GMRS Basics - Everything You Need To Know To Be A GMRS Expert AKA GMRS 101 or GMRS For Dummies

my friends there is no stopping it new studies have proven that all the cool kids are now using gmrs radios but because gmrs is growing so quickly that means there's a lot of new gmrs cool kids coming on board that means there is much confusion and fear but fear not because i am here to help all the new gmrs school kids the beginners and by that i mean you because in case i have not mentioned it before you are my favorite viewer so in this video i am going to relieve you of all of your gmrs insecurities and fears and i will explain all of the basics the very very basics of gmrs so that by the end of this video you will be an official certified youtube gmrs cool kid expert and what do i ask in return for this invaluable service i'm not going to beg you to subscribe and click the bell i'm not going to plead for you to join my channel like so many other desperate youtubers do but a thank you would be nice so what is gmrs as the shirt says gmrs stands for general mobile radio service gmrs is very similar to but different from ham radio gmrs is not ham radio gmrs is made for normal people normal people to talk to other normal people it's basically cb 2.0 for when you're on the road off-roading adventuring hiking skydiving or sitting on your couch whenever you need to talk to another person and just pick up a radio to use gmrs you don't need to understand what direction electricity flows through a diode or what a standing wave ratio is or how to calculate watts to amps to volts all you need to know how to do is hold a radio and push the button so allow me to explain some of the technical details as technical as you'll need to know details of gmrs to help you on your road to gmrs expertise so that you can become a certified youtube gmrs expert gmrs operates in the 462 and 467 megahertz range it is limited to 22 channels plus eight special repeater channels notice i said channels and not frequencies that 462 and 467 67 megahertz that i mentioned a moment ago you don't have to remember that all you need to remember is 22 channels and sometimes eight repeater channels it's very simple now one big point of confusion with the new gmrs cool kids is those repeater channels because they share they overlap with the regular 22 gmrs channels and this can cause much confusion the reason that it's so confusing is because you can listen to repeaters you can listen to people talking on repeaters on regular gmrs channels 15 through 22 but you can't talk to them unless you configure your radio radio to use one of those special repeater channels and set it all up so you may hear people talking on say gmrs channel 15 but you can't talk to them every time you try to talk to them they're not ignoring you it's just that they can't hear you if you're not talking on that same repeater if your gmrs radio is repeater capable it will have more channels special channels 23 through 30 that you can set up to use to talk on a repeater many radios have even more channels that you can configure to use as repeater channels but you're still limited to only those special eight repeater channels no matter what the box says when it says 200 channels 500 channels there are still only 22 gmrs channels plus eight special repeater channels which are partially shared with those first 22 channels the difference between a regular gmrs channel a simplex channel as the experts call them and a gmrs repeater channel can be confusing so to learn more about repeater channels versus what's the difference between a repeater channel and a simplex channel [Music] watch that video that i made just for you licensing a very confusing subject you do need a gmrs license to talk on a gmrs radio you do not need a jmrs license or any license to purchase a radio or even to listen to a gmrs radio you only need it to talk or transmit as us experts call it on a gmrs radio if you're just listening no license is required notice that i said the word transmitting and not broadcasting us experts use the term transmitting not broadcasting because if you use the word broadcasting on a youtube video or even when you're talking on your gmrs radio all of these sad hams who seem to think that they're the gmrs frequency police they will come crawling out of the woodwork and they will punish you by explaining in extreme minute irritating detail the difference between the word broadcast and transmit so to get a gmrs license you simply buy it you buy it just like you buy a fishing license the gmrs license once you purchase it is good for 10 years and it covers your entire immediate family your whole family your whole immediate family can use the same license for help and instructions on how to give your money to the fcc so that you can use our free gmrs airwaves go to that webpage it has pictures the cost for a gmrs license is complicated back in early 2021 the fcc congress whoever they lowered the price of the gmrs license from 70 which has been for quite some time to 35 but as of the end of 2021 as of today if you go to buy your gmrs license at the fcc website they still charge 70 and as of now nobody including the fcc seems to know exactly when they will actually reduce the price from 70 to 35 a fine example of your government hard at work for the people now as i already mentioned once you purchase your fcc license for whatever the cost is today your entire immediate family is allowed to use that license and this causes even more confusion for the new gmrs cool kid so allow me to expound when you share your license when you allow your gmrs license to be used by other family members you all use the same gmrs call sign that the fcc will assign to you even if you're talking to each other you still use the same call sign you get one call sign for the entire family optionally when announcing your call sign you can you may if you choose add a identifier at the end of your call sign like a or base but it's optional it is not required the only thing that is required is that you use the same call sign speaking of announcing your call sign the fcc says that must announce your call sign at the end of every transmission and at least once every 15 minutes if you're in a long conversation now some people some people will come along and say no you must announce your call sign every 10 minutes but that is not correct this is not ham in the ham world you have to announce every 10 minutes whatever who cares in the gmrs world us cool kids only have to announce our call sign once every 15 minutes according to the fcc and although you can talk on your gmrs radio transmit broadcast transmit you can talk on your radio in any language you choose you must announce your gmrs call sign in the english language or morse code probably the biggest question that everybody asks about gmrs is how many fars does it talks and how many fars you can talks on a gmrs radio depends on many many things mostly it depends on what is between you and the other radio that you're trying to talk to because the rf electricities the gmrs rf electricities that fly through the air travel mostly by line of sight they do not go around things or over things very well things such as mountains buildings forests if any of those type things are between you and your friend you may not be able to hear each other if there's nothing between you and your friend you can talk many many fars most gmrs hts that's what us experts call a walkie-talkie most hts are limited to 5 watts that's not because of any law or rule that's because that's about the most you can get out of a battery without draining it instantly but even with only 5 watts you can still talk many fars using a little handheld ht ht if there's nothing between you and your friend line of sight line of sight the maximum amount of power that the fcc will allow you to use is 50 watts but 50 watts does not mean you will transmit 10 times farther than 5 watts but 50 is better than 5. so the technical the very technical answer to how many fars does it talks if you're using a gmrs radio you can expect to talk anywhere from a half a mile or so to 30 or 40 miles or so maybe less maybe more it depends now many gmrs radios will allow you to use a repeater repeater a repeater is just a fancy gmrs radio usually up on a high mountain or on a hill and usually with a big antenna repeaters are usually owned and operated by a club but anybody any slob can put up a gmrs repeater no special license or certification or anything is required so when a repeater usually with the bigger antenna is up high on a hill or a mountain it has a better line of sight line of sight than most other radios down below in the slum it can see more radios from up here then you down here in the slum can see because it's up high and it has a better line of sight so by programming your radio to talk and use this repeater it then transmits to the repeater high on the mountain with more line of sight and it instantly retransmits everywhere within its line of sight so that somebody else using their radio over here programmed to use the same repeater can hear you thusly increasing the number of fars that you can talk exactly how many fars it depends as a new gmrs cool kid as a pre-certified youtube gmrs expert another very important thing to know is gmrs etiquette there is no gmrs etiquette there is no special lingo no codes no etiquette other than not using foul language and not being a the only real rule is using your call sign which we already talked about when announcing your call sign at the end of the transmission or every 15 minutes as we already discussed in chapter 2 all you need to do is say this is [Music] this is abcd123 please for the love of xenu sitting at his throne in the volcano do not do not do this [Music] this is alpha bravo charlie because if you do that everyone will laugh at you gmrs is for normal people just talk normal english if you choose you may use 10 codes from your old cb days or your old police days 10 4 10 9 10 100 to say goodbye on gmrs we do not say 73s that's how the ham radio guys say goodbye at the end of their transmissions on gmrs we say 69s because gmrs is more fun and finally allow me to clarify and explain the difference between gmrs radios and other non-gmrs radio types this is an frs radio this is what you find at walmart it costs 20 usually on the box it says range 10 miles or 20 miles or some other all frs radios share the same 22 channels as gmrs radios you can use this radio to talk to any gmrs radio and visa versa a frs radio will have a small non-removable antenna so you can't take it off and put on a bigger antenna the power output on an frs radio is limited to 2 watts and only half a watt on some channels and by definition you cannot talk on a repeater but because it shares and uses all the same channels as a gmrs radio the same standard channels which share repeater channels remember it is confusing that means you can listen to a repeater using an frs radio but you cannot talk on it no license is needed to use the frs bubble wrap bubble pack radio as they're often referred to and if you have a gmrs license and you're talking on a frs radio you do not need to announce your call sign because no license is needed when using an frs radio this is a ham radio [Music] the fcc says you may not transmit on gmrs frequencies using a ham radio even if you have a gmrs license and you will notice i said gmrs frequencies not channels because a ham radio doesn't operate by channels it operates by frequencies a ham radio is usually much more complicated to use than a gmrs radio some people have gone so far as to say that a ham radio is difficult to use unlike a gmrs radio and that's because it doesn't have all the preset channels like a jmrs radio does or the rule a gmrs radio has the rules baked in it's pretty much idiot proof there's lots of idiots using ham radios this is a gmrs radio this is my favorite gmrs radio the wookson ocean kg935g affiliate link below it outputs five watts actually five and a half watts maximum and i've used it to talk many times to people using other similar gmrs radios over 10 miles away i can use this radio to talk on a repeater that's over 70 miles away line of sight and that means that i'm able to talk to people hundreds of miles away all using this gmrs radio it is very easy to use even though it has many advanced gmrs features it's still simple enough that all you have to do is turn it on and push this button and talk and that's because it is a real gmrs radio it has all the fcc rules baked in you can't break any rules about power transmitting or what channels you can talk on using this radio it's very simple to use as are most real gmrs radios now when shopping for a new radio many of the new cool kids don't know what to look for or how to tell if a radio that they're looking at or shopping for is a gmrs radio or not but it is very simple to tell if the box says gmrs then it's a gmrs radio if the box says something like tri-band or dual band then it's a ham radio so if the box says gmrs that's how you know that it is a gmrs radio congratulations you are now a youtube certified gmrs expert if you have any questions about using gmrs or gmrs radios you know how this works [Music] you

Channel: NotaRubicon Productions

Views: 111,780

Keywords: GMRS basics, GMRS for Dummies, how to use gmrs, how does gmrs work, what is gmrs, gmrs vs ham

Id: VS884tc4T2Q

Length: 17min 1sec (1021 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 28 2021