The Ham Ninja's DMR Tips and Tricks

As I dive into this aspect of ham radio, DMR, I thought I would share some of the tips and tricks that others have shown me or that I've figured out on my own.

I'll be updating this BLOG page when I find other things that I think people could use help with.
(Last Update 10/8/2018)

Most of what I'm about to talk about assumes you are using BrandMeister.  I'm a newbie, so if you find a mistake, leave me a comment and I'll edit the post. (Click on images for larger)

The Ham Ninja's AnyTone AT-868UV & AT-878UV DMR Radio Tips

I'm covering a couple of procedures for configuring the Anytone AT-868UV as well as providing some links to good references at the bottom.  

You can read my review on the radio HERE but in summary this is a much better radio than I was anticipating.  The market has a few very cheap Chinese radios like the BaoFeng UV-5R, and this is nothing like that.  I have a few nits in my review but overall, I give it two thumbs up, even when comparing to my analog HTs.  

NOTE: All of these tips apply to the Anytone AT-878UV unless otherwise noted.  Also, if you don't know what DMR is, see "DMR Defined".

I'll be updating this BLOG page when I find other things that I think people could use help with.

Review of the AnyTone AT-868UV

Updated: The AnyTone AT-868UV (868 from now on) is a very cool "Digital Mobile Radio" (AKA DMR radio).  It's a dual-band analog radio that also supports DMR so you can use it for both classic analog and digital. I really like the "Zone" feature, which is nothing more than a grouping of channels.  Zones are great for me since I only want to see some channels when when I'm at my summer home or working with my ARES team.   This is similar to the Yaesu "Bank" but Yaesu banks are hard to use, not labeled on some radios and kind of kludgy.  The way you switch banks is different on my two Yaesu HTs and I’m always forgetting how it works.  

I won the 868 in a raffle at a Papa System Group love-in.  The Papa Group is a great bunch of hams here is SoCal, supporting about 14 analog repeaters in Southern California that can use IRLP linking.  In addition they have 11 D-STAR repeaters, and 13 DMR repeaters with more coming.  By the way, the reason the Papa System is so popular is that all of the analog repeaters are linked together with bridges to D-STAR and DMR. 

2018-09-03 Col des Bush Valley

Today I did some “chasing” rather than summiting... from a summit.  I needed a hike so I thought I would put on the backpack and headed up the mountain behind my house.  Jeanette and I headed out and it was 43 degrees on the trail, nippy for sure.  The first objective was to check on my Geocache.  Owners are expected to check their caches to ensure they are in working order.  I’s a little over 1.5 miles up to the cache I think and the cache was exactly like I left it... about a year ago.  The cache is called “Col des Bush Valley”, a name I came up with while watching the Tour de France from my cabin one year.  The cache location overlooks Alpine and “Bush Valley” so the name fits.

2018-09-01 W7A/AP-005 - Wahl Knoll

I woke at 4AM this morning to bright strobes and clashes of thunder.  No, I didn’t passed out in a hip nightclub (that would be a good story though), it was one heck of a crashing a thunderstorm complete with rain and hail.  I saw that the forecast predicted an early rain but this was ridiculous.  My bedroom is upstairs and I’m just under a metal roof on wood.  I love the sound of rain coming down.  I could tell at times there was hail by the sound of it bouncing off the metal roof  The windows were open so the show was in 3D.  Another wave of thunderstorm came through at 5AM and it rained off and on till about 8AM.  When I got up, I was chilled so I so I started a fire in the wood stove.  I had planned on an earlier start today but the forecast was for it to dry up a bit later so I waited till noon to launch.  Sulu and I loaded up and were were off.

(Note: You can click on a picture for a larger version)

(Second NOTE:  I remembered my GoPro today so I’ll upload the video when I get home)

2018-08-31 W7A/AP-003 - Pole Knoll

Well, I’m back in the white mountains of Arizona and doing a little more Summits On The Air.  Jeanette and I took off early today from the cabin to hike W7A/AP-003 - Pole Knol. We forgot the coffee and since we got in late last night we couldn’t pick up any. We decided to head into the village to have breakfast at Bear Wallow Cafe.  The eggs and fix’ns were awesome.  Fully tanked up, we headed out to the Pole Knol recreation area, on the other side of Springerville, just past the Greer turnoff.  It was a cool morning requiring a fleese but not bad. 

(Note: Click on pictures for larger)

It’s been raining up here off and on for a couple of months so the country is green green green.  After arriving at the parking area for the Pole Knol Recreation Area we set out.  The trails were well marked with blue triangle tags on trees.  In the summer, markers aren’t really needed since a lot of the trail is road or very well maintained trails.  There’s a lot of winter recreation in this area so the taggs are really for the cross country skiers and snow shoe hikers that can’t see the trails or roads.