Hello everyone, I’m new to the site and I’m a complete and utter newb to radios and regulations. I would like to set up a private radio system for use with my mobile repair personnel as cell service is sometimes not available in the areas we operate (But there are radio repeaters available on hilltops), is it;
Feasible to outfit a fleet of 3-5 trucks with mobile transceivers?
Feasible (Legal?) to encrypt transmissions sent and received with those transceivers? I’d rather not have customer information sent completely in the open (I know that nothing is private, but encryption would help).
What kinds of costs would I incur with this?
Would I be required to attain FCC licensing for every user (employee) who will be using the transceivers?
To use encryption, you would have to get a business license. No individual licenses there, just the master license. Not cheap, the cost of coordination and such is significant.
If you’re talking about many different areas/cities, it’d have to be itinerant frequencies, which are basically authorized generally only for low power use. Won’t be any ‘free to use’ repeaters you can use wandering around. Repeaters in business use are specific licensed systems.
If you’re talking about one city, you may have a local common carrier radio provider available who has repeaters available, though encryption is less likely through one of those. The repeater has to be set up for it, and it’s much more expensive.
Mobile to mobile, no repeaters, business radio will probably be good for 2-5 miles.
I’ll have to do some more research. To be honest, I was wondering if it was even feasible. I had heard a lot of mixed information and FUD regarding legality of encryption. This is multiple towns, involving a distance of more than 50 miles and not line of sight, so I would need to use repeaters (right?). Now that I know that it’s feasible I’ll do my own research. Thanks for the heads up :-).
I need to research laws and specific equipment that would fit my requirements.