Southern Alberta DMR

[Jay911]

I've figured out how to beat a geographical area search result out of Spectrum Manglement, so I'm slowly compiling a list of all DMR and other (NXDN, etc) licenses in the Calgary area. When I get it sorted out, I'll share the Excel spreadsheet here. I might even put it in a x36 .hpe file eventually.

Learning a lot about some of the signals we have been hearing and talking about in the past - the "virtual license" feature on Spectrum Manglement is actually half-decent once you get it working. For example, CFD's backup voice alert system actually has three broadcast towers, not two...

(Oh, and for those who don't understand why I'm doing all this, climb out from under your rock - Uniden has announced upcoming DMR support for the x36 line of radios.)

 

[SCPD]

I've figured out how to beat a geographical area search result out of Spectrum Manglement, so I'm slowly compiling a list of all DMR and other (NXDN, etc) licenses in the Calgary area. When I get it sorted out, I'll share the Excel spreadsheet here. I might even put it in a x36 .hpe file eventually.

Learning a lot about some of the signals we have been hearing and talking about in the past - the "virtual license" feature on Spectrum Manglement is actually half-decent once you get it working. For example, CFD's backup voice alert system actually has three broadcast towers, not two...

(Oh, and for those who don't understand why I'm doing all this, climb out from under your rock - Uniden has announced upcoming DMR support for the x36 line of radios.)

I found the Spectrum Management not very accurate when it comes to emission types
I found business using DMR for years still show FM and lots of them
Sad to say from the time I started to monitor users of DMR half have gone encrypted In just over a year. The new arena in Edmonton radio system is DMR encrypted
Guess we will never know section 123 needs the garbage emptied

 

[robertmac]

While a lot of Spectrum Direct is out of date, I think it is worthwhile to update the list somewhere. If Jay goes to the work of doing this, I will appreciate it. I have made a suggestion about some going to DMR but the RR Database still shows it as FM as well. So we do need updates and I for one would like to compare to what I have. Mine is limited to what I used to scan in FM, and not all DMR, NXDN.

 

[Jay911]

Yeah, IC has been less than diligent about emissions, but the newer records appear to be better. Plus I have some freqs/systems I know that are DMR or NXDN so I've included those.

If anybody has a freq they want me to look at, please post it here.

 

[smason]

(Oh, and for those who don't understand why I'm doing all this, climb out from under your rock - Uniden has announced upcoming DMR support for the x36 line of radios.)

And Whistler now as well!

 

[thundermedic]

While a lot of Spectrum Direct is out of date, I think it is worthwhile to update the list somewhere. If Jay goes to the work of doing this, I will appreciate it. I have made a suggestion about some going to DMR but the RR Database still shows it as FM as well. So we do need updates and I for one would like to compare to what I have. Mine is limited to what I used to scan in FM, and not all DMR, NXDN.

It could be that they are listed that way because there was no DMR drop down at the time

We are updating how to save DMR systems into the database for this release. So start submitting!

 

[Jay911]

Okay, I think I have the file suitable for public consumption. It's a zipped up Excel 2013 workbook. There are a bunch of things I want to mention though.

I've put my 'best guess' at the protocol in use in a column for each freq. Where I know it for sure, or where the emissions described in the Industry Canada files said so, I have made those protocols listed without a question mark, or with particular details added (such as trunking type and/or sysid). I did include some analog stuff, or at least stuff described as analog, for two reasons: One, some systems use a mix of digital and analog, such as Wheatland County Fire, where their pagers are analog but the system is reportedly MotoTRBO. Two, as was said earlier in this thread, some licenses are still listed in the Industry Canada DB with analog emissions but are really digital.

I also included NXDN because it is forthcoming from at least one of the two major scanner vendors out there.

There are some companies which I left multiple copies of simplex frequencies listed. One in particular is the cluster of Walmart Logistics warehouses in NE Calgary and the Balzac area. This is because in the virtual licenses, the simplex frequencies are listed as being very low power and just in use around each building. So it's possible that the frequency you see at one site might have completely different parameters (color code etc) at another site.

This is not meant to be an exhaustive, complete list of DMR/NXDN in Alberta or even southern Alberta. Again, I had the RRDB and a kludgey Industry Canada Spectrum Management search to work with, and I'm sure there are some frequencies I missed in places around the region. Please supply them in this thread - along with any updates you find to the frequencies in this file - and I'll keep updating it and/or submitting them to the RRDB.

I'll post another post in this thread shortly with some specifics about certain systems and frequencies listed in the file.

 

[Jay911]

Here's some info on specific systems in the spreadsheet.

Calgary Fire Backup Alerting - it would appear there are three broadcast sites for this system, not two, which explains the three frequencies listed. The third one is on #19 Station's big radio tower in Parkland (SE).

Agrium Carseland Nitrogen Operations - this plant SE of Calgary used to have a Motorola 3600 (Smartnet/Smartzone) trunk system in use but the emissions changed to MotoTRBO, so I have submitted it to the RRDB in that fashion. There are some UHF (400 MHz) frequencies allocated to the plant in analog emissions formats, so I included them in case they're DMR and somebody can figure them out as well.

Calgary Stampeders/CFL have a frequency pair with DMR emissions at McMahon Stadium in Calgary. The virtual license is unclear if this is actually a regular repeater or two simplex channels so I left the "input" (415.8125) listed.

Calgary Flames Limited Partnership has a mass of repeater and simplex freqs registered at both the Saddledome and McMahon (IIRC, both teams are owned by the same consortium, which makes the licensing logical). The Saddledome freqs are listed as DMR, but the McMahon freqs are listed as analog. I have a feeling that the McMahon license is probably just listed incorrectly in IC's data. CFL season starts in less than a month so it should be easy to figure this out pretty soon.

Another system which I've kept multiple simplex freqs listed across different sites is the University of Calgary which has the same freq in use in four distinct locations - the forensic campus up on Spy Hill, two sites at the Foothills Medical Centre, and one potentially at the main campus. This is in addition to the "Security" repeater at the main campus.

Western Midland Communications has two NXDN96 systems listed. One we already have a forum thread for, sys 2082, which I at first thought was City of Airdrie. So far the only user I've heard on this system is Southland Transportation. This system (2082)'s tower is on the "TransAlta" tower west of Broadcast Hill in Calgary, which also includes (to the best of my knowledge) the Calgary Municipal Radio "TransAlta" site, the AFRRCS "Springbank" site, VE6OIL, and others. The other WMC system is supposed to be on 2021 100 Avenue NE, which is the Hampton Inn by Hilton in the NE. No idea if it is for only the Hampton Inn itself or a wider coverage area. I haven't heard anything on these freqs yet, but I haven't been searching very hard.

Wheatland County has been on TRBO for ages now - probably the oldest in the area around Calgary. The emissions on Industry Canada's site say analog, of course, but also there is one frequency missing from the current list in IC's data, compared to what we have in the RRDB. When the system transitioned from analog to TRBO years ago, 155.490 was the primary dispatch channel and to the best of my knowledge was included in the TRBO frequencies. It's not in the IC data as of today. Remains to be seen if this frequency is active - I haven't included it in the spreadsheet; if you are near to Strathmore, you might want to try to tune it in.

That's what I have for now. If anybody has any questions, comments, or concerns, please let me know!

 

[beeperboy]

Impressive list Jay! I think Western Midland (8655 Old Banff Coach Rd) is the CBC tower though.

Western Midland used to have a UHF MPT1327 system on that tower. They may have reused the MPT freqs for NXDN?

 

[thundermedic]

Western midland no longer exists, it was bought by Prairie Mobile a year + ago and everything is on the CBC tower.

 

[smason]

Okay, I think I have the file suitable for public consumption. It's a zipped up Excel 2013 workbook. There are a bunch of things I want to mention though.

Nice job, thanks!

 

[kayn1n32008]

VE6OIL, and the Prairie Mobile NXDN systems are on the CBC tower on broadcast hill

 

[robertmac]

Re: Strathmore 155.49. Yes, it usually has digital noise on it fairly often. It is one of the digital frequencies I have yet lock out as I do monitor it when I am in eastern Alberta so do not want to lock out.
Not having closely reviewed every frequency, one did pop out. That is 154.71 that is listed as DMR for Drum FD. Of course this is used as a link for Strathmore RCMP. The next time I am ouht Drum way, I will see it I

 

[robertmac]

Re: Strathmore 155.49. Yes, it usually has digital noise on it fairly often. It is one of the digital frequencies I have yet to lock out as I do monitor it when I am in eastern Alberta so do not want to lock out. Not having closely reviewed every frequency, one did pop out. That is 154.71 that is listed as DMR for Drum FD. Of course this is used as a link for Strathmore RCMP. The next time I am out Drum way, I will see if I can pick up digital on it.

 

[SCPD]

I agree with brechtd .. their data is so bad that I can randomly just pick frequencies and call them DMR.

Pretty useless. Been there done that a long time ago .. still sucked.

 

[DX-300]

Just FYI I can pick up 155.4900 clearly in SW Calgary here on the AOR DV-1 it is still in use by Strathmore FD. So far I assume EMS there still use it from time to time as well, but I'll make sure to confirm that.

 

[Jay911]

I took another look in Strathmore before they shut down Spectrum Manglement for the weekend and found the 155.49 license hiding in the 16K0F3E emissions. Must have skipped over it during the last run-through.

 

[thundermedic]

Okay, I think I have the file suitable for public consumption. It's a zipped up Excel 2013 workbook. There are a bunch of things I want to mention though.

Are these confirmed? We would need CC, TG, and TL to ender them into the database.

 

[Jay911]

No, this is just a license pull from IC records. Some of them we already know as they're in the RRDB, but the purpose of the spreadsheet is to allow people to go out and monitor/confirm the frequencies on their own (and then hopefully submit them to RR).

 

[Jay911]

I'm working at making the spreadsheet into an x36 HPE favorites file. I envision it will need to be a full favorites list of its own (you probably won't want to add it to another FL) because I plan to make each of the unique locations a separate system/department - primarily so that the ones that are on common/itinerant frequencies can be set to a very short radius around their licensed location.

Obviously I don't have the DMR firmware (yet; but I have purchased keys for my radios) so they will be programmed initially as conventional channels. When the firmware drops and the capabilities become available, I'll modify it as necessary.

It'll take me a couple of days at least to put this file together. Watch this space.