FRS

From HFUnderground

Revision as of 20:51, 26 November 2018

Family Radio Service

UHF replacement (or rather supplement) to the CB service. License free two-way radio service regulated under Part 95 of the FCC rules - Personal Radio Services. FRS is widely used nationwide - 22 channels available, 15 of which are shared with the GMRS service. See also MURS. FRS is heavily used by private individuals, traveling groups for car-to-car communications, businesses, at construction sites and for various other purposes, including illegal activities and criminal enterprises.

The easy accessibility to low cost FRS equipment, simple-to-use radios and short range mean that drug dealers have been confirmed to use FRS to communicate with lookouts, etc. in several cities in the USA. In urban areas it is often possible to hear several different groups using several of the FRS frequencies at once with a respectable listening setup or even with a handheld VHF/UHF scanner located in a good spot high up for improved line of sight coverage. In urban areas, street-level handheld FRS range is often only around 1 mile. In rural areas or in high-up locations the range can increase significantly to dozens of miles.

FRS is similar to the UHF CB service in Australia and New Zealand the PMR446 service in Europe and the UK as well as various other VHF/UHF personal radio services throughout the world. It is often what laymen think of when they think about walkie talkies.

In late 2017, the FCC changed the rules to accommodate the vast majority of "bubble pack pirates" operating higher power and/or operating on the 8 GMRS only frequencies. FRS now consists of 22 channels, 15 of which are shared with GMRS. Power limit is 2 watts on the 462 MHz channels, and 0.5 watts on the 467 MHz channels. The FRS rules were also modified to prohibit the sale of FRS/GMRS "combination" radios - effectively classifying all existing FRS/GMRS radios on the market as FRS radios only and removing the license requirement. Transmission of data signals on the FRS channels is also now permitted under the updated Part 95 rules. 14 channel radios operating under the previous rules remain legal and the prohibition against removable antennas remains in effect.

FRS channel 1 462.5625 MHz with no CTCSS [carrier squelch or CSQ] is the unofficial FRS calling channel. FRS channel 20 462.675 MHz with 141.3Hz CTCSS is the GMRS calling channel, sometimes referred to as the "travel channel". Many FRS radios default to channel 1 with 67.0Hz CTCSS tone and it is common to find users using either 67.0Hz or CSQ unless they are in an area where heavy FRS use requires them to move to a different channel and/or CTCSS tone.

Various handheld walkie talkie FRS radios