Linking GMRS Repeaters

[UncleYoda]

2 hours ago, marcspaz said:

I don't like the idea of linking any repeaters for the sake of rag-chewing... but there is some practical applications that many seem to overlook.

Anybody can come up with scenarios where any use could be helpful.  The issue is, is GMRS as specified in the regs, the right service for your usage scenario.  If not, and you want FCC to make a change, then propose that.  Just going rogue because it suits your purpose makes you a radio outlaw.

 

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Also, people keep saying linking repeaters is illegal and it is not.  It is 100% legal.  There is, however, a rule against using networks to link repeaters.  You can do RF linking over GMRS frequencies (which uses more bandwidth, not a very friendly idea) or you can link repeaters over another radio service that you are licensed for.

Part of the the issue is just the precise meaning of what "illegal" means in this context.  We should refer to violation rather than illegal since it is about regulations.  But I think it is generally understood that illegal in the radio context means violating FCC regs.

Linking over RF is not explicitly prohibited in the wording of the regs.  But it is at least discouraged in the rule clarification where it explains any linking is bad.  As far as I have ever heard or read, starting with ham, mixing radio services is prohibited by regulation.  There are no other frequencies that I know of that can legally (haha) carry GMRS conversations.  If you know of some, can you list the frequency and/or the service?

 

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If you don't like how the radio service is used near you, then don't use it.

Sounds a lot like "our country, love it or leave it".  Leaving if you don't like how it is used would be fine IF EVERYONE WAS FOLLOWING THE RULES.  Leaving because some people want to break the rules is just running away rather than fighting.

[WRUE951]

6 hours ago, marcspaz said:

 

I'm sure you folks are getting great coverage where you are, but there are a lot a variables that make it so that works in those situations. It becomes problematic for a vast majority of the US.

 

The Calif High Desert offers a lot of locations with good elevation and wide open valleys.  One repeater here siting on a 4500 foot mountain top  (El Paso)  can talk Palmdale - Lone Pine about 160 miles (Repeater sitting about center point).   I've heard people talking on this repeater on HT's standing at Whitney Portals on the same path.   I think dry weather has a lot of benefit to talk distance as well.  

[WRYZ926]

7 hours ago, marcspaz said:

We have one of our antennas 1,000 feet above average terrain and we are barely pushing it a 45 miles, with dead spots inside that coverage area due to terrain.  That particular repeater is known throughout the mid-Atlantic for being one of the top 3 repeaters, even when we include amateur radio coverage, and the top coverage repeater for GMRS in the area.  Due to the terrain limits here, people/companies running farms need networked radios for reliable coverage and most of them are using commercial radio for it.

Our 70cm antenna is at 900 feet and we get about a 35-40 mile radius of coverage. Our GMRS antenna is at 400 feet and we get 30-35 mile radio of coverage. And both bands have same dead spots depending on the terrain and trees.

Our 2m antenna is also at 900 feet and we get a 80-85 mile radius with it. I mention it to show the difference between VHF and UHF. The 2m and 70cm repeaters actually use the same set of antennas and go into a diplexer.

[WRXB215]

10 hours ago, Socalgmrs said:

I make my living working this type of scenario (huge ranches) and I’ve never come across a ranch big enough that a single repeater won’t cut it.  I mean 50w does over 200miles.  Most ranches I’ve been to from central California to Texas and Alabama run 20-40w used motorola repeaters.   They are mooooore then enough for a few 1000 acres most cover well into town and adjacent ranches.

Next time you are in Texas, set up a repeater at Hughes Apache Ranch please.

[amaff]

On 9/17/2024 at 11:51 AM, Herebyproxy said:

Here in North Georgia we have a 25 linked repeater business. And yes, it has turned into a lucrative business charging almost 100 bucks a year for access for 1 user. On their face book page they have stated that they are operating within the regulations and they are not going to unlink the repeaters until they are forced to.....Interesting that gmrs repeater owners are allowed to use the service for profit.

Apparently someone's had enough 

 

[marcspaz]

I would love to tell them that linking over a network is a rule violation, not a law violation, and linking repeaters via analog non-routed RF is assumed to not be a rule violation (legal), since its not explicitly denied in the rules.

 

Now, linking repeaters across the northern part of the state and monopolizing every channel is a @$$h0l3 move... which should be the real topic.

[OffRoaderX]

1 minute ago, marcspaz said:

linking repeaters across the norther part of the state and monopolizing every channel is a @$$h0l3 move

Wait.. How does linking a repeater across multiple states monopolize every channel?

[marcspaz]

1 hour ago, OffRoaderX said:

Wait.. How does linking a repeater across multiple states monopolize every channel?

 

Phrased they way you did, it likely wouldn't. However, in the reddit post, several people implied (or maybe I inferred) that the club/group/whatever has every repeater pair used on their network, making it almost impossible for anyone else to standup their own repeater anywhere in North Georgia due to capture effect on the mobiles in the area. Im sure the capture effect causes problems on simplex and same channel repeater inputs, too.

 

Of course, I am summarizing an interpretation of what I read and sharing an opinion based on that interpretation, assuming it's true.

 

 

[WRUE951]

2 hours ago, amaff said:

Apparently someone's had enough 

 

New York and Jersey runs circles around Georgia in linked repeaters..  Linking is happening in almost every state..  The worst i think, New York  

[amaff]

48 minutes ago, marcspaz said:

Of course, I am summarizing an interpretation of what I read and sharing an opinion based on that interpretation, assuming it's true.

It's true around the big population centers at least, per my family in the area. 15-22 are basically useless because every repeater channel is repeating the same message from some guy on the other side of the state talking about his genital warts or whatever it is rag chewers like to go on about.

[WRKC935]

19 hours ago, amaff said:

It's true around the big population centers at least, per my family in the area. 15-22 are basically useless because every repeater channel is repeating the same message from some guy on the other side of the state talking about his genital warts or whatever it is rag chewers like to go on about.

Gee that sounds like a ham radio conversation. 

Seriously, at a bare minimum the way to report it is saying that the repeaters are being keyed with out the person accessing them being within the coverage footprint of the repeater.  This is causing harmful interference on that frequency / frequencies in a specific location or area.  That is spelled out in the blurb the FCC put on the their web site about why they don't want people linking repeaters.  No way to monitor the frequency in use before accessing it and causing interference. 

Mind you I am all for linking GMRS repeaters, and have even come up with ways to mitigate this and other issues that were cited as being the problems with linking.  But the FCC says the rules are what they are, so until they change the rules, I don't link repeaters. 

Now I will say this, that group has backed themselves into a corner.  If someone is interfering with their linked repeater system, they have ZERO recourse to deal with it.  It's like having a house full of drugs and calling the cops because someone stole their bag of weed.  The FCC is the only governing body with GMRS.  If they call the FCC, then they open themselves up to being looked at for what THEY are doing.  So that's not really an option for them.  Local police and government in general have no ability to enforce FCC regulations.

So, the option they are left with is the redneck thought process of "I'm gonna *insert dumb redneck statement of violence here* and that will get it done.   Of course the problem with that is the local police DO have the ability to deal with that.  And although I'm not sure what Georgia's laws are but if they are like Florida then doing that sort of thing might involve a free trip to a hospital or even the grave yard.  While people may claim that they will just go drag them into their yard and throw them a beating, it's rarely done for that reason.  And can escalate quickly if they do.  And the police will still not give a rip about the GMRS interference, the assault, battery, menacing and all that WILL get a response.

[amaff]

4 hours ago, WRKC935 said:

And the police will still not give a rip about the GMRS interference, the assault, battery, menacing and all that WILL get a response.

Bingo.

[WRUE951]

6 minutes ago, amaff said:

Bingo.

They (police) did one time here when a 70 year old jack wad started cursing at two kids talking on the radio Ch3.. The kids dad, with help from some of us who knows this menacing idiot gave the dad information who and where he lived..  The dad had a recording and took it to the police..  The police made a visit to the idiot, it shut him up for a few months.. He is now occasionaly out there jamming repeaters and making belching and farting noises over radio conversions..  We no longer hear him cursing and harrasing young kids anymore..  

[amaff]

2 hours ago, WRUE951 said:

They (police) did one time here when a 70 year old jack wad started cursing at two kids talking on the radio Ch3.....We no longer hear him cursing and harrasing young kids anymore..  

As usual, it's got little to do with the radio usage, and a lot more to do with what he was actually doing (ie: harassing kids). If it wasn't kids, would they have done anything? Because it doesn't sound like it's stopped his general radio dickery. He just realized that screwing with people's kids MIGHT be a step too far.

[WRUE951]

47 minutes ago, amaff said:

As usual, it's got little to do with the radio usage, and a lot more to do with what he was actually doing (ie: harassing kids). If it wasn't kids, would they have done anything? Because it doesn't sound like it's stopped his general radio dickery. He just realized that screwing with people's kids MIGHT be a step too far.

I think the dad has close ties with the PD, which is fine in my book.. Nothing will stop this guy but at least he stoped bothering kids..  I think the real issue with this guy is on the mental side.  So we live with him making his rounds jamming repeaters..   This guy has an Extra Ham lic so its a bit more  strange why he plays these games.  

[Northcutt114]

On 8/16/2025 at 1:16 PM, marcspaz said:

 

Phrased they way you did, it likely wouldn't. However, in the reddit post, several people implied (or maybe I inferred) that the club/group/whatever has every repeater pair used on their network, making it almost impossible for anyone else to standup their own repeater anywhere in North Georgia due to capture effect on the mobiles in the area. 

This is an accurate assessment of the situation. Can confirm.

[Northcutt114]

On 8/16/2025 at 2:02 PM, amaff said:

It's true around the big population centers at least, per my family in the area. 15-22 are basically useless because every repeater channel is repeating the same message from some guy on the other side of the state talking about his genital warts or whatever it is rag chewers like to go on about.

This is also an accurate assessment of the situation. Can confirm.

 

[Northcutt114]

The issue is, as far as I can tell it, there are a lot of people who are very upset by what the group is doing and who are also, simultaneously, completely unaffected by it. If I lived in the North GA area and I wanted to put up a repeater so that me and the boys could talks fars, only to find out that all the channels were already occupied, I might be a little upset. But I don't and so I'm not. I don't have the emotional bandwidth to virtue signal over things outside of my control.

I have interacted with the group over the air and each and every one of them have been polite and professional. They invite "non members" to participate in their talk arounds. There are some trolls and there are some people kerchunking and roger beeping just to annoy but I kind of liken it to public transportation. If everybody's on the train, someone's going to be annoying.

Having the ability to talk across the state without a HAM license is, I think, the major appeal. Again, some might say, that is not what GMRS is about. I heard it put this way once and I thought it was very accurate. GMRS is the radio you talk on when you're doing an activity. HAM is when the radio is the activity.

Either way, Cotton, I'm looking forward to seeing how it all plays out.

 

[WRKC935]

2 hours ago, Northcutt114 said:

The issue is, as far as I can tell it, there are a lot of people who are very upset by what the group is doing and who are also, simultaneously, completely unaffected by it. If I lived in the North GA area and I wanted to put up a repeater so that me and the boys could talks fars, only to find out that all the channels were already occupied, I might be a little upset. But I don't and so I'm not. I don't have the emotional bandwidth to virtue signal over things outside of my control.

 

 

And for the sake of the discussion, there is NOTHING stopping you from putting a repeater up, on one of the frequencies they are using and talking on it.  And this is for the same reason I gave before on them backing themselves into a corner. They have a linked repeater system and have overlapping coverage of a number of the pairs if not all the pairs.  But again, who are they going to call?  The FCC?  I seriously doubt it. Because again, backed into a corner with no recourse.  What are they gonna tell the FCC?  They going to admit they have all the pairs tied up with linking?  That they are running a for profit business selling air time on GMRS? 

I personally dealt with this in Ohio.  At first I was willing to try to work with the guy.  But he started telling me HE had the pairs and I could only run a short antenna and low power.  His repeaters (turned out to be paper repeaters) were well established.  When I started looking into his repeaters, and found his business license and it stated he was for profit selling air time on GMRS, I picked the two pairs he was on and parked repeaters on both pairs.  He wasn't happy.  I invited him to call the FCC and told him I had all of it documented including his state business license where he was selling air time for profit.  It never went any further.

 

[WRUE951]

8 hours ago, WRKC935 said:

And for the sake of the discussion, there is NOTHING stopping you from putting a repeater up, on one of the frequencies they are using and talking on it.  And this is for the same reason I gave before on them backing themselves into a corner. They have a linked repeater system and have overlapping coverage of a number of the pairs if not all the pairs.  But again, who are they going to call?  The FCC?  I seriously doubt it. Because again, backed into a corner with no recourse.  What are they gonna tell the FCC?  They going to admit they have all the pairs tied up with linking?  That they are running a for profit business selling air time on GMRS? 

I personally dealt with this in Ohio.  At first I was willing to try to work with the guy.  But he started telling me HE had the pairs and I could only run a short antenna and low power.  His repeaters (turned out to be paper repeaters) were well established.  When I started looking into his repeaters, and found his business license and it stated he was for profit selling air time on GMRS, I picked the two pairs he was on and parked repeaters on both pairs.  He wasn't happy.  I invited him to call the FCC and told him I had all of it documented including his state business license where he was selling air time for profit.  It never went any further.

 

 My recourse in a situation where all pairs are taken by the same person or group,  would be to put up an open repeater on the most busiest channel and share  .. Thats basicly all you can do..  If the guy wants to claim airwave ownership and threaten to call the FCC, buy him some popcorn..    

[Northcutt114]

8 hours ago, WRKC935 said:

And for the sake of the discussion, there is NOTHING stopping you from putting a repeater up, on one of the frequencies they are using and talking on it.  And this is for the same reason I gave before on them backing themselves into a corner. They have a linked repeater system and have overlapping coverage of a number of the pairs if not all the pairs.  But again, who are they going to call?  The FCC?  I seriously doubt it. Because again, backed into a corner with no recourse.  What are they gonna tell the FCC?  They going to admit they have all the pairs tied up with linking?  That they are running a for profit business selling air time on GMRS? 

I personally dealt with this in Ohio.  At first I was willing to try to work with the guy.  But he started telling me HE had the pairs and I could only run a short antenna and low power.  His repeaters (turned out to be paper repeaters) were well established.  When I started looking into his repeaters, and found his business license and it stated he was for profit selling air time on GMRS, I picked the two pairs he was on and parked repeaters on both pairs.  He wasn't happy.  I invited him to call the FCC and told him I had all of it documented including his state business license where he was selling air time for profit.  It never went any further.

It's interesting for sure. They claim that they are not in violation of any rules. Last night, I was in range of one of their repeaters and was listening to some of the chatter. Two gentlemen talking about their adult daughters and at some break in the conversation, someone just started keying up with a roger beep, over and over and over. Once it subsided one of the other gentlemen said something to the effect of how it just burned him up that people kept harassing them when they "weren't doing nothing wrong." I thought to myself, "I'm not sure the guy roger beeping would agree with you."

I certainly don't get the feeling that this group feels they own the air waves, though. A few weeks ago I was up in their area and I overheard a conversation between someone who claimed to be the owner of the organization. The other gentleman claimed to have gotten a radio from him some months back and he couldn't talk to anyone on it nor could they hear him. The man who claimed to be the owner seemed not to have a memory of who this person was or having given him a radio. Regardless, he was polite and professional. He offered the other gentlemen his cell number and mailing address. He told him to mail the radio and he'd see what he could do to fix it and mail it back at his own expense. Hardly the attitude that I see others on the net depicting of him.

I'm torn. I get the outrage but like I said, it's largely from people outside the AO. People that I've run across in the area seem happy with it, largely. One guy told me, "Heck man, I can't put a repeater on top of that mountain for what it costs me to join up." and, I mean, he kinda has a point.

[UncleYoda]

24 minutes ago, Northcutt114 said:

They claim that they are not in violation of any rules.

That's not even believable.

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I'm torn. I get the outrage but like I said, it's largely from people outside the AO.

As someone from outside the AO (but within receive range of Augusta repeater, which used to be linked), I still have an interest in the issue.  Some brave soul who lives there should document the details and submit it to FCC and let them sort it out.

[Northcutt114]

30 minutes ago, UncleYoda said:

That's not even believable.

That's kind of how I feel. And it's a sentiment that I've heard several times. Others, though, seem to be aware and are in defiance. Awhile back some guy keyed up and asked for a radio check. The guy who asked for the check was a HAM operator recently moved to the area from somewhere out west, as I recall. He was new to GMRS and "didn't know you guys on GMRS were allowed to link repeaters online." What followed was a brief conversation between him and the guy who answered his check where the other guy admitted that they were aware of the FCC's clarification but that "the rule hasn't been officially changed" and that "until the FCC forces us to" they weren't going to change. HAM guy said "Good for you" and signed off.

 

30 minutes ago, UncleYoda said:

As someone from outside the AO (but within receive range of Augusta repeater, which used to be linked), I still have an interest in the issue.  Some brave soul who lives there should document the details and submit it to FCC and let them sort it out.

Even in my brief time in this hobby, I have come to believe that the FCC's doesn't do much enforcement at all. Plus, I kinda always like the pirate and the underdog in a fight. And if I wanted to be able to talk all over North GA, I couldn't do it myself for what they are asking in dues. But I also don't walk to talk all over North GA, nor do I sometimes want to hear them do it. So, there's that.

 

[GreggInFL]

6 minutes ago, Northcutt114 said:

What followed was a brief conversation between him and the guy who answered his check where the other guy admitted that they were aware of the FCC's clarification but that "the rule hasn't been officially changed" and that "until the FCC forces us to" they weren't going to change. HAM guy said "Good for you" and signed off.

LOL. The HAM guy who said "Good for you" will probably be the one who turns them in.

[Northcutt114]

3 minutes ago, GreggInFL said:

LOL. The HAM guy who said "Good for you" will probably be the one who turns them in.

Could be...or maybe HAM guy is secretly a pirate radio guy at heart? I don't know. If you look around, there's a couple of mega threads on a few different forums (none of which are local to the area) with people saying that they are going to report them...and all of those threads are over a year old now.