Ballyhac Cove - New Repeater in Maine

[SteveH]

I just got my first GMRS repeater on the air yesterday. It's listed in the directory as Ballyhac Cove and it's located at my home in Owl's Head, ME. The intent is to have a repeater that will cover the immediate area which includes Owl's Head (of course), Rockland and Thomaston to the north and the small towns south of us on the peninsula.

 

Crossing fingers I went out today with a mobile rig in the car and my wife Chris on a HT at the house. I headed north through the Owl's Head village and then up to Rockland downtown, then south on Rt. 1 to Thomaston and then looped back along the St. George River. I could hear the repeater very well except for a couple of dead spots around buildings in Rockland. Chris had more dead air and crackling, probably more related to my cheapie mobile antenna than anything else. The center of the village was also pretty dead but you can't get cell phone reception there either.

 

Obviously having the repeater at my house (which is on the shore of Ballyhac Cove) instead of on a high spot is not helping anything but my goals are modest too, at least for now.

 

I do have a question regarding a glitch when I posted the info on the repeater. Owl's Head properly has the apostrophe in the name. When I entered it on the page with the map, it comes out on the graphic on the page as Owl/'s Head with a slash before the apostrophe. Any way of getting rid of that without dropping the apostrophe?

 

Steve WQQB941/KB1TCE 

[Logan5]

Way to go, sounds like very good propagation. going to read your other post to familiarize myself with your set up. I have had my repeaters up for a couple of months now and it is quite enjoyable to hobby with, experimenting and testing equipment. gives you a sense of power, not to mention the comfort of knowing you are able to round up family when the Cell phone service is shut down or is taken down by a man made or natural disaster. the best advice I have been given, is HIGH high quality antenna as high as you can safely get it, with as short of feed-line as possible. LMR400 is ok, but Heliax is much better.

[PastorGary]

I do have a question regarding a glitch when I posted the info on the repeater. Owl's Head properly has the apostrophe in the name. When I entered it on the page with the map, it comes out on the graphic on the page as Owl/'s Head with a slash before the apostrophe. Any way of getting rid of that without dropping the apostrophe?

 

Steve WQQB941/KB1TCE 

 

 

Steve - Since there are no Moderators at the main directory site, the only person who can change text errors is Rich D.

 

Use the "Contact" button in the top navigation bar to send RIch a note about it. Please understand, however, that Rich is very busy with work and it may take awhile to get that accomplished.

 

Thanks for your understanding... but don't worry about the text - it's fully understandable as-is and can stay that way until Rich gets to it.

 

 

P-G

 

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[SteveH]

I'm running about 40 watts into 30 ft. of RG-213. (Shack is on the 2nd floor of our house.) The antenna is a Comet commercial antenna with 9dBi gain.

 

I could probably get the antenna up another 10 ft or so (it's about 25-28 ft now) but I was impatient and didn't want to wait for assistance. 

 

I run a BPQ32 BBS with ports on HF and 6 meters. Now that was a learning curve! The GMRS repeater will hopefully give some local non-ham friends a way of staying in touch with family w/o commercial infrastructure.

Steve

[SteveH]

Steve - Since there are no Moderators at the main directory site, the only person who can change text errors is Rich D.

 

Use the "Contact" button in the top navigation bar to send RIch a note about it. Please understand, however, that Rich is very busy with work and it may take awhile to get that accomplished.

 

Thanks for your understanding... but don't worry about the text - it's fully understandable as-is and can stay that way until Rich gets to it.

 

 

P-G

 

==========

Thanks PastorG, I'll do that. Yup, there's no urgency.

 

Steve

[mainehazmt]

Congratulations on getting it set up  I like you kinda pushed it thru faster than I should have But it enhances the learning experience! (my excuse anyway!)  I had hoped to gain some users so I could experiment with mine   but hasn't happened  Maybe When ever I get that way I can try and give ya a shout  Mine is open as there is just e and my family but seems Im the only one that plays with it!  Im headed to Acadia end of the month Call ya from top of Cadillac mt!

John

[SteveH]

Hi John,

Good to meet another Mainiac. It's been a long time since I was up your way. My father-in-law was born in Caribou and we'd go up there on occasion with him and my M-I-L as they liked to stay in touch with some of the people there.

 

I was poking through my piles of boxes in the basement and I happened on a small cache of aluminum mast sections. I use them with 1-1/2" pipe clamps on the back of the shed to make what is essentially a push up mast for my 6m yagi and rotator. I have a set of clamps on the end (the hidden end) of the house that used to support an ocf dipole. Heck - that will make a perfect support for the GMRS antenna. I should be able to get the antenna base up about 40 ft or more easily - it's a lot lighter than the 6m assembly. Best of all I won't even have to get on the roof (ours is a 45 degree pitched roof - not old guy friendly).

 

It's on the far end of the house from the shack so I figure I'll just put the repeater in the basement by the base of the mast. (In the upstairs guest bedroom would be far better but my wife does set some limits on me )

 

Steve

[mainehazmt]

stuff it in the attic! run the coax out the vent  gets you closer lol  well if you get up here you can always use it   462 / 467.550  pl 123

[SteveH]

Not really an option - the attic of our place isn't accessible except by a little hatch that's above a closet with shelving. The other advantage of the basement is that the repeater will be next to one of our two 12 volt battery banks. The other is in the shack.

[mainehazmt]

thought I was one of the rare ones to have battery banks in basement  lol  hooked to inverter for winter power outages  love to have lights on in power outage and local power company takes a double look  esp when they cant hear a generator running

[PICrow]

@ mainehazmt

 

Another Mainer here, I am in your neck of the woods as a matter of fact (Presque Isle). I see you that have an open repeater listed in Limestone. I am curious if that is still functioning and the frequencies?

[PastorGary]

Reminder from the MyGMRS Staff -

 

Since this forum is open to search engine recording and monitoring, please do not place frequencies or access tones/DPL in the open forum. Contact PICrow by private messaging with any updates or details that you may have about a specific system.

 

Thank you.

[SteveH]

I've been away from the board for a bit (well, a few months). Not much has changed. The repeater is still running 24x7 but no users have been active except for my wife and myself. I have registered a couple of individuals who visit the area from time to time but the people I was hoping would use it haven't shown any inclination. A couple families could really benefit from it and one even has a license and radios all set and programmed.

 

Horse - water - 

[PastorGary]

Thanks, Steve - welcome back - nice to see you here again.

[Guest spd641]

Steve,

Give it time plus word of mouth will get around.I will tell you from personal experience you have to educate people.I have spend a good amount of time telling others about GMRS and most think of it as those toy WM radios and you have to educate them about what repeaters are` and what kind of real radios are out there.I have did this numerous times and a few have jumped on board.

 

I guess the thing with the public in general is they do not want to spend money on a license thinking they can't justify the cost believing the whole time they shouldn't have to get a license for those $30.00 set of radios but when I actually show them my set up and tell them the range I get from it and actually demonstrate it they like the idea and will go through the proper channels to get thier license...William