Help with San Bernardino programming on a BCT8

[jcemt]

Hello my name is Jared,

I've been having a heck of a time getting this to work. Ive researched it and tried to program it for hours with no luck. I have a BCT8. I'm trying to program this system: San Bernardino, County of (Public Safety) 02 Trunking System, Barstow, California - Scanner Frequencies I'm stuck and neep help.

I went into trunk programming mode, put in mode II 800, put in the system frequencies, then it's over. Im lost from there. What do I do from there? Where are the "talkgroup id's?" What the heck is this "dec" and "hec" stuff?

Any help would be greatly appricated,

Jared

 

[patin]

do you hear the CONTROL channel sound if you dont then your not gonna be able monitor that system number until you are close enough to pick up the CONTROL channel

 

[djgrooven]

Hello my name is Jared,

I've been having a heck of a time getting this to work. Ive researched it and tried to program it for hours with no luck. I have a BCT8. I'm trying to program this system: San Bernardino, County of (Public Safety) 02 Trunking System, Barstow, California - Scanner Frequencies I'm stuck and neep help.

I went into trunk programming mode, put in mode II 800, put in the system frequencies, then it's over. Im lost from there. What do I do from there? Where are the "talkgroup id's?" What the heck is this "dec" and "hec" stuff?

Any help would be greatly appricated,

Jared

The Decimal is for scanner programming and the hexadecimal is for Motorola programming, so you would use the decimal format for your BCT8

 

[jcemt]

Copy that. So the "dec" is my talkgroup id? I've never had such difficulties. I've spent hours and I still can't figure it out. So I put in all the control freqs and used the dec number for my talkgroup id. I can't get this scanner to id scan. What am I doing wrong?

 

[zz0468]

Where, specifically, are you trying to listen from?

Have you tried programming in the control channel frequencies as conventional channels to check if you can actually hear the site?

Are you hearing ANYTHING on the scanner?

Do you have an antenna that's adequate enough to hear what you want to hear?

 

[jcemt]

Yes, I tried the conventional. As long as I don't have it in trunk mode, it picks up random traffic. I think now the issue may be this thing not going into "id scan." From searching, it seams others have the same problem sometimes. I tried clearing all the channels off the scanner and starting over, but that did not work either.

Heres what ive done in steps:

I go into trunk programming mode by pressing and holding trunk button.

Select bank

Confirm mode II 800

Program all the listed freqs, both the primary and alternate control freqs.

Then go to program id mode

Put in the "dec" figures as my talkgroup ids. Those go in fine and in 1-1, 1-2, 1-3 and so forth.

Now is where the problem starts. I have tried simply exiting programming mode here and scanning, but won't id scan. Ive tried all the quarks I found like make sure pri is off and so forth. Nothing! I can't get it to id scan for the life of me. I've tried playing with all the modes in programming mode but nothing works.

Im not hearing anything unless I put them in conventional.

Any ideas?

Thanks,

Jared

 

[Duster]

Once again, where exactly are you located in relation to the sites?

 

[jcemt]

I'm in the very northwest county. Ridgecrest/Trona area.

 

[zz0468]

I'm in the very northwest county. Ridgecrest/Trona area.

System 2 is located in Barstow on Flash II. It's extremely doubtful that you will receive a usable signal that far outside it's coverage area. What specific frequencies are you actually receiving traffic on? Have you actually heard a control channel? If so, what specific frequency are you receiving control channel data on?

You're probably 60 miles from System 2, and less than 20 miles from the conventional sites that are intended to cover your area.

 

[jrholm]

You may not get the trunked system in the Trona area. In fact there are dedicated frequencies in Trona that link to the sheriff's and fire's talkgroups because the trunked system is not designed to cover that area.

 

[jcemt]

So possibly if im out of range, id scan will not come up?

I may sound like a knucklehead, but where I used to work we had a motorola handheld on SBC fire and it worked crystal clear in ridgecrest. So thats why I don't understand why I cant get my BCT8 to work with a quality 800mhz mobile antenna.

I need to monitor SBC fire dispatch and SBC sheriff dispatch for this area. I think its system 2 out of barstow. Could it be system 1?

ZZ0468,

The freqs I was hearing traffic on in conv mode were from the "Conventional 800mhz. fill-in" on the San Bernardino page.

Basicly, I know SBSO of SBC Fire handhelds have good coverage in ridgecrest so I'm lost on why I cant get this scanner figured out.

Thanks for all your help guys!

You may not get the trunked system in the Trona area. In fact there are dedicated frequencies in Trona that link to the sheriff's and fire's talkgroups because the trunked system is not designed to cover that area.

 

[djgrooven]

So possibly if im out of range, id scan will not come up?

I may sound like a knucklehead, but where I used to work we had a motorola handheld on SBC fire and it worked crystal clear in ridgecrest. So thats why I don't understand why I cant get my BCT8 to work with a quality 800mhz mobile antenna.

I need to monitor SBC fire dispatch and SBC sheriff dispatch for this area. I think its system 2 out of barstow. Could it be system 1?

ZZ0468,

The freqs I was hearing traffic on in conv mode were from the "Conventional 800mhz. fill-in" on the San Bernardino page.

Basicly, I know SBSO of SBC Fire handhelds have good coverage in ridgecrest so I'm lost on why I cant get this scanner figured out.

Thanks for all your help guys!

Yes it would be System 2 that is pathched to your area. If you are only trying to monitor SBSO & SBCO Fire use the D-Law,D-Fire r/f''s for Trona area. If you want to hear all of SBCO #2 traffic just stream the feed. I just seen that it came back on line.

 

[zz0468]

So possibly if im out of range, id scan will not come up?

If you're out of range, you won't hear anything from System 2.

I may sound like a knucklehead, but where I used to work we had a motorola handheld on SBC fire and it worked crystal clear in ridgecrest. So thats why I don't understand why I cant get my BCT8 to work with a quality 800mhz mobile antenna.

It was probably listening to the conventional channel on El Paso Peak.

I need to monitor SBC fire dispatch and SBC sheriff dispatch for this area. I think its system 2 out of barstow. Could it be system 1?

No. System 1 doesn't cover out that far, either. Listen to the D-Law and D-Fire channels at Slate, El Paso, and Government Peak. those are the only sites that serve that area. No Trunking, conventional only.

ZZ0468,

The freqs I was hearing traffic on in conv mode were from the "Conventional 800mhz. fill-in" on the San Bernardino page.

Ok. It makes perfect sense that's what you'd be hearing, and nothing from any of the trunked sites.

Basicly, I know SBSO of SBC Fire handhelds have good coverage in ridgecrest so I'm lost on why I cant get this scanner figured out.

Thanks for all your help guys!

They use the conventional channels. I think you should have it figured out by now.

 

[jcemt]

Sucsess!!!

Ok, so I used the 800mhz conventional fill-in channels. I used every freq to be sure I gave it a chance.... it worked! Crystal clear!

So the whole problem has been I've been trying to it up on trunking.

Thank you so much guys!

 

[djgrooven]

Sucsess!!!

Ok, so I used the 800mhz conventional fill-in channels. I used every freq to be sure I gave it a chance.... it worked! Crystal clear!

So the whole problem has been I've been trying to it up on trunking.

Thank you so much guys!

What D-law is Trona SO on. I know That Trona is a substation from Barstow and it is patched from 2-dc-1 & 1-dc-3. Fire should be on D-Fire_1 correct?

 

[Duster]

I'm in the very northwest county. Ridgecrest/Trona area.

And there ya go. The other posters are correct.

I can state for a fact that you cannot receive System 2 anywhere in the Trona/Ridgecrest area until you get around the first curve south of Red Mountain on 395. Just about the only place IN Trona you can receive USABLE trunked signal is in the driveway of the Fire Station (used to be #127) on Trona Rd at Athol St, and that is a signal from Rodman Mountain (System 3). I was working in Trona when we transitioned from the VHF system to the 800. We didn't get MDT data service for some time after the system came online, so I would write down license numbers I needed as I patrolled, and would drive to the fire station and run them in bulk, plus check for messages in the system. It was interesting...and we never did get MDT coverage in the Windy Acres/Ridgecrest area the entire 3 years I was out there.

The conventional 800 channels have all been renamed (some relocated) since I was there, but there used to be a Law repeater on El Paso Peak (south of Cerro Coso College), and a Fire repeater on Government Peak at Red Mountain, plus a Law, a Fire, and a Local Govt repeater on Telegraph Peak north of Trona for the Searles Valley.

 

[jcemt]

Im not sure. The conventional receive freq is the same for D-Law-4, D-Law-6 and D-Law-10 so I don't know which one it is.

You were right on the money. As soon as I got south of red mountain I picked up system 2. Which put my scanner in "id scan.". So yep, if you're out of range that's why it won't id scan.