Tone Detection on Harris XL-200

[cooleyaustin98]

Hello,

I am trying to figure how to do tone detection on Harris radios. Something similar to QuickCall2 on Motorola. Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[mikehagans]

You're looking for T99. I believe it is option 09 on the XL200. I know this is an old (unanswered) questions - but I need information on T99 also.
The XL200 manual has minimal information and none about programming in RPM2.
I'm in a rural county in N. Alabama. We recently entered into a contract for a P25 simulcast system. While we are waiting for our sites to be built for our Phase 2 P25 7/800 system, I have fire stations and rescue squads using legacy conventional systems with "two-tone" alerting for "paging them out" to a call in their response area. Their old portable radios are shot and I'm tasked with replacing them with the new triband XL200P radios, for the next ~18 months on these analog systems.
I'm using non-Harris tones so I set up tones B and C in the T99 table. I set two sets of tones up, one for fire station A and one for Fire station B.
But now I'm stuck. How do i scan a list that includes a frequency/system with T99 enabled (so that the radio does not open squelch on the T99 channel unless the T99 code occurs) and still scan other frequencies that do not use T99?
I also have several individuals that volunteer for two different agencies using T99 codes. They need to scan between two different repeaters, with different tone sets (the two tones sets mentioned above) and be alerted when either one is activated. Can anyone help me? Harris and RPM/RPM2 are NEW to me.

Mike

XG-100 (RPM)
XL200P (RPM2)

 

[wa8pyr]

I'm using non-Harris tones so I set up tones B and C in the T99 table. I set two sets of tones up, one for fire station A and one for Fire station B.
But now I'm stuck. How do i scan a list that includes a frequency/system with T99 enabled (so that the radio does not open squelch on the T99 channel unless the T99 code occurs) and still scan other frequencies that do not use T99?
I also have several individuals that volunteer for two different agencies using T99 codes. They need to scan between two different repeaters, with different tone sets (the two tones sets mentioned above) and be alerted when either one is activated. Can anyone help me? Harris and RPM/RPM2 are NEW to me.

In a nutshell, you can't, at least not reliably.

While scanning, the radio will be off the alert channel as the radio scans; being off the alert channel means the radio won't catch all the tone and won't alert reliably.

You can scan, or you can park on the alert channel.

Presumably they're awake and paying attention while scanning, so in theory they should hear the alert when the radio stops on the (non-alert) dispatch channel.

 

[mmckenna]

I also have several individuals that volunteer for two different agencies using T99 codes. They need to scan between two different repeaters, with different tone sets (the two tones sets mentioned above) and be alerted when either one is activated.

That's a real gamble. Our fire department could be paged out by either our dispatch center or the County. Since missing a page was not an option, two radios were necessary to make sure we got the page. Scanning and tone alerting are not a good combination, unless you are willing to risk missing a call.

 

[natedawg1604]

That's a real gamble. Our fire department could be paged out by either our dispatch center or the County. Since missing a page was not an option, two radios were necessary to make sure we got the page. Scanning and tone alerting are not a good combination, unless you are willing to risk missing a call.

Do you mean 2 radios at stations? Or does everyone carry 2 radios?

 

[merlin]

While scanning, set your alert channel as priority. a far less chance of missing a T99 call.

 

[mmckenna]

Do you mean 2 radios at stations? Or does everyone carry 2 radios?

In the apparatus bay, there were 2 separate radios:

1. Our agency radio.
2. County radio

Both radios fed an audio amplifier that piped audio through the station.

Both radios had two channel setups:
1. Daytime. All radio traffic would be heard, plus the tone outs would trigger an audible alarm
2. Nighttime. Radio would mute until it hear their specific tone set, then audible alarm, light trigger, audio would be piped through the station.

No one carried two radios on their person. If I recall correctly, the engine had two mobile radios.

 

[wa8pyr]

While scanning, set your alert channel as priority. a far less chance of missing a T99 call.

Still won't work reliably, I've tried it. If you miss even part of the first tone because of scanning, the radio just won't decode properly.

For something as mission-critical as two-tone alerting for a fire department, it's not worth taking the chance.