On 1/25/07, Christopher Hodgdon <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > First I would like to say that I am happy to be a part of this group, > I just found it today and wish to spend a lot of time on here. I am > newly licensed as a ham (KE5IGO) and am now the EC for our county ARES > program, Kaufman County ARES, Inc. North Texas area.
Welcome to the group! > We are working on getting a repeater system in place that we will be > able to use and will provide the needs of our organization and those > that we help. Chris, My only advice... and I give it to a lot of people as soon as they say the magic words... "emergency communications"... and you don't have to take it... If you haven't already... Find someone who's built a GOOD repeater before and listen to their advice. Either here on RB, or better yet... locally. Find a local guru and work with them. They know things you don't yet, and they know the local area's RF quirks. There's a steep learning curve in building a really good repeater. There's a very shallow learning curve to building one that appears to perform well until it's tested with good test gear and/or real-world events... Emergency communications, even ARES, repeaters are no place to start from scratch with no experience... Struggling with the repeater when it fails to cover all the area that it can cover, and/or having it blowing up under heavy load in a real emergency -- is not the time to find out you built it wrong. (GRIN) If you can find the local public safety repeater techs who are also hams... get them involved in your project up front. You'll be happy you did, later. They know how to build things that have to stay on the air 24/7. Buy the things they recommend. Good quality antennas and feedline and a great duplexer system WILL cost more than the repeater itself, usually by about a factor of at least 2x. Be prepared with the budget. Cheap antennas, feedline, and duplexers will bite you in the butt for years. Etc etc etc... stepping down off the soap-box now. Nate WY0X
