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HT1250 Quick-Call 2 randomly opening

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alkassell

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Feb 9, 2011
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13
Location
Chesterfield, Ma
I'm new new to the world of programming radios, so please forgive any misuse of terms - I'll try to describe my question / problem as best I can.

I got tasked a few months ago to update the programming on our FD's HT 1250's. I purchased ( on the behalf of the FD ) CPS from Motorola and a cable, and with some help from another FD's tech guy, I managed to muddle my way through. Everything has worked fine with one exception: The radios seem to open up when they shouldn't.

Here's the history: Many of us use our radios as pagers, using quick-call II, when we don't want to monitor all traffic. Previously they were programmed to make an alert tone without voice, but many of us wanted to hear the voice transmission at the same time ( we have Minitor V pagers as well, but it's nice to have redundancy, and some (especially our Chief) don't like to carry both ), so I changed it over to 'Call Alert with Voice' in the CPS, and cured that. There are also times where we may not be near the radio, and I worried that the automatic timer might reset the radio before we realized there had been a call, so I changed that to 'Manual' in the CPS.

So here's the problem:Occasionally the radio will open up when we aren't being toned. It doesn't give the alert tones, and it seems to happen randomly ( i.e., in the middle of the night I'll hear chatter from a neighboring town that uses the same frequency for dispatch ). The way the radios are programmed, we have to either change the channel, or do a short press on one of the side buttons to re-set it. It's happening on more than just my radio, so I doesn't seem to be a radio issue. When we do get paged, the alert tone comes on, as well as voice, and if we don't re-set it manually, it will stay open indefinitely ( all of which is what I wanted ). It's possible that it doesn't re-set correctly, and we don't notice for a while because there's no radio traffic, but the display doesn't show that there was a call when this happens - it shows the name I programmed in the conventional personalities ( "Page Call" ). When there is a call, it shows "Call Received" ( I think that's what it says ) until the radio is reset. There are other times where it is definitely closed to radio traffic, the way it should be.

So... Am I missing something in CPS? Are we not re-setting the radios properly some of the time? Is it some random glitch? A poltergeist perhaps? I can easily believe it's user error either in CPS or with the radios, but what is it? If it were consistent ( or at least I could find the pattern ), I'd be a little less confused.

Any help would be greatly appreciated - if my chief gets woken up in the middle of the night by some random traffic that doesn't concern us, it's gonna be a bad day for me...
 

SteveC0625

Order of the Golden Dino since 1972
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Oct 24, 2009
Messages
2,795
Location
Northville, NY (Fulton County)
I'm new new to the world of programming radios, so please forgive any misuse of terms - I'll try to describe my question / problem as best I can.

I got tasked a few months ago to update the programming on our FD's HT 1250's. I purchased ( on the behalf of the FD ) CPS from Motorola and a cable, and with some help from another FD's tech guy, I managed to muddle my way through. Everything has worked fine with one exception: The radios seem to open up when they shouldn't.

Here's the history: Many of us use our radios as pagers, using quick-call II, when we don't want to monitor all traffic. Previously they were programmed to make an alert tone without voice, but many of us wanted to hear the voice transmission at the same time ( we have Minitor V pagers as well, but it's nice to have redundancy, and some (especially our Chief) don't like to carry both ), so I changed it over to 'Call Alert with Voice' in the CPS, and cured that. There are also times where we may not be near the radio, and I worried that the automatic timer might reset the radio before we realized there had been a call, so I changed that to 'Manual' in the CPS.

So here's the problem:Occasionally the radio will open up when we aren't being toned. It doesn't give the alert tones, and it seems to happen randomly ( i.e., in the middle of the night I'll hear chatter from a neighboring town that uses the same frequency for dispatch ). The way the radios are programmed, we have to either change the channel, or do a short press on one of the side buttons to re-set it. It's happening on more than just my radio, so I doesn't seem to be a radio issue. When we do get paged, the alert tone comes on, as well as voice, and if we don't re-set it manually, it will stay open indefinitely ( all of which is what I wanted ). It's possible that it doesn't re-set correctly, and we don't notice for a while because there's no radio traffic, but the display doesn't show that there was a call when this happens - it shows the name I programmed in the conventional personalities ( "Page Call" ). When there is a call, it shows "Call Received" ( I think that's what it says ) until the radio is reset. There are other times where it is definitely closed to radio traffic, the way it should be.

So... Am I missing something in CPS? Are we not re-setting the radios properly some of the time? Is it some random glitch? A poltergeist perhaps? I can easily believe it's user error either in CPS or with the radios, but what is it? If it were consistent ( or at least I could find the pattern ), I'd be a little less confused.

Any help would be greatly appreciated - if my chief gets woken up in the middle of the night by some random traffic that doesn't concern us, it's gonna be a bad day for me...
The easiest way to fix this is for somone to look over your codeplug. I can look at it for you if you like. PM coming to you with my email address.
 

alkassell

Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2011
Messages
13
Location
Chesterfield, Ma
Thanks for the help, Steve. I'm going to move some of the PM here to open this back up to the public:

From Steve:"... your tones don't seem right. 1403.0 is a standard Plectron system tone. The other two (600.0 and 843.0) do not appear on any tone chart that I have. Can you verify the tones with a reliable source? This may well be the cause of your falsing problems."


From me: "I can verify the tones, but I'm guessing that's not the problem, because it does open up when we are paged, with the alert tones, and the display changes on the HT1250. When it opens up at other times, it gives no alert tones, and the display doesn't change - you just suddenly receive voice transmission. I'm not the one who programs the pagers, but I can get that info, and make sure it matches ( they seem to work fine ). I can also probably get that info from Northampton Control, who dispatches for us."

Any other thoughts?
 

RKG

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Joined
May 23, 2005
Messages
1,096
Location
Boston, MA
Does you Fire Alarm send the QC tone with PL? If so, be sure your CDM is programmed to require both PL and QC.
 

alkassell

Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2011
Messages
13
Location
Chesterfield, Ma
When checking on your suggestion, RKG,, it got me thinking ( always dangerous ): The channel we use with QC is not an RX only personality ( this is the way it was set up when I inherited the task of updating the radios ). Is it possible an inadvertent tap of the mike unlocks the radio? I can switch it to Rx only - probably best so that we don't accidentally broadcast when lugging or portables around.

Also, your post prompted me to notice that our dispatch freq. ( we refer to them as Control, not Fire Alarm, but same thing ) has a TPL code on it's regular channel, but for it's QC channel it's set as CSQ ( again, this is how the radios were set when I took over with the them ). Shouldn't they both be set to the same TPL? My instinct is to change both these things - any thing I'm missing?
 

SteveC0625

Order of the Golden Dino since 1972
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Joined
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Messages
2,795
Location
Northville, NY (Fulton County)
When checking on your suggestion, RKG,, it got me thinking ( always dangerous ): The channel we use with QC is not an RX only personality ( this is the way it was set up when I inherited the task of updating the radios ). Is it possible an inadvertent tap of the mike unlocks the radio? I can switch it to Rx only - probably best so that we don't accidentally broadcast when lugging or portables around.

Also, your post prompted me to notice that our dispatch freq. ( we refer to them as Control, not Fire Alarm, but same thing ) has a TPL code on it's regular channel, but for it's QC channel it's set as CSQ ( again, this is how the radios were set when I took over with the them ). Shouldn't they both be set to the same TPL? My instinct is to change both these things - any thing I'm missing?
Your guess is probably correct for the Rx, but not the PL.

Make your alerting personality Rx only and leave it set for CSQ. Most dispatch systems don't transmit the PL with alerting tones since they know that pagers like the Minitors do not handle PL at all. (I missed that when I looked over your codeplug.) The instruction sheets that I sent you do call for the alerting personality to be Rx only and CSQ.
 

alkassell

Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2011
Messages
13
Location
Chesterfield, Ma
Thanks, Steve - I really appreciate your help, and the notes. I did read that note - I didn't remember that it was set for Tx also. The radios were programmed by someone ( dunno who ) long ago, and I was asked to update them with the Ma Tactical Communication Plan's frequencies. Since I didn't know what I was doing for the most part, I tried not to change more than I needed to - hence never changing the features of the QC II personality, except for switching from 'Call Alert' to 'Call Alert w/ Voice', and changing the Auto Reset Timer Type to 'Manual'. I will switch the personality to Rx only, and leave the squelch as 'CSQ'.

A couple of other questions:
-I have the 'Auto Reset Timer Type' set as manual, as I mentioned, and above it the box for 'Alert Tone Auto Reset' is unchecked. Is that correct? My goal is to have the HT1250 continue to alert until someone manually resets it.
- In your notes, Steve, you mentioned a tone generator app. How can I use that to test the QCII system? I obviously don't want to tone out my department by broadcasting it. Do you just use it to verify that the tones received are the ones programmed, but not use it to generate tones? We do have a tone test 6 days a week, but it would be nice to be able to test radios and pagers without having to wait for the tone test.

I will update the code plug later, and see what happens. Since it's been an intermittent problem, I may not know if it's cured for a while, but either way Rx only seems like the proper way to have it set, even if for no other reason than I know I key my mike on the portables accidentally fairly often.
 

SteveC0625

Order of the Golden Dino since 1972
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Joined
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Messages
2,795
Location
Northville, NY (Fulton County)
Thanks, Steve - I really appreciate your help, and the notes. I did read that note - I didn't remember that it was set for Tx also. The radios were programmed by someone ( dunno who ) long ago, and I was asked to update them with the Ma Tactical Communication Plan's frequencies. Since I didn't know what I was doing for the most part, I tried not to change more than I needed to - hence never changing the features of the QC II personality, except for switching from 'Call Alert' to 'Call Alert w/ Voice', and changing the Auto Reset Timer Type to 'Manual'. I will switch the personality to Rx only, and leave the squelch as 'CSQ'.
That should do the trick for you.

A couple of other questions:
-I have the 'Auto Reset Timer Type' set as manual, as I mentioned, and above it the box for 'Alert Tone Auto Reset' is unchecked. Is that correct? My goal is to have the HT1250 continue to alert until someone manually resets it.
(If you hit F1 while your cursor is on that check box, you will get a little help screen which will explain the function.) If you leave the box unchecked, it is a repeating alert tone.

- In your notes, Steve, you mentioned a tone generator app. How can I use that to test the QCII system? I obviously don't want to tone out my department by broadcasting it. Do you just use it to verify that the tones received are the ones programmed, but not use it to generate tones? We do have a tone test 6 days a week, but it would be nice to be able to test radios and pagers without having to wait for the tone test.
The app won't let you generate tones through the radio. If it's Radio ID, it hears tones and tells you what they are.

You can set up a HT1250 to send tones. What I do is set the sending radio on one of our simplex channels that no one uses (secondary EMS frequency), and then temporarily adjust the alerting personality in the receiving radio to that frequency. Then I can send out tones as much as I need. I also set the sending radio to low power for this.

I will update the code plug later, and see what happens. Since it's been an intermittent problem, I may not know if it's cured for a while, but either way Rx only seems like the proper way to have it set, even if for no other reason than I know I key my mike on the portables accidentally fairly often.
It may take a while to confirm that your changes have solved the problem. But, as we've discussed, the best and safest way to have an alerting channel in a portable is for it to be Rx only. For mobiles or mobiles used as base radios, there are some good reasons to have the alerting channel be Tx and Rx, but that's for another discussion.

As I pointed out in email, the radios were fairly well programmed when you took over. There are some minor tweaks in those notes I sent you that will help performance, notably the Tx and Rx audio settings, but overall, you should be in good shape now. Don't hesitate to reach out if other issues arise.

p.s. I'd still like you to verify those two tones. They are not on any standard tone charts from any of the commonly used tone systems. It's a small loose end,, but worth tying up if you can.
 

alkassell

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Joined
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Messages
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Location
Chesterfield, Ma
I will verify the tones tonight - I can use the app you mentioned during the evening tone test. I will also see if I can get them from dispatch if that doesn't work for some reason.

That's also a good idea about changing frequencies temporarily for testing tones - I knew that the HT1250's could generate them, but it never occurred to me to switch frequencies so as to not cause a ruckus with my FD. We have some freq's we are allowed to use, but never do - I'll pick one of those, and use low power.
 

jeatock

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Another possibility... from experience.

Since the 1970's our FD used a non-ctcss QC-II tone on VHF analog. About ten years ago a major metro county joint dispatch center 50 miles away was assigned the same frequency for their new county-wide initial notification system. Apparently the frequency coordinator rubber-stamped approving the frequency, ERP's and antenna height with no regard to the FCC's 'Safe Harbor Rule'. Some days a hand-held scanner with a 6" rubber antenna doesn't have enough squelch to get rid of them.

Guess what? They use about every tone pair in the book, including ours and three other FD's in my area. We had to change paging frequencies. We also went to EIA 5/6 tone paging which is proving to be bulletproof, quicker and sends more info than a generic alert.
 
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