April 7, 2026 – Setting Up and Programming your Radio?
Good evening. This is W1UT and tonight’s training is about “Setting Up and Programming your Radio.” Before I begin, if there is anyone listening who would like to present a training topic please let me know. Features such as Winlink and APRS are topics I know very little about. Just look up my call sign on QRZ.com or on the Utah VHF society web site.
Modern radios have amazing capabilities and each one is a little different. Thus spending time reading your radio’s operating manual is very important. There are several general settings when first setting up your radio on a large linked system such as the Intermountain Intertie. Here are a few items that are important to set up that apply to analog FM operation. I will cover ...
The easiest way to setup your radio is to use software on your computer. Not only can you setup memories but the software can also setup settings on your radio and save these settings to a file. Then if you wish to make changes all you would need to do is to open the settings file and make the appropriate changes. A programming cable is usually required unless your radio has bluetooth capability.
Most radios today that are analog can be set to Narrow or wide band operation. All digital modes are must be set to Narrow band operation. The intermountain intertie system is purely an analog system. You can set your radio to narrow operation but this will restrict your audio to a very low level – thus wide mode is preferred. In the setup menu of your radio find a section that refers to Narrow and Wide band operation. Make sure to set your radio to WIDE.
Another important setting that will need to be changed is your Transmitter Timeout Timer. All radios in that past 40-45 years have this setting. When you find this menu setting please set the timeout timer to 1-2 mins max. This will ensure that if you have a stuck mic that the transmitter timeout timer will time out your radio after the timeout timer setting expires. This setting will also ensure you keep your transmission short.
Most repeaters in the intermountain west use CTCSS tones to activate a repeater. CTCSS stands for “Continuous Tone-Coded Squelch System” and has been in use for many years. Somewhere in your menu system is a place to activate encoding to CTCSS. To gain access to the intermountain intertie system a CTCSS tone of 100 hz is used for the entire system. Make sure to set the tone frequency to 100 hz as well as enabling CTCSS. This will cause a subaudible tone to be transmitted by your radio to activate the repeater tied into the system.
One the first things a new ham operator does after getting a license and a new radio is to program every repeater in the region into their radio. This is way over kill especially if using a handheld. You will find that at most you will likely only use 5 or so repeaters. If you travel a lot then more repeaters should be programmed. Otherwise start with 5 or 6 repeaters or simplex frequencies programmed into your radio and with time you will determine if any more are needed. There are many ways to program frequencies or memory channels into your radio. You can program frequencies manually which will often require using the manual. You can also program your radio using a computer and a suitable programming cable. Free programming software is available on the internet called “Chirp”. Some radios come with programming software or you can purchase programming software specifically designed for your radio.
When programming channels make sure to enter the minimum information needed to access a repeater or simplex frequency such as receive frequency, transmit frequency or offset, transmit power level and the CTCSS tone. CTCSS tones are not needed for simplex operation. Some radios may allow you to add alpha numerics defining a name for the channel. This is up to you.