Multiple P25 Control Channels

[MIscan]

I have a BCD386T I'm using in Michigan's MPSCS system. I live at the fringe of one towers area and sometimes travel into the next towers area. Three years ago I set up two systems and switch between these systems depending which area I'm in. I'm now reorganizing my setup and wonder if I can combine the two systems into one by combining both sets of control channels into one system.

 

[ht396jm]

I have a BCD386T I'm using in Michigan's MPSCS system. I live at the fringe of one towers area and sometimes travel into the next towers area. Three years ago I set up two systems and switch between these systems depending which area I'm in. I'm now reorganizing my setup and wonder if I can combine the two systems into one by combining both sets of control channels into one system.

NOPE. Years ago, this was one of my first questions I asked on this forum. You have to keep the active control channels separated into different sites, the scanner locks on the first channel it hears and then moves on to another site. If you have only 1 site, even with multiple control channels programmed, the scanner will NOT scan them in succession in the same site. Hope this helps.

 

[MIscan]

Thanks, It has been years since I programmed this scanner. I wanted to clean this up and thought. Why have the same ID's repeated twice in two different (systems) sites? But felt that I may have gone down this road before and that I might have to have the separate (systems) sites .

 

[hiegtx]

Thanks, It has been years since I programmed this scanner. I wanted to clean this up and thought. Why have the same ID's repeated twice in two different (systems) sites? But felt that I may have gone down this road before and that I might have to have the separate (systems) sites .

That was one of the drawbacks of the 396T (one site per system). So, if trying to cover more than one site, the talkgroups had to be duplicated in each system. That also made the PSR500 more popular, as you could include control channels from more than one site in a system. The PSR500 was released in 2007, and Uniden did not introduce the 396XT until 2009; one of the 'new features' for the XT scanner was multi-site.

 

[ht396jm]

Thanks, It has been years since I programmed this scanner. I wanted to clean this up and thought. Why have the same ID's repeated twice in two different (systems) sites? But felt that I may have gone down this road before and that I might have to have the separate (systems) sites .

I hear ya. I actually did this first, THEN asked about it in the forum. Turns out I was missing more than half of what I wanted to listen to when I thought I was actually being smart.

 

[cubn]

You can put both control channels in the same system if the towers/cities are far enough apart that you are not likely to hear both CCs at the same time. The 396T will keep monitoring the first freq in the system until there is no signal and it will check the next freq in the system for a control channel.

If the towers are closer and you only want one system in your scanner, put the local tower first and the far away tower second. That way the far away tower should only be scanned when you are out of range of your primary tower. This is how I set up my system for road trips in Illinois Starcom21 on the 396T.