have used GMRS for over 3 decades. Alwasy used as a family communications system. Few years back started using it for some off road events. Now its either GMRS or CB for all the off road events I go to. Still use it primarily for private communications. Not to sound rude but if someone was on my repeater thant not my user I wont answer answer them and neither will my users. Thats my decision. In a disaster I doubt GMRs would be much use no matter how many claim it will be.

 

[WRQC527]

I chose GMRS as an additional communication mode to augment amateur radio. My friends who I spend time hiking and off-roading with are amateur radio operators, while my wife and I use GMRS. 

[WRYZ926]

3 minutes ago, WRQC527 said:

I chose GMRS as an additional communication mode to augment amateur radio.

Same for me. 

[Lscott]

18 minutes ago, WRYZ926 said:

Same for me. 

Same, and the license term and cost finally got reasonable too.

[WRYZ926]

It never hurts to have more useful tools in one's toolbox. And that is how a few of us sold the idea of a GMRS repeater to our club too.

[SteveShannon]

34 minutes ago, WRYZ926 said:

It never hurts to have more useful tools in one's toolbox. And that is how a few of us sold the idea of a GMRS repeater to our club too.

That concept of “additional tools” is why our club is discussing putting up a commercial repeater at the same site of our Amateur repeater so that in an disaster we could hand out commercial radios to specific unlicensed people.

[WRYZ926]

I'm not sure if our club's emergency trailer has any commercial radios or not. But we do have all amateur bands and GMRS covered now.

[WRHS218]

I've had a amateur license for decades. Got it for the communications aspect during desert adventures. Unfortunately most of the folks I went with decided not to get a license. Moved to GMRS because most of the family and friends I am around now will use it. A couple of friends and some other family members have GMRS licenses now. I'm talking to a few neighbors about getting GMRS licenses and using the radios to check up each other during winter weather events and during wildfire season. I have a couple of older neighbors that don't have cell phones. I will keep my amateur license as well. As others have said, having more tools is good. 

[Borage257]

I didn't choose GMRS, it chose me.

[WSAH452]

3 hours ago, Borage257 said:

I didn't choose GMRS, it chose me.

same here Got 2 GMRS Radios For my birthday last year and found out I needed a License to use them 

[WSAN780]

Communications were overlooked when it came to my preparedness plans. GMRS fits my needs well, the license was cheap and easy, etc.

[SvenMarbles]

I’m probably a strange example of someone in the radio hobby. So get this,.. I’m a life-long radio hobbiest, who has no interest in being a ham..

I like radio, the science of it, antennas, tinkering, and the ability to posses an end-user only method of relative long distance coms for PRACTICAL purposes. 
 

I don’t really care to “make contacts” or chat with randos.. 

I COULD pass a ham tech exam on any given afternoon with no need to study. But I would have to actually make time and arrangements for doing so. 

But frankly GMRS is better suited to my needs anyway. GMRS is essentially 70cm ham radio, and the call is good for the family. There’s repeaters and everything . It’s a practical service that allows utility coms and not just “say your call, chat with other ridged ham guys about whatever”. You can actually use GMRS for actual practical coms to the wife for a grocery list, or whatever.. 

Ive got the big house radio and our cars equipped. It’s a complete domestic radio situation. Our local repeater is 2 miles away and covers 60 miles.. There just isn’t another radio service that works this way..

 

[WRZP437]

It just seemed like a good tool to have for comms when needed.  I've talked a little bit on the local repeater, used the radio for listening to the weather station when we've had weather coming in and the local ham club's 2m net.  I did make my mind up, hopefully this year I will go for a Technician license, maybe just go straight for a general with a bit more studying. 

[nokones]

Taking a test where a person studies the answers to the test questions does not demonstrate a person's proficiency and proves a person's knowledge on the subject matter. It only proves a person has a good memory skill. So, what does that prove and why it should be basis for qualifying a person and issue them a Amateur Radio Service License is beyond me. Testing for an Amateur license is a joke and makes no legitimate sense.

That is one radio service I will not ever be part of or having any interest in.

My previous career was involved around radio communications for over 40 years. I have enjoyed the subject of two-way radio communications.

I got my GMRS license back in the early 90s when the license issued were mobile license that had three letters beginning with a "K" and 4 numbers.

GMRS appeared to be interesting at the time because it was UHF and allowed the use of a repeater. There wasn't many users and you never heard any traffic on the single frequency you were licensed for and the 462.675 freq pair was reserved for React and emergency use only.

I was very ingenious on solving radio communications problems and developed and invented solutions to those problems.

Unfortunately, being a government employee it was illegal for me to use those resources to parlay those inventions into millions of dollars for myself. So, some companies took opportunities and did make millions and millions off my solutions and inventions.

[WRQC527]

7 minutes ago, nokones said:

Taking a test where a person studies the answers to the test questions does not demonstrate a person's proficiency and proves a person's knowledge on the subject matter. It only proves a person has a good memory skill. So, what does that prove and why it should be basis for qualifying a person and issue them a Amateur Radio Service License. Testing for an Amateur license is a joke and makes no legitimate sense.

This is one radio service I will not ever be part of or having any interest in.

The question was "Why did you choose GMRS", not "Why do you hate amateur radio". Without hating on amateur radio, why did you choose GMRS? 

[SteveShannon]

28 minutes ago, WRQC527 said:

The question was "Why did you choose GMRS", not "Why do you hate amateur radio". Without hating on amateur radio, why did you choose GMRS? 

My friends were using it on the rocket range.

[WRQC527]

1 hour ago, nokones said:

Taking a test where a person studies the answers to the test questions does not demonstrate a person's proficiency and proves a person's knowledge on the subject matter. It only proves a person has a good memory skill. So, what does that prove and why it should be basis for qualifying a person and issue them a Amateur Radio Service License is beyond me. Testing for an Amateur license is a joke and makes no legitimate sense.

That is one radio service I will not ever be part of or having any interest in.

My previous career was involved around radio communications for over 40 years. I have enjoyed the subject of two-way radio communications.

I got my GMRS license back in the early 90s when the license issued were mobile license that had three letters beginning with a "K" and 4 numbers.

GMRS appeared to be interesting at the time because it was UHF and allowed the use of a repeater. There wasn't many users and you never heard any traffic on the single frequency you were licensed for and the 462.675 freq pair was reserved for React and emergency use only.

I was very ingenious on solving radio communications problems and developed and invented solutions to those problems.

Unfortunately, being a government employee it was illegal for me to use those resources to parlay those inventions into millions of dollars for myself. So, some companies took opportunities and did make millions and millions off my solutions and inventions.

That's better. Still hating on amateur radio, but at least your edit answered the OP's question.

[WRYS709]

1 hour ago, WRQC527 said:

That's better. Still hating on amateur radio, but at least your edit answered the OP's question.

You should see what the ham forums say about him!

[WRQC527]

1 hour ago, WRYS709 said:

You should see what the ham forums say about him!

I bet it's unfavorable. It's too bad radio forums degenerate to bashing other services. I mean, I guess all forums have that problem, but my take is that there's so much to share, and some folks would rather pee in the punchbowl.

[WRYS709]

There are the ham forums for "some people" but you have to know the secret handshake to get in!

[WRQC527]

17 minutes ago, WRYS709 said:

There are the ham forums for "some people" but you have to know the secret handshake to get in!

There's an old saying that goes "I would never want to be a member of a club that would have me as a member." 

[MarkInTampa]

I was a ham 30 years ago, just had a tech license but liked hanging around some of the VHF/UHF repeaters and made a few friends. The problem was we had two radio clubs that hated each other. If you got caught talking to the wrong person, you were shunned by one group or the other. It became a old wives club. I let my license expire, moved across 3 different states in those years and decided to give GMRS a try a bit over a year ago to see if I wanted to play with radios again.

I got to be friends with a few guys on GMRS that went on to become ham's so I got went ahead on got my ham tech license back as well. For the most part I usually use simplex on ham and maybe one or two repeaters on occasion out of dozens available to me, just like the more more relaxed feeling of GMRS and the folk's I've met over the past year or two.

The sad part is I was out riding my bike around 15 years ago through a park when it was field day. When I got back home I threw a few boxes of radio gear (a few radios, Astron power supply, SWR meters and the like that I had not used in since in the hobby) in the car, dropped them off at the club table and told them to do whatever they wanted with it. I wish I had it back. Oh well....

[WRYS709]

17 hours ago, WRQC527 said:

There's an old saying that goes "I would never want to be a member of a club that would have me as a member." 

It traces back to Groucho Marx...