XTL 5000 fading receive

[SgtBoleware]

I'm working with an XTL 5000 and it's receive strength starts out fine, but quickly weakens gradually.

Nothing has changed in the radio and we haven't had power outages. Also, it's happening on all the channels from multiple radios, so i've narrowed it down to the specific radio being the issue.

Any ideas on what could be causing this?

 

[davidgcet]

your mention of others having the problem on multiple channels is confusing so we need a terminology clarification please, does this radio not hear others well after a moment, or do others not hear this one well? if others can't hear this one, it would be power falling off, bad antenna, or frequency drift as the most likely culprits. if this one is not hearing others regardless of channel, then it could be an antenna issue or a weak front end. all you cna do is check for SOLID power connections, make sure your coax is not damage or flattened, and try a different antenna. beyond that, it is time for a tech to check the radio itself.

 

[SgtBoleware]

Sorry, What I meant was that we've tried talking to it from multiple radios with the same end result.

It's starts off receiving normal, but the audio slowly becomes weaker and weaker.

Power was checked and was fine, the antenna connections were fine and was checked with a meter with less than 5% reflected.

 

[jim202]

Sorry, What I meant was that we've tried talking to it from multiple radios with the same end result.

It's starts off receiving normal, but the audio slowly becomes weaker and weaker.

Power was checked and was fine, the antenna connections were fine and was checked with a meter with less than 5% reflected.

Has any wiring been done to the radio recently? Reason I ask is that the neither speaker output wires can be grounded. There is a DC voltage on both of them and you will damage the audio output stage if these wires become grounded. If there are any audio attachments like a siren package, you should have them disconnected until you solve your problem.

When you make a technical post here, it is best to describe the issue in detail. With the information you originally posted, it sounded like the receiver was loosing sensitivity and not hearing any station very well over time. That had me scratching my head on how that could happen.

 

[davidgcet]

by the audio slowly becoming weaker, do you mean the volume drops or the signal starts getting scratchy? if the volume is dropping, try another speaker on it just to rule that out. though honestly a bad speaker usually does not start good and fade so i doubt it is that.

is this system digital or analog? are the other channels being tried conventional or trunked? if trunked talk groups, then it really does not rule out anything since you are still using the same repeater/antenna systems.

also, does distance from teh tower seem to affect it? how far is the radio from the tower? if tried on a simplex channel, how far apart were the units. you don't want to be right next to each other, but a half mile to mile apart will tell a lot on a simplex channel.

EDIT: MOL lists a firmware update that fixes poor RX on analog securenet systems. are you using securenet?

 

[SgtBoleware]

We're using analog, conventional, distance doesn't seem to be an issue. We've tried from people outside the hall to people about a mile away and it's the same. We're not using Securenet either.

The volume of the message is dropping, still clear voice though.

 

[Luis_R]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 2.2.1; en-us; T-Mobile myTouch 3G Build/FRG83D) AppleWebKit/533.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/533.1)

Might be a bad or going bad audio p.a. I had a similar problem with an XTL2500 and found that to be the problem.

 

[SgtBoleware]

Thanks for the help all!