Gratiot County Road Commission

[gsalogar]

Yesterday I started receiving a nearly constant sound on 156.105. It sounds like data bursts and I have not heard any voice communications. I have verified this on 2 different scanners. There also appears to no longer be a PL tone. Any ideas on what is going on? Thanks.

 

[rdale]

I vaguely recall a meeting where they mentioned MotoTRBO - can you listen to the recorded TRBO clips and see if that's what it sounds like?

 

[gsalogar]

I do not find recorded clips. Where are they?

 

[rdale]

W2SJW - Radio Sounds

 

[EC-7]

Im hearing it too. Im in Merrill.
Full signal strength here, so its not skip.
Its some sort of digital signal. Sounds kinda like a Control Channel, since its TX about 80% of the time.
They were analog just about a week ago.
I dont know why they would need to switch modes, since what they had was working fine.
Waste of tax $$ that could of been better spent.

 

[rdale]

They probably had to narrowband, so many agencies were spending just about as much to add features like GPS tracking, which MotoTRBO does easily.

 

[jack3726]

Do they have a TGID on MPSCS.

 

[Ronaldski]

Yeah it appears to be a lot of the county commissions are changing. Bay county is all but silent on 150.995, Tuscola did switch to mototurbo it was mentioned in seminar open house at Anderson radio -> I submitted that info but got rejected btw.
Saginaw is on mpscs, midland county ?

 

[gsalogar]

Thanks all- it does sound like MOTOTRBO. They are not on MPSCS, so I am out of luck there. No scanners can decode MOTOTRBO correct? Going to miss them as it was the best way to know road conditions prior to traveling. I did confirm with the wife of a road commission worker that they did get new radios and vehicle trackers. Sounds like this radio system is what provides the tracking- except supervisors- their trucks are not tracked (go figure).

 

[Ronaldski]

yeah I turned off the ctcss tone for the 996t and yep unfortunately 150.995 Bay County commission I get the mototurbo sound too. - > http://www.w2sjw.com/sounds/mototrbo-undecoded.mp3

So a Dbase admin can adjust Gratiot- bay county commissions accordingly.

 

[ffexpCP]

DB has been updated.

 

[Ronaldski]

Dont forget to update, Bay -
Bay County, Michigan (MI) Scanner Frequencies and Radio Frequency Reference

 

[ffexpCP]

Thanks- I missed that one. Its changed now.

 

[EC-7]

If the radios are used to upgrade due to narrowband, GPS tracking and maybe MDT messaging, then its money well spent. As long as the technology is utilized properly.

The GPS tracking alone *could* be HUGE if they ever shared the info and implemented it right. Wouldnt it be cool to get road plowed / salted reports on the news or web, similar to how we have the new traffic speed / flow reports and indicators. This could save some lives or at least prevent accidents, showing what roads are clear.

As for scanning MotoTRBO, I heard that a ham club had software that was decoding it easily, but they joined up with Motorola and took down the links to the software and is "working" with Moto and wont release it now. Too bad, but it sounds like its out there and just a matter of time before it leaks out. I dont have the link, as I stumbled across it recently and didnt think much about it at the time.

 

[rdale]

The software is here, you just need to install and hook it to your disc tap.

 

[vinzep491]

Search DSD Software.

 

[EC-7]

I downloaded the DSD software. I can see the data. I dont know about voice yet, since the weather was nice and no plows out. It does decode the MPSCS digital system good!

If there is enough interest for a live feed of the road commission, I can host one. It might be Gratiot and another county or two, who use MotoTRBO, to be able to get full use of a dedicated PC. I have 13 PCs sitting here for feeds, so let me know if there is interest.

 

[vinzep491]

THIRTEEN


!?

And I thought I "go hard".

 

[vinzep491]

What computer platform are you running the DSD on?

 

[EC-7]

I got the PCs from a closing business dirt cheap, for use on scanner feeds, HAM Radio APRS tracking, and some other radio related projects.

I have the DSD software working on a Dell Dimension 3000. 3Ghz processor, 1.5MB ram. Ubuntu 10.4 software, onboard audio and SoundBlaster card work. I used a Radio Shack Pro-90 and AOR AR-2515 scanner, both with a discriminator tap.

Ill be posting a easy How-To on my personal site soon. Ill have all the info in one place. Ive never tried Ubuntu or Linux before, and after 8+ hours of researching and finding missing/wrong info, I found out its actually very easy to run and use, when you have the directions. It can be working in under 30min. You can even run/test it off a small USB flash drive, and not have to do any permanent changes/installs to your computer.

Ive gotta say, that software is REALLY cool, being able to take any outdated analog scanner and turn it into a (basic) digital scanner that picks up MPSCS and other digital modes / systems.