Can CP200 Operate on Narrow & Wide Simultaneously?

[BBowe]

Hi guys, have a question, hope this is in the right forum...

Please excuse my ignorance in advance, I'm not as savvy on this subject as I would like to be.

I work at a federal correctional facility in WA state and have been tasked with the conversion of our radio system over to narrowband. I am trying to devise a plan as to implementing this transition. Due to the nature of the facility in regard to staff safety and general operations, I have to minimize the radio downtime as much as possible. We are using Motorola CP200 handsets and utilize 2 repeaters, a primary channel and a secondary channel used for direct contact to the Master Control room. My current plan (hopefully this will work) will be to come in on graveyard shift, program half of the handsets to narrowband on the secondary channel while leaving the primary on wideband, swapping them out with the ones in use and doing the same thing with the remaining handsets, then reprogramming the secondary repeater to narrowband and having everyone switch to the secondary channel while I go back and do the whole process over for the primary channel.

Is this possible? Can the Motorola CP200's operate with one channel on wideband and the other on narrowband? Or is it a wideband-or-narrowband-only situation?

Our equipment supplier has assured me that the actual reprogramming process is simple, but the logistical aspect may be difficult. I have emailed him with this question but have not received a response yet, I was hoping some of you folks might have some valuable insight for me. Any help would be very much appreciated!

[firefive76]

Originally Posted by BBowe

Hi guys, have a question, hope this is in the right forum...

Please excuse my ignorance in advance, I'm not as savvy on this subject as I would like to be.

I work at a federal correctional facility in WA state and have been tasked with the conversion of our radio system over to narrowband. I am trying to devise a plan as to implementing this transition. Due to the nature of the facility in regard to staff safety and general operations, I have to minimize the radio downtime as much as possible. We are using Motorola CP200 handsets and utilize 2 repeaters, a primary channel and a secondary channel used for direct contact to the Master Control room. My current plan (hopefully this will work) will be to come in on graveyard shift, program half of the handsets to narrowband on the secondary channel while leaving the primary on wideband, swapping them out with the ones in use and doing the same thing with the remaining handsets, then reprogramming the secondary repeater to narrowband and having everyone switch to the secondary channel while I go back and do the whole process over for the primary channel.

Is this possible? Can the Motorola CP200's operate with one channel on wideband and the other on narrowband? Or is it a wideband-or-narrowband-only situation?

Our equipment supplier has assured me that the actual reprogramming process is simple, but the logistical aspect may be difficult. I have emailed him with this question but have not received a response yet, I was hoping some of you folks might have some valuable insight for me. Any help would be very much appreciated!

The wide/narrow setting is selectable by personality (channel), so yes, it is possible to have one channel as wide and another as narrow.

[mmckenna]

Yep, but you are making it way too hard on yourself.

Narrow band and Wide band will get along. Audio quality will suffer a bit, but it's not unusable. I've done a fire department and a police department. On the fire department we had enough people to have one guy programming mobiles and portables and another doing the repeater and me doing the remote receivers. Took us a good part of the day, but it went just fine.
The Police department I did on my own over two days. First day I did the portables and the mobiles (L O N G day!). The following day I went back and did the repeater, back up repeater and the remote receivers. There were not any issues and the dispatchers and officers adapted to it.

On a narrow band receiver, a wide band transmission will sound over modulated.
On a wide band receiver, a narrow band transmission will sound under modulated, or quiet.

You should double check this first with your repeater as sometimes the PL deviation levels are not enough to work properly. If the repeater was set up correctly and aligned, it should be OK.

So, go around and reprogram all the portables, both channels, to narrow band. Then go hit the repeaters. Then go have a cold beer.

[BBowe]

Well that's about the best news I've heard this week. Will definitely try that route in that case. Honestly though, nothing in my life is that simple. If this doesn't result in some degree of fiasco I don't know what I'll do with myself.

Thank you very much guys, very encouraging.

Happy Thanksgiving!