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Best GMRS handdheld & mobile
- Thread starter gabrod
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I know its non-compliant with the FCC rules but I use a dual band (Kenwood TM-V71A) ham rig for just what you are asking. Works great. It's really your only option for what you want. Most folks I know use commercial mobile and portable radio for GMRS but they are mono band UHF rigs for the most part.
Stephen
Member
XPR7550, used for commercial, GMRS, and ham very well.
FWIW, GMRS is WFM and a lot of the new production Part 90 radios (last couple of years or so) wont do WFM.
Just saying that in case you thought about going that route.
Just saying that in case you thought about going that route.
Is this radio capable of hitting repeaters from 50 miles away?
Ohh man this looks nice, I forgot abouit this, One company around here rents these radios for you to use around here, but they are expensive
thank youThanks let me look into it
n1das
Member
GMRS can use either "wide" or "narrow" bandwidth. The cheap 22-channel GMRS/FRS bubble pack radios are narrow on all channels. There were a few models for a while that had the option of using "wide" bandwidth on the GMRS primary channels. The old 14 channel FRS-only bubble packs are narrow-only and have been from day one. Narrowband capable Part 90 gear was coming on the market around when FRS was created in 1996. IIRC, all Part 90 equipment has been required to have narrow bandwidth capability since 1997.
Many GMRS repeater owners (myself included) have had problems with their repeaters getting keyed up by adjacent channel splatter from bubble pack users on the upper 7 FRS channels spaced 12.5kHz away from the (wide bandwidth) repeater inputs. The repeater gets keyed up by a bubble pack using a PL tone matching a tone in the repeater. The repeated audio comes out very distorted due to the bubble pack being 12.5kHz off-frequency from the repeater input. I fixed this in my repeaters by operating the repeater in "narrow" bandwidth mode.
I have also had problems in my neighborhood when operating simplex in wide mode on the GMRS primaries. Local bubble pack users on one of the GMRS splinters (shared with FRS 1-7) often are heard splattering onto the GMRS primary channel I'm using only 12.5kHz away. I solved this problem by using narrow mode. The Part 90 radios I'm using also have Part 95 type acceptance so they are 100% legit for GMRS use.
All of my adjacent channel splatter problems from local bubble pack users completely went away after switching to narrow mode on all GMRS channels. I now operate only in narrow mode with my Part 90 radios on GMRS. I found it better to simply go with the flow of Part 90 and use good Part 90 equipment.
Good luck.
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I don't know. Are any handheld GMRS radios cable of that? It will depend on terrain and the repeater I am sure. It is a very good, solid performing radio. You aren't going to find many new GMRS radios with the capabilities you are looking for that are actually part 95 certified, the Tr-505 is. Buy one and try it, they have a great return policy.
gabrod, if you want to monitor many things, buy a SCANNER.
If you start randomly screwing around with radios and services, most of which require specific licenses and approvals, you open yourself up to simple mistakes that can result in an FCC Notice of Violation followed by a four or five figure fine.
Start with ONE radio (transceiver) for ONE service and ONE license, unless you start with a scanner, which is receive-only. You'll come out ahead in the long run.
If you start randomly screwing around with radios and services, most of which require specific licenses and approvals, you open yourself up to simple mistakes that can result in an FCC Notice of Violation followed by a four or five figure fine.
Start with ONE radio (transceiver) for ONE service and ONE license, unless you start with a scanner, which is receive-only. You'll come out ahead in the long run.
That depends more on the repeater's antenna height than on the HT!
For a 50 mile reception range, a repeater's antenna will need to be at least 1000' or higher!
Line-of-Sight calculations yield the answers to such questions:
Radio Line of Sight Calculator for use on VHF/UHF Ham Bands
The average HT's antenna height is around 5.5'. This alone will provide only 6 miles LoS. Two HTs will therefore have around 12 miles LoS. Of course both of these examples are under ideal conditions, meaning no obstructions at all. You'd likely find such conditions only on the prairies in Midwestern states.
For my purposes I assume a maximum of about 40% to 50% of the LoS range.
mmckenna
I ♥ Ø
Do -NOT- use a hacked/modified amateur radio for GMRS.
1. It's illegal, the amateur radios do not have type certification for any services. Amateur doesn't require type certification for transmitters, even mass produced ones. They do have Part 15 type certifications, but thats for the receiver only.
2. A lot of amateur gear is 25KHz FM channel width only, and there are situations where you may need narrow band FM, especially if you need to talk to the consumer grade FRS and FRS/GMRS radios.
3. Some amateur gear has filtering on the transmit side that may not play well with transmitting outside the amateur bands.
4. You can do better, and you can do better legally.
Part 95 compliant radios are out there and are plentiful. Most of them will cover the 70cm amateur radio band just fine (and legally!). Many of us who have/had GMRS and Amateur licenses have done this. Most modern commercial radios have a lot of memories, so it's not difficult to program in 70cm amateur radio repeaters and simplex frequencies.
Commercial radios come with handy features that amateur gear doesn't have, like off hook PL decode. I found this -very- useful when I had access to a busy repeater. The repeater owner assigned me my own CTCSS tone, so I could set up RX CTCSS on the radios so I'd only hear traffic from my family. Taking the mic off hook switched it to carrier squelch so I could hear if the repeater was in use before transmitting. Also, while annoying in some cases, options like MDC1200 or FleetSync can be handy for radio ID's.
"Best" radio depends on a couple of things that you haven't provided information on.
1. "Best" depends on your budget. The "best" $250 radio is a lot different from the "best" $1000 radio.
2. What is your installation area like for your mobile? Do you need a remote head?
3. What's your experience level? Have you programmed commercial radios before, or do you need the radio programmed for you?
4. What's your expectations for coverage? Be realistic here....
There are a lot of really excellent radios out there that are perfectly legal and will do what you want. Having realistic expectations and an appropriate budget means a lot to picking one out.
When developing your list of expectations and your budget don't forget the antenna system. For mobiles, you really do need a decent mobile antenna, preferably permanent mount NMO. If you are planning on using a radio as a base, you need to consider a suitable base antenna, feed line, lightning suppression, grounding, antenna mounting, power supply, etc.
As for receiving, adding a scanner to your equipment will open up your options quite a bit and may actually get you a better overall system rather than trying to fit all these functions int one radio. It may also be a lot cheaper if you want to listen to services that are running P25, DMR, NXDN, Trunking, etc. This also lets you keep your two way radio available, rather than tying it up listening to other traffic.
1. It's illegal, the amateur radios do not have type certification for any services. Amateur doesn't require type certification for transmitters, even mass produced ones. They do have Part 15 type certifications, but thats for the receiver only.
2. A lot of amateur gear is 25KHz FM channel width only, and there are situations where you may need narrow band FM, especially if you need to talk to the consumer grade FRS and FRS/GMRS radios.
3. Some amateur gear has filtering on the transmit side that may not play well with transmitting outside the amateur bands.
4. You can do better, and you can do better legally.
Part 95 compliant radios are out there and are plentiful. Most of them will cover the 70cm amateur radio band just fine (and legally!). Many of us who have/had GMRS and Amateur licenses have done this. Most modern commercial radios have a lot of memories, so it's not difficult to program in 70cm amateur radio repeaters and simplex frequencies.
Commercial radios come with handy features that amateur gear doesn't have, like off hook PL decode. I found this -very- useful when I had access to a busy repeater. The repeater owner assigned me my own CTCSS tone, so I could set up RX CTCSS on the radios so I'd only hear traffic from my family. Taking the mic off hook switched it to carrier squelch so I could hear if the repeater was in use before transmitting. Also, while annoying in some cases, options like MDC1200 or FleetSync can be handy for radio ID's.
"Best" radio depends on a couple of things that you haven't provided information on.
1. "Best" depends on your budget. The "best" $250 radio is a lot different from the "best" $1000 radio.
2. What is your installation area like for your mobile? Do you need a remote head?
3. What's your experience level? Have you programmed commercial radios before, or do you need the radio programmed for you?
4. What's your expectations for coverage? Be realistic here....
There are a lot of really excellent radios out there that are perfectly legal and will do what you want. Having realistic expectations and an appropriate budget means a lot to picking one out.
When developing your list of expectations and your budget don't forget the antenna system. For mobiles, you really do need a decent mobile antenna, preferably permanent mount NMO. If you are planning on using a radio as a base, you need to consider a suitable base antenna, feed line, lightning suppression, grounding, antenna mounting, power supply, etc.
As for receiving, adding a scanner to your equipment will open up your options quite a bit and may actually get you a better overall system rather than trying to fit all these functions int one radio. It may also be a lot cheaper if you want to listen to services that are running P25, DMR, NXDN, Trunking, etc. This also lets you keep your two way radio available, rather than tying it up listening to other traffic.
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