Your First GMRS Repeater...

[quarterwave]

For some of us here, we've been doing this a while.

I thought it might be fun for some of us to share what we used for our first repeater. Was it a repeater or something we built into one? Here's mine (Don't laugh at me too much!):

My first one was more or less for testing. I used a Motorola MOXY mobile doing about 30 watts, and the receiver was a Bearcat 400 mobile scanner. I used a vox controller to key it. That's not all...it was split site...no duplexer. Vertical antenna seperation was about 25 feet and horizontal was about 150 feet. It surprisingly didn't work to bad. I had a phone cable that I buried from A to B and it carried audio plus a switched ground and 12V reference for the relay to key the mobile. Funny, but it worked. I later switched to a Radius mobile for the reciever (with PL!) and true COR to the mobile, but I used a reed relay to isolate them electrically. I later had a Micor, and then a couple of Radius with a duplexer, which I still use, and now my MTR2000 that hopefully will last a long time.

 

[cavmedic]

Two gm300's with that eBay controller.


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[cavmedic]

Then I rebuilt with cdm1550's , cat 200 controller, astron ps and all rack mounted in a portable flight case.


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[phillydjdan]

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2 GM-300s and a rick controller feeding a 5db uhf antenna on the roof via LMR400 cable...

 

[joesheets]

This is very timely thread!
I have been thinking of building my first repeater for family and friends to use locally on the GMRS band.

A few questions:
1) What kind of antenna would work best and at what height?
2) What kind of range are we talking about?
3) Are there power restrictions (20, 30, 50 watt)?
4) Right now, I have a Diamond discone at about 35 feet. works well for 2m 70cm on ham bands. would this be a reasonable antenna to use?

Thanks in advance,
Joe

 

[wb4wdu]

WoW, You guys had some good stuff to start out with. I made my first repeater from 2 GE Progress Line mobiles. All tubes. The antennas were mobile antennas with the receive antenna mounted about 150 feet up a tower and the transmit about 50 feet lower. Powering these units took a big power supply, A big battery charger and a car battery. Later I was given an old progress line base station and pulled the Transmitter and receiver from the mobiles and put them in the station cabinet. My next repeater was a GE Mastr Progress line. It had a solidstate receiver and the transmitter was a solidstate exciter and tube type PA. Man it worked a lot better than the tube type unit. All this was back in the 70's when I had the time to play with things. The antenna cable on the first repeater was RG-8 which had a huge amount of loss.

 

[quarterwave]

This is very timely thread!
I have been thinking of building my first repeater for family and friends to use locally on the GMRS band.

A few questions:
1) What kind of antenna would work best and at what height?
2) What kind of range are we talking about?
3) Are there power restrictions (20, 30, 50 watt)?
4) Right now, I have a Diamond discone at about 35 feet. works well for 2m 70cm on ham bands. would this be a reasonable antenna to use?

Thanks in advance,
Joe

Literally:
1 - Gain, and as high as possible
2 - Depends on terrain and antenna height
3- 50 out of the PA
4 - Yes, if it will tune to 462 Mhz

 

[gewecke]

Well, both my repeaters have been 440mhz. micor units using a controller, one of several that I build by hand for ICS.

ICS LINKER IIa REPEATER CONTROLLER Product Reviews

I have yet to put one together on GMRS, but may in the future.

73 & Happy Holidays,
n9zas

 

[rescuecomm]

Uniden ARU-150 if I recall correctly with flat pack duplexer.

Bob

 

[ywhic]

Motorola SM50 for TX (40w) with a CPU fan right on the TX 'pin'.. and GM300 for RX.. EBay $9 cable with the small gain potentiometer.. 25' of LMR400.. still waiting on the HK EBay 50w duplexer..

Also since I found out LMR400 isn't too good for duplex repeaters I just bought 45' of LDF4-50A Heliax for $51 shipped.. it should make the DB loss a decent 0.662 of so..

The Heliax and antenna duplexer should be here the same time.. I hope..

Browning BR-450 5/8 5.5 dbd Antenna is at 41 feet to the tip..

Using the SM50 in testing I got almost 10 miles going North and 9.1 miles going South to my Kenwood 805D in my car with a 5db mag mount antenna..

Its only on from 9am to 2pm so I can monitor it and do the callsign every 15 minutes per the rules..

 

[quarterwave]

Motorola SM50 for TX (40w) with a CPU fan right on the TX 'pin'.. and GM300 for RX.. EBay $9 cable with the small gain potentiometer.. 25' of LMR400.. still waiting on the HK EBay 50w duplexer..

Also since I found out LMR400 isn't too good for duplex repeaters I just bought 45' of LDF4-50A Heliax for $51 shipped.. it should make the DB loss a decent 0.662 of so..

The Heliax and antenna duplexer should be here the same time.. I hope..

Browning BR-450 5/8 5.5 dbd Antenna is at 41 feet to the tip..

Using the SM50 in testing I got almost 10 miles going North and 9.1 miles going South to my Kenwood 805D in my car with a 5db mag mount antenna..

Its only on from 9am to 2pm so I can monitor it and do the callsign every 15 minutes per the rules..

I have not used a SM50 for TX, but I have used a M120 (same as GM300, exc 2 channel) for a TX side for about 15-16 years....never had an issue. I force feed the cabinet with air using 2 - 4" fans. I have seen some SM50 / SP50 combos out there...SM50 for TX and the guts of a SP50 portable as the RX. Always wondered how well the SM50 holds up with heat. I guess in your case, it would be easy to reverse the two if you ever had an issue.