Before I get too deep into everything - I want to disclose that my department is currently not the department that "owns" this radio setup, but we are talking to management about how to make it better for everyone.
I work at a large employer who uses about 200-250 radios throughout a 1.3 million sq ft facility. It is a fully open first floor, with a mezzanine second floor. The current setup has been "furnished" by a LARGE communications company, who is usually known for some... interesting... decisions. It is a UHF repeater system, with 16 channel analog radios - of which all 16 channels are used pretty consistently. I do not know what repeaters are currently in use, but I do know that we (my department) was the ones running the LDF4-50A cable (or similar equivalent) to Commscope DB404 antennas. We have almost all Icom and Motorola "cheap" business radios, but with a smattering of Vertex DMR mobiles and handhelds (mobiles being used as base stations).
My proposal has been to switch over to DMR, since with the 16 channels we have a HUGE issue of people talking over each other and individual departments having no "operations channel" for themselves to use. So with 16 repeater pairs, thought that either they can all be used and open it up to at least each pair with a TS1 and TS2 channel - or being able to cut the "purchased" frequencies in half and show the management some savings can be had as well.
As for infastructure - all repeaters are housed in a cabinet in the middle of the mezzanine. Problem is - the people (us) who were "directed from above" to install the antennas INSISTED they be installed with almost 35-50ft of cable coiled up before the antenna "in case the cable breaks", but didn't understand how much loss goes through that much unnecessary cabling, and the antennas are all hung vertically from the ceiling beams, but only about 50-60 feet away from each other. All the frequencies are minimally spaced, and there's FREQUENT de-sense issues and users keying up over someone else on a daily basis - training be damned.
In the end DMR is what I wanted to pitch for better efficient use of the spectrum allotted to us, MUCH clearer audio in an industrial environment, and with the right infastructure changes a more robust system which won't allow users to step over each other. I have been trying to put this together but coming from mostly HAM and military radio - have no idea how to manage that many DMR channels in a single building. Do we need an antenna for each repeater? Do we need a damn array of antennas hanging from the ceiling or will 2-3 across the building be sufficient? Does output power of the repeaters have to be more than 10w (pretty sure they're blasting 35-40w indoors)? And then lastly, how to justify moving the ENTIRE building to DMR radios (versus MagOne radios) and possibly 16 new DMR repeaters (if the ones installed aren't already). I am hoping to bribe an IT person here to open the cabinet and let me peek but chances are slim - so I am pitching this proposal trying to cover all bases with an emphasis on more timely, clear communication which will greatly help operations and be a safety asset in this environment.
I work at a large employer who uses about 200-250 radios throughout a 1.3 million sq ft facility. It is a fully open first floor, with a mezzanine second floor. The current setup has been "furnished" by a LARGE communications company, who is usually known for some... interesting... decisions. It is a UHF repeater system, with 16 channel analog radios - of which all 16 channels are used pretty consistently. I do not know what repeaters are currently in use, but I do know that we (my department) was the ones running the LDF4-50A cable (or similar equivalent) to Commscope DB404 antennas. We have almost all Icom and Motorola "cheap" business radios, but with a smattering of Vertex DMR mobiles and handhelds (mobiles being used as base stations).
My proposal has been to switch over to DMR, since with the 16 channels we have a HUGE issue of people talking over each other and individual departments having no "operations channel" for themselves to use. So with 16 repeater pairs, thought that either they can all be used and open it up to at least each pair with a TS1 and TS2 channel - or being able to cut the "purchased" frequencies in half and show the management some savings can be had as well.
As for infastructure - all repeaters are housed in a cabinet in the middle of the mezzanine. Problem is - the people (us) who were "directed from above" to install the antennas INSISTED they be installed with almost 35-50ft of cable coiled up before the antenna "in case the cable breaks", but didn't understand how much loss goes through that much unnecessary cabling, and the antennas are all hung vertically from the ceiling beams, but only about 50-60 feet away from each other. All the frequencies are minimally spaced, and there's FREQUENT de-sense issues and users keying up over someone else on a daily basis - training be damned.
In the end DMR is what I wanted to pitch for better efficient use of the spectrum allotted to us, MUCH clearer audio in an industrial environment, and with the right infastructure changes a more robust system which won't allow users to step over each other. I have been trying to put this together but coming from mostly HAM and military radio - have no idea how to manage that many DMR channels in a single building. Do we need an antenna for each repeater? Do we need a damn array of antennas hanging from the ceiling or will 2-3 across the building be sufficient? Does output power of the repeaters have to be more than 10w (pretty sure they're blasting 35-40w indoors)? And then lastly, how to justify moving the ENTIRE building to DMR radios (versus MagOne radios) and possibly 16 new DMR repeaters (if the ones installed aren't already). I am hoping to bribe an IT person here to open the cabinet and let me peek but chances are slim - so I am pitching this proposal trying to cover all bases with an emphasis on more timely, clear communication which will greatly help operations and be a safety asset in this environment.