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ETH075 – RFinder
29 June 2017 | by If you are anything like me you have used those little repeater 
directories and strained your eyes in the process. I use to hate trying to find a repeater to use while I was on a trip. Most of the time, while I was on a trip, the town that I was in didn’t have any repeaters in it, but the next town over did. Maybe it was two towns over, or the third of fourth town that I look at in the directory. Either way, it was a pain in the…well you know.
Bob had the same thinking that I did all those years ago, but he acted on it. He went and digitized all the repeater data that was available and made it into an Android app. It is now available to IPhone, Android and on the web for just a small fee.
RFinder is the official repeater directory of Canada, the United Kingdom as well as 13 other countries. This year the ARRL partnered with RFinder to print the 2017 ARRL repeater directory. This years directory has 10,000 more listings and is the first time that the ARRL has crowd sourced the repeater information. The data that RFinder uses comes from many different places including Repeater societies, club websites and directly from repeater owners.
For more information about RFinder, hear it from Bob himself in the latest episode of the Everything Ham Radio Podcast at http://www.everythinghamradio.com/podcast/75
4 Responses to “ETH075 – RFinder”
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Ready for this to happen
Now to tie it with gps mapping and data transfer to the radio. A traveler’s dream
While the RF Finder is a cool tool, it is still a work in progress.
Here in rural “7” land we’ve noticed that it has contained an odd mixture of repeaters that missing, those that have either never been on the air or have not been on for many years – and a small number of people seem to mistake getting a repeater listed on RF Finder as the equivalent of it being properly coordinated.
To be sure, things are getting better as bona-fide frequency coordinators are better-able to make sure that the contained data is up-to-date, accurate and makes sense, but doing so is a constant battle that requires continued effort.
Here’s hoping that this tool will be increasingly useful with time!
You may also wish to check out repeaterbook.com, which is a free alternative.