Orion Radio's

[KG5HHS]

Hello,
I have been wanting to make a radio stack for a while for 4 different bands (LB,VHF,UHF,800mHz). I have decided to use the M/A-Com Orion's. There's just a few issues. I want to cover amateur radio as well. is there any way to program these radio's out of their bands? Would it be possible to program a orion that says the band is 150-174mhz down to 144mhz? I dont want 8 different radios stacked up if i can get away with using 4. I will mostly be monitoring and not transmitting. any info would be greatly appreciated.

 

[DisasterGuy]

The filters on the Orion are very tight. Taking one out of band isn't an easy task but there are splits on the Orion and M7100 that cover amateur. Either way I would recommend going with a 7100 over an Orion for everything but LB.

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[KG5HHS]

I think i will stick with the Motorola W4's for the VHF and UHF then. I do need to stick with an Orion/M7100 radio for the 800mhz band. That leads me to my next question.
The city I live in uses an EDACS System with Provoice. I can not pick up this system on an analog scanner and have a "CC Scan" Issue when I try to program my P5100 (Model: MAHM-S8RXX). I have only had been able to Monitor this system on my BCD396XT Scanner. I'm not sure if the system has ESK, but for not I will continue as if it doesn't.
I am currently looking at two different radios right now. One is an Orion D28LPX with features 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 10, 12, 16, 22, & 29. The other radio is an M7100 Model MAHG-N8MXX, however, I am still waiting on more information on this radio. Assuming this system does not have ESK. Will one of these radio's be able to monitor this system?

 

[KG5HHS]

The thread in reference to the "CC Scan" issue is listed here: http://forums.radioreference.com/harris-ma-com-ge-ericsson-forum/320564-m-com-p5100-cc-scan.html

 

[ElroyJetson]

For your application, sticking with the Motorola mobiles is definitely the better option. If Motorola made it kind of difficult to take some radios out of band, Ericsson decided to make all but impossible. Hardware filter mods and .sc4 files are a real pain.

Speaking of the CC issue, somebody should experiment and figure out once and for all what HAS to be right for a Harris radio to lock on a system and scan, and what errors will keep that from happening.

 

[DisasterGuy]

Just and FYI, the main limitation with Harris radios (specifically speaking about Orion / 7100) going out of band is the tight design of the filters. With that said, while there are several very easy tricks to program many Motorola units out of band that doesn't translate to them performing well out of band. I have done several of the easy SW mods to Motorola units and found them to be very variable in stability out of band. The best bet is to use a radio with a split where it is designed to operate or use an appropriate amateur tranceiver.

Mobiles in work truck range from M7100 to XG75M and XG 100M but 8 still use a TM710G for amateur.

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[Thunderknight]

Speaking of the CC issue, somebody should experiment and figure out once and for all what HAS to be right for a Harris radio to lock on a system and scan, and what errors will keep that from happening.

The NAC has to be right. Don't assume what RPM fills in after entering the WA network is right because it often isn't.

 

[KG5HHS]

The NAC has to be right. Don't assume what RPM fills in after entering the WA network is right because it often isn't.

What do you mean "The NAC" has to be right? I'm trying to program this radio for an EDACS Provoice system using ProGrammer.

 

[Thunderknight]

What do you mean "The NAC" has to be right? I'm trying to program this radio for an EDACS Provoice system using ProGrammer.

D'oh. I was more answering Elroy's post and thinking P25.

My bad.

 

[KG5HHS]

D'oh. I was more answering Elroy's post and thinking P25.

My bad.

ah, ok. No problem. I thought I was missing something.

 

[ElroyJetson]

Actually I was thinking of plain ol' EDACS mode FIRST, but of course it'd be good to understand
the minimum essentials required for your radio to lock onto ANY given kind of trunking system.

In Motorola's case, it's dead simple. If you have the control channel entered correctly and the system ID set right, you can screw up all kinds of data and the radio will still be locked on to the system.

In fact, it's that "permissiveness" that allows you to use a Motorola radio to "safely" scan a trunked system, if you know what you are doing. The parameters needed to receive properly are very few and very simple. But you can mess up the transmit side of the programming in multiple ways. Safe scanning involves intentionally messing them up.

Harris....different story. EDACS has always been much simpler from a programming perspective, but also includes the built-in ability to program a radio to be RX only on every talkgroup, and disable all login types as well. EDACS is 100 percent scanner friendly, using EDACS radio equipment. Motorola never quite ceded that level of control to the programmer.

 

[KG5HHS]

I'm sorry, I should have been more clear. The VHF and UHF radios will be all conventional. I will use those to monitor amateur radio, public safety, & interop. Frequencies. The 800mhz radio will be used to monitor the cities EDACS Provoice system as well as interop frequencies.