Cb radio squelch

All the squelch is doing is silencing signals below a certain signal strength level. The higher the squelch is set, the stronger (closer) the signal has to be to before you'll be able to hear it. If you have the squelch set very low, then relatively weak signals will get through. You'll still hear strong signals just fine as well. If the squelch is set lower than the background noise level, that's when you hear constant static.

I adjust my RF gain down to the point where the background noise barely moves the S-meter. That helps filter out some of the noise on signals that aren't quite as strong.

 

Yes, if you turn RF gain all the way up, wherever the needle on the signal strength meter is when no one is talking is your background noise level. The signal strength is measured on a scale from 1-9. The background noise level can vary quite a bit depending on location, time of day, and other factors.

 

That's probably just fine. When the RF gain is turned down to reduce the noise, you won't need to have the squelch as high to cut out the static. If very weak signals still break through and you don't want to hear them, just turn up the squelch a bit more until you don't hear them.

 

Lowering RF Gain decreases or attenuates the incoming signal level. A certain amount of that incoming signal is just background noise. If someone's signal is weaker than the background noise level, you're not going to be able to understand them no matter how high the RF gain is. Turning the RF Gain down to where you eliminate most of the background noise isn't going to significantly reduce what you can hear, except for perhaps the very weakest signals that are just above the noise level, but you probably won't care much about those anyway because they're too far away.

 

If you still have static breaking through, just turn up the squelch a bit until it stops.