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This
page has general procedures for the Knox County Neighborhood HamWatch program.
Please refer to the Town Information page for more detailed
information.
General Considerations
There are a limited number of FRS and GMRS channels so it is
important to make wise use of them.
For use in emergencies, it is essential to have specific
channels assigned for that purpose and to use other channels for more general,
lower priority communications.
To ensure that you are receiving all calls in a given area, each
radio in your network must have the privacy (PL) tones disabled.
Speak slowly and clearly. Spell out difficult words or names,
preferably using standard phonetics.
All communications should be brief so that others can use the
channel. Pause frequently by releasing your PTT so that someone with a higher
priority call can break in.
Always yield to a station that is making an emergency call.
Channel (Frequency) Usage Guidelines
Channel/Frequency |
Use |
1 (462.5625 MHz) |
High priority/emergency calling between FRS
radios or with GMRS radios in the same neighborhood. Use highest FRS power
available. This is consistent with National SOS Radio Network practice. |
2-7 |
General use between FRS and/or GMRS radios
within a neighborhood. |
8-14 |
General communications between closely
positioned radios. Limited to 1/2 watt maximum. |
19 (462.6500 MHz) |
For communications with a full power GMRS hub
station. |
20 (462.6750 MHz) |
Reserved for the Spruce Head 675 Repeater |
A Note on Privacy (PL) Codes
When
a PL is enabled on a given channel on two or more radios, each of those radios
will only hear the calls made by the radios with the specific PL. Any radio
without a PL enabled will be able to hear the transmissions.
If a call is made from a radio with no PL, radios with PLs
enabled will not hear that call. Therefore it is important that radios that are
set up for emergency communications not have PLs enabled for the emergency
channels.
Channel Numbering
Channel numbers are not necessarily consistent from radio to
radio. GMRS only radios cannot operate on the FRS only channels so those
channels (e.g. 8-14) may actually be the next set of shared channels (e.g.
15-22). Also, the BTECH GMRS radio's channel assignments begin with channel 0,
not 1.
If your radio does not have a frequency display, refer to the
manual for the actual frequencies to avoid confusion.
Some radios also have channel numbers above 22. These aren't
added channels as such but they permit special configurations (like a PL) for
any of the standard channels. |