PMR in the U.S. ?? Has anyone used it or gave it any thought ?

[rf_patriot200]

I picked up a couple of Icom radios, IC-F3162DT and IC-F6162DT. Both can do FM and dPMR digital mode.
Is there a list of dPMR talk groups used on the Ham bands? This would likely be for the EU area since dPMR doesn't seem to be used in North America.

Also dPMR446 seems a bit different. Particularly with regards to radio ID's and talkgroups. Looks like they use "common ID's". Not sure how those map to radio ID's and talkgroups.

Correct. It technically Can be used in the United States, as long as you're a licensed Amateur radio op. I have 1-16 in most of my digital radios.

 

[GlobalNorth]

Keep in mind that we, as amateurs, are a secondary user to the DoD and their PAVE PAWS early warning radar system, as well as other radar system in that bands. There is an area in Alaska which amateurs can not operate in 70 cm, as well as an area proximal to the Canadian/US b

 

[kc8ldo]

Keep in mind that we, as amateurs, are a secondary user to the DoD and their PAVE PAWS early warning radar system, as well as other radar system in that bands. There is an area in Alaska which amateurs can not operate in 70 cm, as well as an area proximal to the Canadian/US b

I understand all of that. My question is specifically about dPMR. I was looking at how to program a UHF Icom radio, IC-F4162DT, to intra-communicate with a license free, in the EU, dPMR446 radio here in the US. Of course both radios would be operating in the Ham 70cm band here, thus requiring the user to have at least a Tech Class license. I‘ve been reading the standards document to get some idea how to do it. There are some differences between the “normal“ dPMR and the lower tier dPMR446.

https://dpmrassociation.org/downloads/ETSI/ts_102490v010901p.pdf

This is an example of a dPMR446 license free radio.

https://www.kenwood.eu/files/file/comms/uk/brochures/TK-3701D_20191030_LR.pdf

 

[kc8ldo]

This is the radio series I’m working with from Icom.

 

[exkalibur]

I have the PMR frequencies in my "License Free" scanlist along with FRS/GMRS and MURS. I've heard a decent amount of people on the PMR frequencies that are clearly not licensed hams. I'm betting they're people from overseas, or people that bought a set over there and brought them home.

 

[paulears]

As we’d say in the UK, you are all bonkers! If our PMR446 band is inside the US ham band, available to everyone licenced, why on earth would you want to tie your hands behind your back with a few channels, on a narrow channel spacing, when you could use that channel spacing with your existing radios?

most UK PMR446 radios may well have 6.25KHz channels, but they are NOT very narrow on receive at all. The deviation is turned down, but with low power, few users notice the filtering is a bit, er, less narrow than it should be. All you get is low power, and a bit of co-channel interference. No advantages at all i can think of?

 

[kc8ldo]

I have the PMR frequencies in my "License Free" scanlist along with FRS/GMRS and MURS. I've heard a decent amount of people on the PMR frequencies that are clearly not licensed hams. I'm betting they're people from overseas, or people that bought a set over there and brought them home.

I asked that question in another forum. This is the first I had someone confirm it happens here.

 

[kc8ldo]

As we’d say in the UK, you are all bonkers! If our PMR446 band is inside the US ham band, available to everyone licenced, why on earth would you want to tie your hands behind your back with a few channels, on a narrow channel spacing, when you could use that channel spacing with your existing radios?

most UK PMR446 radios may well have 6.25KHz channels, but they are NOT very narrow on receive at all. The deviation is turned down, but with low power, few users notice the filtering is a bit, er, less narrow than it should be. All you get is low power, and a bit of co-channel interference. No advantages at all i can think of?

Yeah, narrow band FM isn’t that interesting to me. My interest was in the digital mode. I have radios for D-Star, DMR, NXDN, P25 and now dDPMR. Nothing for System Fusion yet. I’m trying to get up to speed on dPMR.

I was possibly looking at a business trip to the UK a couple months ago. It could still happen so my interest in getting a radio setup for dPMR446 without the low power requirement. As the other poster pointed out he has encountered people in the US using those radios here.

In any case I’m trying to figure out how to make a “normal” dPMR radio communicate with the low power license free units. There seem to be some significant differences with radio ID’s and talk groups.

 

[paulears]

I saw plenty of Brits with our radios (usually the cheap blister packed ones) skiing - I didn't at the time realise 446 was a ham frequency in the US - ours is 430-440.

 

[AB4BF]

For us hams who are not familiar with dPMR, here is a wiki page:

Digital private mobile radio - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Very interesting reading...

 

[paulears]

There is huge confusion here - as in DMR vs dPMR as formats, not the digital pmr446 system. As far as I understand it, the ETSI idea was for the FDMA system with 6.25KHz spacing, but the people who use things like Baofengs and similar on the PMR446 band, to get a bit better range, are slapping DMR (TDMA) onto the digital channels, with the normal 12.5KHz bandwidth. As a result results can be very variable. People might buy things like Icoms or Kenwood Nexedge and have it working splendidly, but easily wrecked by the DMR transmissions. How any of this then slots into the US amateur band I cannot imagine?

 

[kc8ldo]

There is huge confusion here - as in DMR vs dPMR as formats, not the digital pmr446 system. As far as I understand it, the ETSI idea was for the FDMA system with 6.25KHz spacing, but the people who use things like Baofengs and similar on the PMR446 band, to get a bit better range, are slapping DMR (TDMA) onto the digital channels, with the normal 12.5KHz bandwidth. As a result results can be very variable. People might buy things like Icoms or Kenwood Nexedge and have it working splendidly, but easily wrecked by the DMR transmissions. How any of this then slots into the US amateur band I cannot imagine?

The EU really screwed up by allowing two, but incompatible, digital modes to be used on license free PMR446 service. One is the tier-1 DMR, people are really using tier-2 radios, and the second is the mode-1 dPMR. That gets people really confused.

https://kenwoodcommunications.co.uk/files/file/comms/uk/pmr446/PMR446-White-Paper-V6_18AUG2016_JT_KB.pdf

I also wonder just how many people are using the very narrow mode NXDN radios on the dPMR446 frequencies. The bandwidths are the same. If you look at a SDR waterfall display you can't tell the difference.