KTVU reports: San Francisco first responders relying on outdated technology

Last night's story on San Francisco's plan to replace its 14 year old radio infrastructure.

San Francisco first responders relying on outdated technology - KTVU -

There is nothing wrong with the system SF has except a few coverage issues and Motorola won't support it anymore.

They could easily keep going with a few voting receivers but completely switching to a digital solution at this point is just foolishness. The interoperability is because the airport district didn't buy enough radios, and no one on the entire system ever receives any radio training. Half the talkgroups are never used, and during the Asiana crash no one knew which TGs to go to......

But, after all, it isn't THEIR dollars, it is, once again, the taxpayer footing the bill, and what do they know?

At 2:43 the notorious missing knob.

As far as the system upgrade better now then later. IMO

But no matter what the system will still require training for interop, digital can't fix that.

If the cop at 243 gets in contact I have a knob for him. Crazy they can still find knobs for that. Well digital I'd the future and with companies and other fcc changes some can argue business cartel technology does change. In aspect whatever they install now will be obsolete by time it's built out but they'd be on same page as others nearby. I thought the original trs was to solve interop problems? Ha. Digital isn't bad though. I know why allot people don't like it because they fear one thing after a upupgrade comes. But one problem keeping a old system is liability with used parts and manufacturers no longer supporting. They could but don't because it's a loss of revenue and the push to keep up to date is in demand now days. Theyd loose out. What I don't understand is why the fire uses the trs on site during a scene instead of a repeated on scene tac that relays back to the trs. I believe fdny is making use of that method and is working rather well. Others do and have no issues. There's nothing more annoying then being in a scene and you just get a bonk trying to key to another 50 feet above you in a building. I think the dtrs is good but at cost it hits tax payers. One logical solution would be to only replace what needs be such as say phase 1 any phase 1 equip compliant keep and use only buying what needs to be replaced however when buying a contract for dtrs a agency has to consider future mandates and of course salesmen will doom say the sale fpr a slam dunk but in reality it'll cost more to keep upgrading over time rather just buying the cow in full now for tdma. It may not be set to stone now but one day they'll push the tdma on 700 with a date.

com501 said:

There is nothing wrong with the system SF has except a few coverage issues and Motorola won't support it anymore.

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well, that last bit is a big problem ...

i am on the floor after watching that they thing they have problems now
wait till they put in a P25 System they thing they have coverage holes wait till the
they try to use a P25 system in a building fire good luck Sf Fire have fun

n6hcm said:

well, that last bit is a big problem ...

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It may be a big problem, for the customer. But honestly it's the customers fault.

I guarantee they have been advised of support going away on legacy equipment they are using. Well before the support would go away. It's in Motorola's interest that they advise them. They are in the business of making money after all.

Motorola is no different then most companies when it comes to support of legacy equipment.
Motorola is probably better than most companies at supporting legacy equipment, Centracom Gold elite, Anyone.

Support can be.
No longer make a part/s for device, but may have the available parts in stock until depleted.

Or Support could be, no longer actively working on software , firmware updates on equipment.

Point is there is different kinds of support.

Although agencies and sales love using the no support card, to push through getting a system upgrade.

I would not expect Motorola to support a spectra or MSF5000 when they fail, if your lucky you can find the part on ebay. But in Public safety it goes to auction.

scannerbuff999 said:

i am on the floor after watching that they thing they have problems now
wait till they put in a P25 System they thing they have coverage holes wait till the
they try to use a P25 system in a building fire good luck Sf Fire have fun

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If they switch from analog to P25 today, and that was the only change. It would sound better and no less coverage than they have now, may actually be better coverage in some conditions.

The SmartZone system they are using now probably wasn't designed to cover SFO. However, it does seem to do a decent job within city limits. I find it unrealistic to expect coverage with a HT on a hip inside every building. Their current system isn't any worse than the previous low bad/PIC system SFPD had before.

Of course there was no interoperability at SFO. SFO units are now on a P25 system of their own and most of it is encrypted. Since mutual aid was involved, I don't know why law enforcement didn't use CLEMARS and fire didn't use VFIRE to talk to each other.

Radiobern said:

I don't know why law enforcement didn't use CLEMARS and fire didn't use VFIRE to talk to each other.

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Because that involves turning the channel selector knob, and most officers are not trained how to do it. They'll *****/moan about missing knobs, but few of them will bother to learn how to properly use the radio.

SF 800MHz Replacement Project

Here's a copy of the 800MHz Public Safety Radio Replacement Project RFI (Request for Information).

Pages 4 to 5 say that the new SFMTA radio system will have both a 9 channel 700MHz P25 Phase II system along with a 15 channel 800MHz Open Sky System built by Harris and operational by the end of 2015.

Oh krap. Broken Sky. Really? Whose kids got put through college on that boondoggle this time? They are so going to regret that.....

com501 said:

There is nothing wrong with the system SF has except a few coverage issues and Motorola won't support it anymore.

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14 years ago, Motorola was selling systems that, today, are based on 20+ year old products. It's not unreasonable for Motorola to no longer support these older systems.

But digging down deeper, one has to clarify what one means by "support". There's a certain large, 22+ year old Smartnet system in California that will probably be pushing 30 years old when the last of it goes away. A lot of the hardware is NLA, but Motorola can and will still create codeplugs for 6809 controllers for the rebanding efforts that are finally getting underway here.

Looking at the bigger picture, I see a vendor that, sure, they want to sell new systems, but they still do everything they can to support the older systems out there that still have to exist for a while longer. There's just a limit on what they CAN do on this older equipment.

There's no love lost between Motorola and myself, but I've gotta give them credit where it's due.

com501 said:

They could easily keep going with a few voting receivers but completely switching to a digital solution at this point is just foolishness...

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I'm not sold on the whole digital thing myself, but...

One of the things that is driving all this is funding sources. There's a lot of federal grant money that gets made available, but the grants frequently come with a pretty short leash. The last few grant funded projects I've been involved with specified P25 compliant systems. In other words, if you want help paying for it, then you have to follow the rules that come with the money. At some point, the choice is no longer made at the local level.

With the rest of the country moving toward P25 digital systems, bucking the trend and trying to keep an old analog system architecture going by upgrading to more modern hardware might work at first, but it'll eventually be viewed as an irresponsible decision.

jland138 said:

Here's a copy of the 800MHz Public Safety Radio Replacement Project RFI (Request for Information).

Pages 4 to 5 say that the new SFMTA radio system will have both a 9 channel 700MHz P25 Phase II system along with a 15 channel 800MHz Open Sky System built by Harris and operational by the end of 2015.

Click to expand...

I guess they didn't hear about Las Vegas Metro Police and Desert Sky. They had a whole bunch of problems with their Open Sky system and are now moving on to a Motorola P25 system. Perhaps they should consult with some closer neighbors across the Bay. Oakland PD/FD is currently using a P25 system implemented by Harris. They are also going to scrap that system and move on to EBRCS. I don't think Broken Sky or any Harris solution has proven to work for public safety use.

i love the APX7000 in the end

Is SF's TRS dispatch audio P25 DSP to analog already? It sounds very digitized. Almost like the CHP extenders.

If you are listening on a scanner or a RR feed, none of those handle simulcast well. It sounds fine on my Motorola, although I can affiliate, I have a valid ID, but any Motorola radio on the system sounds good if programmed correctly.

They used to have Orbacom consoles, not sure what they are using now. Its been many years since I was in the center.

SFMTA is Muni...buses, not police or fire. As for the current system, the coverage is horrendous, with very limited reception indoors, almost nothing in the underground Muni tubes, and zero reception in BART stations.

So, add some coverage. Don't buy into the Broken Sky BS, and quit spending ridiculous money that no one has. These municipalities continue to spend money as if it were water. It is not their money, and the general population never gets a say on any of this. There is no accountability either, when the systems they spend money on, don't work. Just look at the current examples, Las Vegas being one of the latest.