NYPD going encrypted?

[Priority-One]

I'd see FDNY going for the 8000 for multi band purpose. Are they still using the 3500?

 

[62Truck]

I'd see FDNY going for the 8000 for multi band purpose. Are they still using the 3500?

They are currently using XTS5000.

 

[cackis]

FDNY fire units are still using XTS3500's and EMS is using XTS5000's for portable radios. 1st Battalion fire units scheduled to pilot APX8000's shortly. Training has started.

 

[newsnick175]

The city owns a 700Mz system that if worse comes to worse, it could become the new police/fire system.The other newish system [DOITT UHF] is also on a limb.
The big looser might be Nassau County's 500Mhz system which is less than 5 years old. Suffolk on the other hand is looking good with it's new 700Mhz system.

 

[CqDx]

Believe it or not the Nassau 500 MHz system has been on the air for over 12 years. County PD has switched over for many years now and most if not all villages are already on the system.

Equipment obsolescence is a real issue, you wouldn't want to depend your life and others life on a radio system run by antiquated equipment do you?

It appears the Channel 16 DOITT UHF Trunked System is due for replacement, you will find it in the city's 2017 capital budget. This system too has been on the air for almost 10 years. I have noticed the DOITT 700 MHz system recently added UHF in the band plan so there is a possibility that they will migrate the UHF Type II trunked system to a UHF P25 system.

DOITT and NYPD has always held on to their own licenses. I honestly don't see NYPD moving to DOITT infrastructure.

 

[Darkstar350]

I dont know if the NC 500mhz has been on the air for over 12 years
Maybe in the very small testing stages about 12 years ago but not significantly "on the air" until around 2010 or so
Then it was simulcast with their analog freqs for a while until they pulled the plug about a few years ago
The system does have excellent coverage
Its got a few more sites then the 800mhz system has
My best guess is the county will either build the new 700mhz system and keep the 800mhz freqs but "convert" the 800 to P25 or keep using the 500mhz system specifically for the police and migrate the current users of the 800mhz system to 700mhz
Its really up for grabs at the moment
Theres not much other activity on 500mhz around
A company called "MIC Talk" seems to have got a bid for a bunch of 500mhz freqs

I dont see NYPD going trunked anytime soon
If they did they would literally need a separate trunk system for each individual borough and even that may not be sufficient...

 

[ff026]

The city owns a 700Mz system that if worse comes to worse, it could become the new police/fire system.The other newish system [DOITT UHF] is also on a limb.
The big looser might be Nassau County's 500Mhz system which is less than 5 years old. Suffolk on the other hand is looking good with it's new 700Mhz system.

That system does not have enough capacity to handle NYPD routine day to day traffic let alone a major event like New Years Eve or 4th of July. The License's are held by DOITT, not the NYPD.

 

[Project25_MASTR]

I dont see NYPD going trunked anytime soon
If they did they would literally need a separate trunk system for each individual borough and even that may not be sufficient...

I guess I'm failing to see why each borough would need its own system. I could see each borough requiring it's own site for coverage reliability and to spread loading out but system...no.

 

[CqDx]

You would be surprised to know that NYPD knows what exactly they need. Yes it is a analog conventional system with gazillion transmitters and remove receivers, but it works well for its intent and they know Motorola has to bent their back to keep NYPD as their customer

 

[n2nov]

What radio system planners look at is channel loading. This means that they need to figure out how many individual channels, or voice paths, are being used at the same time. The conventional way of looking at it would have a separate channel for each agency or command/division in that agency. A trunked system would be looking at average and peak usage overall between many agencies. Since NYPD needs total reliability for the patrol officer with a 4 watt HT, whether on the street or in an apartment building in the NYCHA projects, being heard 100% is more important.

 

[ff026]

What radio system planners look at is channel loading. This means that they need to figure out how many individual channels, or voice paths, are being used at the same time. The conventional way of looking at it would have a separate channel for each agency or command/division in that agency. A trunked system would be looking at average and peak usage overall between many agencies. Since NYPD needs total reliability for the patrol officer with a 4 watt HT, whether on the street or in an apartment building in the NYCHA projects, being heard 100% is more important.

It's more like 2 watts. It's 2 watts so batteries last longer during a tour.

 

[Project25_MASTR]

What radio system planners look at is channel loading. This means that they need to figure out how many individual channels, or voice paths, are being used at the same time. The conventional way of looking at it would have a separate channel for each agency or command/division in that agency. A trunked system would be looking at average and peak usage overall between many agencies. Since NYPD needs total reliability for the patrol officer with a 4 watt HT, whether on the street or in an apartment building in the NYCHA projects, being heard 100% is more important.

You'd use what is known as the Engset formula to obtain some base amount trunks required on a given GoS (usually 3% for public safety application) and the amount of users.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[coolrich55]

I know there are many reasons why nypd likes the system they are on. Isn't one important one that the dispatcher can talk over a unit and vice versa without really getting cut off? Even when there is an "open carrier" the units can still communicate with each other. I'm not sure how trunked digital systems would handle those situations.

 

[ff026]

I know there are many reasons why nypd likes the system they are on. Isn't one important one that the dispatcher can talk over a unit and vice versa without really getting cut off? Even when there is an "open carrier" the units can still communicate with each other. I'm not sure how trunked digital systems would handle those situations.

You are referring to 4 Wire audio, with console priority. The dispatcher can always hear, but when there is an open carrier/ open mic, it has and can wipe out anyone else coming through. Especially when it is a mobile radio at 100 watts.

 

[Project25_MASTR]

I know there are many reasons why nypd likes the system they are on. Isn't one important one that the dispatcher can talk over a unit and vice versa without really getting cut off? Even when there is an "open carrier" the units can still communicate with each other. I'm not sure how trunked digital systems would handle those situations.

Digital trunking systems (let's take your average P25 trunked system for example) provide the user one of three tones, proceed, busy, and what is essentially an error. If you key the radio and all resources are busy, you get a busy tone…if you keep the PTT depressed, you may get a proceed tone within 1 to 5 seconds (the system puts you "on hold" until a resource clears). Out of range, you get the error tone, etc. Now, certain talk groups can have different priorities (very similar to network routing) and can actually kick active users off (the designated emergency talk group usually gets this honor) of busy resources, especially if a significantly lower priority. There is a way to kill an "open" mic but I've never had to mess with it and my understanding is it simply disables the channel until the offending unit's TOT has expired (this involves having TOT's properly set though).

 

[Darkstar350]

There does seem to be a bit of open carriers on the NYPD channels
Particularly the City-Wide channels which is what i mostly monitor when it comes to NYPD
At least once a day i hear a dispatcher sending that alarm tone out telling all units to check their radios
Way back when the city had one of the biggest contacts with Motorola in the country so thats what they pretty much only used
But in recent years(15-20 or so) they felt that Motorola wasnt cost efffective or giving them what they wanted so since then NYPD is one of the biggest users of Vertex radios
Now very recently with the intrests of inter-operation and dual band radios NYPD has started to incorporate the Motorolas back in to the system
Im not sure about Vertex but im pretty sure some Motorola portables have some what of a "hands free" talk mode where the radio will transmit just anytime when theres noise
So that could be the reason for the open carriers
Another thing is i dont think NYPD has radio ids in all of the radios yet so that would be why the dispatchers cant always determine who or where the open mic is coming from

But yes most of the time it isnt a problem and the units can just talk over the open mic because of how well their system is set up

 

[Project25_MASTR]

There does seem to be a bit of open carriers on the NYPD channels
Particularly the City-Wide channels which is what i mostly monitor when it comes to NYPD
At least once a day i hear a dispatcher sending that alarm tone out telling all units to check their radios
Way back when the city had one of the biggest contacts with Motorola in the country so thats what they pretty much only used
But in recent years(15-20 or so) they felt that Motorola wasnt cost efffective or giving them what they wanted so since then NYPD is one of the biggest users of Vertex radios
Now very recently with the intrests of inter-operation and dual band radios NYPD has started to incorporate the Motorolas back in to the system
Im not sure about Vertex but im pretty sure some Motorola portables have some what of a "hands free" talk mode where the radio will transmit just anytime when theres noise
So that could be the reason for the open carriers
Another thing is i dont think NYPD has radio ids in all of the radios yet so that would be why the dispatchers cant always determine who or where the open mic is coming from

But yes most of the time it isnt a problem and the units can just talk over the open mic because of how well their system is set up

I just love the logic of this.
Dispatch: All units check your radios
Unless they are near another officer or radio…the offender would never hear that.

Yes, there are VOX setting on the newer radios but they aren't commonly used (for good reason). As speaker/mic designs have evolved, it has become more and more difficult to accidentally key the radios but it still occurs, even on some of the higher end PSMs.

 

[N4GIX]

I just love the logic of this.
Dispatch: All units check your radios
Unless they are near another officer or radio…the offender would never hear that.

Dispatchers in the southeast district in Chicago quite frequently (like 8-15 times each day) have to make such useless, frantic announcements:

"Open key, open key! All units check your radio and your partner's radios for an open key! Open key on the Zone! Emergency traffic go to citywide."

I suspect myself that most often the proximate cause is the officers having so much crap on their belts that the PTT button is getting wedged when they cram themselves behind the steering wheel. :roll:

What puzzles me is that often the offending radio will hold the repeater for more than ten minutes, leading me to wonder just how long their radio's TOT is set!

 

[Darkstar350]

yeah its kind of pointless to keep repeating about the open mic
Ive heard some dispatchers actually get angry and start yelling about it
But again the NYPD radio system is sophisticated so they can also send out that alert tone during the open mic
Its the same tone they send out if theres a suspected officer shot, etc
What i dont know is if that tone sets off any pagers or anything as well

I think the NYPD dispatchers also have a setup where they can "shut the repeater off" for a few seconds in such instances
Sometimes its also the repeater itself getting "stuck"

This is why any upgrades to the NYPD system would most likely be dealing with issues such as open mics, radio ids, and the like
Going FULLY encrypted, digital , etc would definitely not be in the best intrest in the near future at least...

 

[KC2zZe]

Paging is not performed on NYCPD channels. Nothing else is set off either. The tones are simply to gain the attention of the field units prior to a message of certain import coming out from Central.