Uhf Radio Question

[Falchoon]

What does the Duplex button do? Sorry if this a dumb questiion.

[Cro]

It allows you to send on one channel and recieve on a different channel.

HocusChrist will be able to give you a more detailed explanation.

You can use duplex mode on channels 1 - 8.

These channels have repeaters (canberra only has a repeater on ch8 though).

When your using duplex (this example we will use ch8), you will send your transmission on ch38, and you will recieve transmissions on channel 8.

Your transmission is sent to the repeater on ch38, and the repeater sends transmissions back to you on ch8.

Repeaters (duplex) give far more coverage than radio to radio (simplex), as they are mostly mounted on top of mountains/hills. So if you were in a valley next to a repeater, and another person was on the other side of a repeater in the valley you can reach them. You can not do this using simplex as UHF requires line of site.

This is my understanding, I can't explain it that well (which is why my post is all over the place...)

[Cro]

Another point is:

Always use the duplex switch on channels 1 - 8.

If you want radio to radio comms, use another channel.

Do not use channel 5 as this is the emergency channel.

Do not use channels 21-22 as these are reserved for data transmissions.

Do not use channels 31-38 as these are reserved for repeater inputs (as discussed in previous post).

[Falchoon]

Thanks Cro, that was very helpful.