[OT] Radio help.

[Drew]

Hello,

It's been a long time since I posted anything here, but I remember a lot of radio geeks being here, and was hoping to get a little help from some of you folks if you have the time, and I thank you in advance for sharing your knowledge.

My situation is this. I'm currently working on a project in the mountains of Western NC, and cellular reception is zip most of the time. The crew is not always in the same place, nor in close proximity to each other. Not having means of communication can become a bit of a safety issue, so I was considering some high powered handheld radios for communication. The problem is, as I start to look around, there are a lot of radios available on Amazon that appear to be fairly powerful, but state they are expressly not legal in the US as currently programmed.

I openly admit, I know nothing about radio. I will also admit that I'd rather not spend huge amounts of money - but something weather resistant....or proof, that's legal in the US, and will give the best possible range in mountains covered with thick foliage is probably not going to be cheap. Thus, I reach out to those who may be able to give me some advice on what to look for, or recommendations for radios that may work for me. For the record, range should never be more than 3 miles, but it may be 3 miles up a pass between two mountains, or from opposite sides of a mountain, which may be wishful thinking. Nevertheless, I'd like to give it the best chance of working with good gear because, ultimately, while 99% of the time these radios may serve only for convenience, that 1% it could really be a matter of safety is a reality.

Thanks again for any assistance any of you folks can provide. Feel free to respond to me off list in order to keep traffic down.

Drew

[Gibson Prichard]

2-way radios fall into two categories: licensed and unlicensed. In the unlicensed class, you are basically restricted to what is known as Family Radio Services, or FRS in the UHF band, or MURS in the VHF band. There are 22 channels in FRS, with most being limited to 2 watts output, which can provide the coverage you are looking for, terrain depending, of course. See https://www.fcc.gov/wireless/bureau-divisions/mobility-division/family-radio-service-frs - page about FRS and you can purchase radios on eBay and Amazon that will operate in these channels, but they may need programming out of the box in order to work on those channels. I am partial toward the low-cost radios from Retevis, such as the H777S, which come programmed on the FRS channels. They are inexpensive enough that you can lose one or drop one off a mountain and not be out any serious money.

That being said, you can apply for a license for a licensed radio channel from the FCC, which would permit a higher-power operation, but the scope of the frequency coordination and licensing might be outside the nature of a simple NLUG email. I have done it, including recently, and it's not hard, but there are a number of questions to answer that most casual radio users might not know the answer to. There are also a myriad of websites that will help you with the process, some for a fee, and some not, but most of them are interested in you buying something from them, like the radios themselves. See https://www.techwholesale.com/fcclicense.html for an example.

Any further questions, ask away. There are a few of us on the NLUG list with radio (ham and business-band) experience that can help.

Gibson Prichard

Nashville, TN

gib...@prichard.tv

615-948-4609

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[Justin W Elam]

Good Evening and 73s to you this Saturday evening.

Like Gibson stated you can go licensed or unlicensed.

Unlicensed on either FRS or CB bands for example. You can pick up both equipment fairly cheaply at your favorite store, Wal-Mart, Amazon, or truck stop.

For what it's worth you would probably be better off with a bunch of CB radios and 12 V auto  batteries.

It works and there is several channels available. Most radios are AM based  have 4 watts PEP, Single sideband radios can use up to 12 watts PEP.

At 4 watts AM you can go 2 to 15 miles dependent on line of sight and antenna height which most are vertical. 

FCC permits a max of 160 miles between contact on the CB frequencies skipping through the ionosphere. Usually at night you will get foreign stations taking over the frequencies. You also must stay within the limitations and cannot use an amplifier or you lose your 'license by rule'

However licensed is another option that can be done. However there is more costs in both time and money. You must decide what equipment you want to buy. Then you have to get you license from FCC and the ULS for the appropriate bands of frequencies for general mobile radio service, business radio or amateur radio.

So you have some options. 

Based on your previous message.

I think giving each of your team's a portable CB, along with mobile stations for the trucks and base station. You should be pretty good. You can load it all into a backpack if you need to. Again a 5 foot vertical antenna will do much better than a shorter one.

All for a couple hundred dollars from your local truck stop.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Cheers from Justin 

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Justin W Elam
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NNNN

[Tilghman Lesher]

To add a little to the discussion, I'd point out that in neither FRS
nor MURS are repeaters permitted. And given that your crews may not
be in close proximity to one another, it does sound like a repeater
would be a sensible addition, mainly because radio doesn't penetrate
through mountains all that well. Your best bet looks like GMRS,
which, although licensed, can be had for fairly cheap, and you really
only need a single license for your entire organization. Each station
needs to mention the license ID on communications, and you can
differentiate between stations with a -1, -2, etc. My GMRS license is
long since expired, but it was something like WQFE722, so the stations
would be WQFE722-1, WQFE722-2, etc.

You don't need specific line-of-sight to the repeater, but it does
need to be accessible without the signal trying to go through
mountains.

On Sat, Aug 15, 2020 at 5:16 PM Drew <coth...@gmail.com> wrote:
>

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Tilghman

[Tilghman Lesher]

Whoops. I remembered one of the license criteria incorrectly. You
only need a single license if this is a family project. If this is a
business project, GMRS may not work, and you may have to switch to a
licensed business band. These are a bit more complicated, in that the
frequency is assigned, and you can only use it within a specific
geographic area -- to prevent interference between licensed users.

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Tilghman