I’ve been getting into GMRS recently and have finally committed to setting up my own repeater!
What is GMRS?
GMRS is basically Walkie-Talkies on steroids.
It uses the same channels and frequencies as the walkie-talkies from Wal-Mart, but after you buy a $35 license that covers you and the whole immediate family for 10 years, you get permission to operate radios with multitudes more power output. And with more power, you get more range!
Walkie Talkies operate without a license with what is calls FRS (Family Radio Service), and you’re limited to 2 Watts output. With 2W, you get barely a mile or so even in direct line-of-site. With GMRS, your radio can now operate with 5W. Which, is a little bit more range, but now you also get the benefit of having an external or exchangeable antenna. So you can get better signal output over that further range, which results in a better experience overall. And now, those 5W radios can benefit from using a repeater!
Which brings us to this post. A repeater is a middle-man device that takes in the signal, and outputs the same signal, effectively extending the range of whatever radio you have in your possession.
However, your 5W handheld radio you input into the repeater might only be able to reach a couple miles, but the repeater has the ability to output 50W! So if you were 5 miles south of the repeater, and that was effectively the limit to your range, then the repeater reaches 20+ miles, then your total range with your handheld radio can now be 25 or more miles!
That’s what I’ve now set up.
With the additional range, you can talk to multiple people with a $50 radio, instead of investing thousands to get the same range.
Think of GMRS like this
If you have a single Watt, think of is as a single finger in a lake. The ripples you make with your finger travel at a predetermined rate. Now, if you have 2 Watts, think of that as having 2 fingers making waves.
If you have 50 Watts, you have the equivalent of 10 whole fists making a splash! That’s a lot more effect, but the waves will be the same speed. So if you were trying to reach around a dock, the waves of the fists are more likely to spread and reach the destination because the waves have more mass, but not more speed.
It makes it so you are more likely to hit the destination with a cleaner signal. Your Walkie-Talkies with 2W might not be able to reach through the walls of your house and still have the momentum to reach the other radio. That’s why you sometimes struggle to make contact with FRS.
HAM, on the other hand, requires you to take a test and still pay a fee for your license, but now you have permission to use 1500 Watts! And with how many people are using HAM to study radio and make it a science, there is an abundance of repeaters even with 1500W to reach all around the world, not just your locality.
So with GMRS, you’re able to get a lot more range, and benefit from repeaters, and still be able to test out different setups and even have vehicle installations, but you don’t have to take a test or make it your life’s hobby. You just pay $35 as a fee, get 10 years with that, and now you can use those radios and even get your own callsign!
Why set up a repeater?
I didn’t have the need for HAM, as that is per-user, not per-family like GMRS, so all you’re talking to is other HAMs. I wanted a practical communication method that didn’t require a test, and the whole family could use it.
Being able to use repeaters means that anyone in the area can respond in the event of an emergency. If there was a fire that caused me to evacuate, I can’t rely on the Fire Department to make minute-by-minute updates on Twitter. And buying a police scanner to listen on their comms was really expensive and still limited in use.
I wanted something useful all around, and great in emergencies. I now have family-comms that reach mostly around town, and eventually can be linked up over the network to communicate all over the country!
And once I got into radios at all, there was more and more I wanted to do with all of it. So a repeater makes it almost like hosting my own website, where you learn more and more about the background of it all when you’re the one doing it. So now I can use my own “chat room” of sorts freely without worrying about who else is trying to speak.
I set up a repeater so that in the event of an emergency, there was more opportunity for people to relay the important information. If one repeater goes down, there is another one to use.
Check out the repeater!
Head on over to https://haikuGMRS.com
If you’re wondering, “why Haiku?” it’s because the frequency the repeater is set up on uses 462.575. And 5-7-5 is the pattern for a haiku! Since words are being spoken, it just made sense.
It’s also easy to remember the frequency if you’re trying to set up the repeater on the fly.
Are you in to radios?
If not, ask questions! I’ve grown to believe it’s the ultimate form of communication that can’t be taken away or broken. Radio waves travel at the speed of light, and being wireless means instant information delivery. Phone services rely on multiple radio towers to connect and deliver information to your phone, and if any node of that network breaks then you might be out of signal and your phone is useless. Sure, wifi, but if the cell tower is down, most likely so is any internetworking. Say if a hurricane blows through, and the whole town is without power or connectivity, radios are the only method of ranged comms.
I believe every family should have a GMRS license and at least 1 radio per family member. No matter what, you never know when you’ll need them.
Heck, I used mine to communicate from the attic when putting up the antenna and routing the cable! Better than screaming at each other.
You don’t have to be a HAM to understand how the radios work, just understand the benefits of GMRS over FRS in terms of higher the number of Watts, the more likely you are to reach your intended destination.
Go grab a GMRS license, grab radios, and tune in to the repeater! Enjoy having the comfort that you will always have a method of communication when you need it.