why cant chester county be monitored with a bcd 396?
chester county
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CommJunkie
Member
Chester County's EF Johnson system can't be monitored with any scanner. EF Johnson never sold the software to any scanner companies.
The only thing you can do is program the 3 VHF Channels into your scanner and listen that way. The police have VHF simulcast frequencies too, but they go back and forth whether they have them on or not.
The only thing you can do is program the 3 VHF Channels into your scanner and listen that way. The police have VHF simulcast frequencies too, but they go back and forth whether they have them on or not.
ctrabs74
Member
Chester County can be monitored with a 396, however it can't be programmed as a trunked system; the freqs have to be entered, for all intents and purposes, as a conventional system.
The PD repeaters are off permanently. The Fire/EMS repeaters are still active.
The PD repeaters are off permanently. The Fire/EMS repeaters are still active.
Septa3371CSX1
Member
The Fire / EMS repeaters have pretty high powered transmitters as well. I've heard reports of the dispatch frequency, 160.185, being heard as far away as the Jersey shore. I can pick up that and the two 159 freqs pretty good in Eastern Delco and the city of Philadelphia. As far as the trunk system Chester County uses, I don't feel LTR is the best trunk system for emergancy services use. It works fine for taxi cabs and businesses but emergancy services deserve a reliable trunk system. Montgomery County uses a Motorola Smart Zone system and it works pretty good (except I can only pick up the analog talk groups). Perhaps Chester County should have invested in a UHF Hi (406-512 mHz) trunked system using a different type of trunked radio system (i.e. Motorola or Project 25). It would require less transmitter sites and better coverage in the rural areas of Chester County.
Chester County Just Got New Radios to Replace there Old ones . And they Will be Switching there System soon also to a EF Johnson Multi-Net 3 P25 Trunking System .
Just got my new Radios from them . Right now there Programmed for the current setup .
If you like to Monitor the County Police and Fire , I do have a 24/7 Live Audio Feed setup for the 800 MHz Trunked system . Have one of my Extra EFJ Radios setup for that .
Steve Avenger44 .
Just got my new Radios from them . Right now there Programmed for the current setup .
If you like to Monitor the County Police and Fire , I do have a 24/7 Live Audio Feed setup for the 800 MHz Trunked system . Have one of my Extra EFJ Radios setup for that .
Steve Avenger44 .
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Septa3371CSX1
Member
Will the fire repeaters still be in service after this switch (160.185, 159.600, 159.735) still be active?
Septa3371CSX1 said:
County has been talking about taking the 159.600 and 159.735 off the air sins there not used as talkin channels .Everone talks in on 800 MHz . 160.185 will still be used , because it is used to activate the fire pagers .
Steve Avenger44 .
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/chescopa/
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When they switch over, will we finally be able to monitor the system? Also, since I guess this switch will be happening in stages, do you know when the switchover will begin to happen?
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policefreak said:
No the system will be closed to scanner listeners . Hear is some pictures of the new radios we are using . These radios are setup for are current system and will be used for are new digital system . from what I see , it will be another year before things switch over . But we got are new radios . lol .
Steve Avenger44
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/chescopa/
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CommJunkie
Member
It's all in the lowest bidder. I thought EFJ went out of business and Chesco hated EFJ...but maybe I was wrong. It wouldn't make sense to upgrade the same system if they did...
Also, what is the point of going P25 if no one can monitor you anyway?
Also, what is the point of going P25 if no one can monitor you anyway?
So are you saying that a P25 Multinet 3 system can't be monitored by APCO-25 capable scanners even if the frequencies are programmed as conventional channels? If so, please explain. I fully understand that it can't be tracked as other LTR systems are, but setting up the frequencies in conventional mode and locking out the home channel should still permit monitoring and decoding, correct?
Also, what range testing has ChesCo done to verify coverage? I haven't observed any P25 transmissions. Trying to implement the system without doing range and coverage testing would be a potential disaster.
Also, what range testing has ChesCo done to verify coverage? I haven't observed any P25 transmissions. Trying to implement the system without doing range and coverage testing would be a potential disaster.
Johnson's new MultiNet P25 is nothing more that true P25 CAI exclusive trunking, almost identical to the over-the-air protocol used by M/A-Com's P25ip. So, unless Chester County intends to encrypt all talkgroups, there should be no reason the the new system should be "closed" to P25-capable scanners.
chankel said:
The system would not be able to be tracked with any scanner . however you could decode the p25 with a digital scanner setup with the 800 MHz Frequencies in conventional setup .
I've been into EF Johnson Gear for a longtime now . All my HAM and GMRS Radios I have are EFJ . EFJ now has a contract with Motorola . Motorola has been helping with there new radios . The EFJ 5100 / 51SL / 5300 / 5100ES / 51SLES / 5300ES / 53SLES Radios are the same as the Motorola XTS-5000 and XTL-5000 Radios . Yes there have been Coverage gaps . but they can be fixed very easy . and sins I have a radio on 99% of the time I hear everything going on in the county . and I hear a lot of interference on the system , and that intereference is casusing most of the problems . sometimes it's worse . but till you take care of the interference problems ,cellphones etc , the problem will NOT go away no matter what system you have installed . Thats why we are regin 1 for rebanding . Once you take care of that issue and take care of some key spots in the county the system will play very nice . Till the County sees this problem , the problems there having will not go away . It's not the systems problem and it's not a radio problem . The county does not even have the EFJ Gear setup the right way any how . The new radios are Flashed for Multi-net Trunking with P25 Digital .
Steve Avenger44
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I suspected as much with regard to monitoring the P25 channels in "conventional" mode. It would seem that there is little benefit to keeping the LTR MultiNet system but going to P25 modulation. P25 comes with the set of signal reception problems unique to digital modulation, and an oddball system like LTRM seems to offer far fewer benefits than an ASTRO-type Motorola system that was built with digital and mixed mode operation in mind. Of course, any added level of complexity in any system increases the number of things that can go wrong.
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chankel said:
Well the counties new system is not a motorola network . It's still going to be EF Johnson . The new system will be mix mode p25 , it wont be smartzone , smartnet system . I was helping out with programming of the new radios . so I deal with police and fire Communications a lot .
ocguard said:
I will look into what are Project End date will be and Let you know . If anyone like to Listen to the Chester County Live Audio Feed , you can use the Teamspeak Software and Use Server Address : 66.189.5.227 Scan Western Mass Server or the IBN Teamspeak Server : 65.98.118.2:8768 .
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