Mags
New Member
Posts: 40 Likes: 12
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Post by Mags on Oct 27, 2020 22:31:09 GMT -6
Those of you who are sharing a frequency with a neighbour need to ask your radio supplier about Continuous Tone-Coded Squelch Systems (CTCSS) or more commonly just "tone squelch". Modern radios are likely already capable of CTCSS. The way it works is your radio transmits an inaudible tone along with your voice transmission. The receiving set only opens its squelch when it detects the inaudible tone. So you can have multiple groups of radios using the same frequency yet only hearing their private group conversations. Obviously its still one frequency so you can't talk over each other - actually you can but it will be same as when someone walks on someone else and nobody hears anything. Its absolutely a workable solution for shared frequencies and it removes the annoyance of hearing your neighbour or worse, hearing a transmission from your neighbour and responding because you thinks its from one of your guys. Thanks for info. Will look into this. We have a shared frequency with neighbour that was agreed on 30 years ago to save $30 a year. But man does it suck. There real talkers and drives us nuts. Don’t get me wrong the radios are a must. It’s real-time and fast when you need to relay something I just wish we were on own frequency. I’m hard of hearing so I don’t here my phone ding or whatever. Magnetic a good idea so you I could see it. i think talking on mike way easier than trying to text, drive (not all our gear has auto steer), pay attentionto task at same time. Radio all the way gets my vote and well worth the relatively small fee.
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jaymo
Full Member
Posts: 173 Likes: 76
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Post by jaymo on Oct 28, 2020 7:57:54 GMT -6
We have weather-channel from North Dakota and Environment Canada programmed on our 2-ways. With weather apps on our phones, it's not as big a feature as it once was but still not a bad feature.
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Post by Oatking on Oct 28, 2020 13:57:11 GMT -6
I have fairly new Kenwood radios, and i have noticed the last 3 years i have lost range. I used to have range over 10 miles but now its down to half a mile so really useless. Anybody know why? Do the radios need reprograming over time . They are 7 years old. I also noticed around the same time that my environment Canada weather stations bands changed locations.
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Post by meskie on Oct 28, 2020 14:01:37 GMT -6
Do your kenwoods have the adjustable squelch on them? We have a couple newer ones that had terrible range this year then realized to squelch must have reset over winter turned it down and were good again. Push the volume knob in and it comes up
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Post by Oatking on Oct 28, 2020 14:12:53 GMT -6
Thanks Ok, i will look for that, I like the fact you can program multiple neighbors on my kenwoods and i like this form of communication over cell phones.
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Post by bobofthenorth on Oct 28, 2020 21:00:31 GMT -6
Radios are the kind of tool that gets neglected and abused. Here's a rule of thumb for those of you using them:
If you can't receive its the antenna - if you can't transmit its the power supply.
An incoming signal is am impossibly small bit of electrical energy that got captured by the antenna and then has to travel down the antenna, along an often sketchy piece of coax, through at least two connections and finally into the radio circuitry. Along the way there's plenty of chance for it to get degraded or lost completely. Starting with the antenna, if it unscrews make sure all the connections are clean and tight. Make sure there's no green death inside any of the coax connections and look for physical damage to the coax itself.
Outgoing signals take serious power yet many times they are pulling that through a plug loosely stuck into the cig lighter or a scotch lock snapped onto the side of whatever power wire happened to be convenient for the installer. A good installation should always bring power directly from the battery with no connections anywhere between the battery and the radio. And don't neglect the ground. Power has to get into and out of the radio. The best power supply cable will be defeated by a crappy tech screw ground stuck into a piece of sheet metal and left to rust.
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Post by torriem on Oct 28, 2020 22:05:48 GMT -6
Don't forget the mic cord. The mic is probably the most abused part of the 2-way radio. We have a small supply of mics we can swap out when they fail. The other day had a Midland unit that could receive, but transmitting people just heard a click. Red light would come on and everything, but no sound. Swapped the mic and it was good again. We often replace the cords on the mics.
We have had one case where a Midland unit would receive but not transmit. Took it in for service and they found the transmitter was totally blown. Replaced it with another older unit from another machine and the same thing happened to it. The problem was the antenna (well the antenna cable to be precise). I think it had a short in it. Would receive fine, but transmitting would overheat and blow the circuit.
Finally we had an annoying radio issue in the 7240 combine. Every time you'd talk on the radio the air conditioner would crank out the heat. Wasn't the radio's fault. The antenna wire built into the cab was too close to the little computer than ran the AC. Every time you transmitted, it interfered with the temperature sensor, so it thought it was super cold suddenly. Solved that one by simply mounting a new antenna on the roof and running the cord in through the side window, well away from the A/C computer. problem solved, thanks to a tip from another forum member.
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