Call Frequency/Channel

[WSAG780]

What is the universal GMRS call channel?

[SteveShannon]

34 minutes ago, WSAG780 said:

What is the universal GMRS call channel?

There is no official channel. 
Some people have suggested 19, but millions of people can’t use it. 

[Socalgmrs]

Gmrs is not really ment for that. It’s not cb.  Gmrs is more like bring your own friends.  Yes some people get on repeaters or happen upon strangers but gmrs is really for friends and family to have comms while out and about on outings or home to home or farms and ranchs but not random strangers. 

[nokones]

Channel 20, 462.675 MHz, has been designated as a Travel Channel with 141.3 Hz encoding only, as the Travel Tone, with CSQ on receive, for the last couple of decades.

[OffRoaderX]

15 minutes ago, nokones said:

has been designated as a Travel Channel.... for the last couple of decades.

The fact that the OP, and a thousand others have to ask this question, prove that this is incorrect.  It might be written down somewhere, but the fact that nobody knows and even less people abide by it shows that, in the real-world, this is incorrect.

as @Sshannon said, there is no [widely-recognized] call channel IN USE - to refer to some outdated and UNUSED reference is disingenuous at best.

[nokones]

I was around back in the days when 462.675 was designated for emergency use only and for point-to-point communications for REACTS.

My GMRS license back in that day stated that 462.675 MHz was for emergency use only.

Orange County REACT was one of the licensees that had authorization to use a repeater on 462.675 MHz in the 70s and they had a repeater on Santiago Peak for all the REACT monitors to relay information.

This repeater is still in existence today and still owned by Crest Communications and used by their Club members.

In later years, the FCC deregulated the use of 462.675 MHz as an emergency only  and the North Shore Emergency Association was instrumental in getting the acceptance of the 462.675 MHz GMRS as a highway calling channel with the 141.3 Hz as the national travel tone.

Here is some info from the North Shore Emergency Association on the history of the National Travel Channel:

This briefly discusses how the "travel tone" of 141.3 Hz and the national calling/emergency frequency of 462.675 MHz came to be. NSEA was one of the very first adopters of GMRS in the early 1970s, then the Class "A" Citizens Band. Here's a quick snippet from the link:

NSEA members were instrumental in bringing UHF technology to other public service groups in CB, especially R.E.A.C.T. (Radio Emergency Associated Citizens Teams). Beginning in 1976 key NSEA members spent extensive time meeting with REACT teams in more than a dozen-and-a-half different states, bringing a portable repeater, together with a number of mobile and portable units for field demonstrations...As a result, over 200 personal use repeater systems (all on the same frequency [462.675 MHz]) were set up throughout the United States. In recognition of this trend of explosive growth the Federal Communications Commission formally recognized our frequency [462.675 MHz] as the national emergency and traveler's assistance channel in the Part 95A Rules and Regulations.

Below is some info from Wikipedia on the National calling and highway channel;

• GMRS: 462.675 MHz is a UHF mobile distress and road information calling frequency allocated to the General Mobile Radio Service and used throughout Alaska and Canada for emergency communications; sometimes referred to as "Orange Dot" by some transceiver manufacturers who associated a frequency with a color-code for ease of channel coordination, until the creation of the Family Radio Service, in 1996, "GMRS 675" or Channel 6/20 on mobile radios today.  It can have a repeater input frequency of 467.675 MHz, and a tone squelch of 141.3 Hz.

The national calling channel is still recognized by some GMRS users and Clubs that are still alive and well but the channel may not be widely recognized by the newer GMRS users today.

[gortex2]

Our SAR Team still runs a 675 machine that was migrated to SAR when REACT fell apart. Its still an open emergency repeater. 

[TRRP]

Is that 141.3 on both sides of 462.675 and its offset?  Just curious as I’m a newbie

[Socalgmrs]

1 minute ago, TRRP said:

Is that 141.3 on both sides of 462.675 and its offset?  Just curious as I’m a newbie

Tone squelch  is both sides in and out.  And off set is or should always be +5 

[SteveShannon]

3 hours ago, TRRP said:

Is that 141.3 on both sides of 462.675 and its offset?  Just curious as I’m a newbie

If you leave the tone out of the receiver side you’ll hear everything transmitted on 462.675, regardless of the tone they use to transmit. For that reason I recommend leaving it out for new users. The downside (if it is one) is that you hear everything on the channel. That’s useful though if you’re just learning. 
If the station you are transmitting to has programmed its receiver to require a tone you must transmit using the same tone.