Whither Richmond/San Pablo Trunked?

[linuxwrangler]

Anyone getting traffic on Richmond/San Pablo trunked system? To avoid my prior rookie mistake, I've double-checked that every group is enabled, nothing is locked-out and am even in ID search mode to try and catch anything.

It's extremely unusual to go over an hour with no traffic at all - especially since Richmond has had 11 shootings and 3 murders since yesterday resulting in SWAT patrols through the city.

 

[rstrose]

perhaps they added new freqs to the system

the old control channel has traffic on it with the typical beeps if you run the scanner in non trunked mode.

 

[trooperdude]

Did they go failsoft ??

 

[linuxwrangler]

After I first posted I switched to listening to the channels directly and I'm seeing the same thing. Audio with beep-tail on all frequencies listed in the database. No control-channel.

I don't know enough about failsoft to know how the scanner would behave when the system is in that mode. When I researched many months ago there appeared to be action toward adding additional capacity to the system and I have periodically heard them call units in for radio reprogramming but for all I know that could be completely unrelated.

 

[rstrose]

see if this fixes it report back please

858.7125
859.4625
866.1
866.75
867.1
867.625
867.75
867.8
867.875
868.1
868.6125
860.7125

 

[Sac916]

I don't know enough about failsoft to know how the scanner would behave when the system is in that mode.

When FailSoft occurs, the radio system stops trunking and goes into a pseudo-conventional mode. Often times it sounds like an open-carrier on the frequencies with a muted beeping tone. Reception/Clarity is often degraded.

Also, when the system goes into FailSoft, each agency/department get assigned a default frequency. The police get thrown onto one dedicated freq, fire goes to another dedicated freq and so-on.

 

[RolnCode3]

It's extremely unusual to go over an hour with no traffic at all - especially since Richmond has had 11 shootings and 3 murders since yesterday resulting in SWAT patrols through the city.

Booooorrrrrrriiiiiiiinnnnnnnggggggg.

Just kidding.
HOLY CRAP!

 

[linuxwrangler]

When FailSoft occurs, the radio system stops trunking and goes into a pseudo-conventional mode. Often times it sounds like an open-carrier on the frequencies with a muted beeping tone. Reception/Clarity is often degraded.

Also, when the system goes into FailSoft, each agency/department get assigned a default frequency. The police get thrown onto one dedicated freq, fire goes to another dedicated freq and so-on.

That doesn't sound like what I'm hearing. No control signal on any of the listed frequencies but listening to the frequencies sounds like it's still trunked. If I leave it on a single frequency I will only hear snippets of conversations from various agencies. If I hear a fire toneout on one frequency I need to quickly tune around to get the second transmission on a different frequency.

 

[WayneH]

Did they go failsoft ??

EDACS doesn't have an equivalent to Motorola's Failsoft mode. EDACS is either trunking or it's off the air.

 

[linuxwrangler]

OK, I'm currently guessing that they have activated the frequencies in this license:
http://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/Uls...oc=15057625&licKey=2433719&archive=&x=11&y=15

All the old frequencies are there plus four new ones. It is similar, but not identical to what rstrose posted above.

As a first attempt, I just put the LCN from 1-9 in frequency order. This was not very successful. So I left the original frequency/LCN pairings and added the new ones as 6-9 in frequency order so the frequency/LCN pairs are as shown below:
866.1000,1
866.7500,2
867.1000,3
867.6250,4
868.6125,5
858.7125,6
860.7125,7
867.8000,8
867.8750,9

This is working much better - lots of traffic and it seems to be on the correct talkgroups but I don't think it is completely accurate, yet. Also, I'm getting a fair amount of beep-tails. The tails have more of a "buzz" tone to them than the old beep-tails did.As I write, the control channel is 867.8750 which is one of the new frequencies.

Hopefully this will be a springboard and someone can fill in the gaps. More as I locate it.

 

[linuxwrangler]

Update. Based on further observation it appears that the original frequencies have retained their original LCNs but that the LCNs I guessed for the new frequencies are not correct. This also appears to be the source of the beep-tails (control channel tells scanner to listen to a frequency where a transmission has just ended).

 

[inigo88]

I can barely get unitrunker to decode the control channel from here in the north bay but I'm doing my best to take a crack at it and at least it's a start!

Apparently there are 8 frequencies - LCNs 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8. And the current Control Channel 867.875 is LCN 6.

More to come if I can find a good spot in my room to get a consistent decode... I guess I should take a stab at building one of those homebrew 800 MHz Yagis!

-Inigo

 

[RolnCode3]

I think some of the scanners have a way of showing you which LCN a frequency is. Depends on what you're using though.

 

[inigo88]

I've got the new Richmond TRS system figured out thanks to Unitrunker, and tracking flawlessly. They retained the frequencies for LCN1 thru 5 in their original order and added 3 more. Here's the system as it stands now:

LCN 01 - 866.1000
LCN 02 - 866.7500
LCN 03 - 867.1000
LCN 04 - 867.6250
LCN 05 - 868.6125
LCN 06 - 867.8750
LCN 07 - 858.7125
LCN 08 - 860.7125

All the talkgroups appear to be unchanged. Thanks linuxwrangler, minus 867.8 which is part of the BART TRS, you had everything really close already so I just went through each freq one at a time and waited for traffic on it while an LCN # lit up on the program. I did this a bunch of times in a row on each freq, and compared the voice traffic heard to what talkgroup was displayed to verify validity of all the LCN #s.

FYI - LCN08 860.7125 seems to be screwed up somehow with their equipment... The intonation of the trailing beeps is different than the rest of the freqs (it's lower and sounds distorted) and my scanner stops for the trailing beeps on this freq but none of the other ones while tracking the system in EDACS mode (I'm using a Pro-96). I think it's actually audable to the users on the system as well, because they seem to be waiting the extra two seconds for the tones to stop before continuing talking on the next freq in line (anyone who's tried to follow EDACS in conventional mode can vouch for the fact that by the time you hear the tones on one freq and try to switch to the next one in line you're already too late because they've already moved on from that one too). So the fact that there are longer pauses in conversation ONLY after LCN 08 seems kinda like everybody is periodically hearing it... but I could just be imagining things.

In any case, enjoy!

-Inigo

I think some of the scanners have a way of showing you which LCN a frequency is.

I've only heard of that for LTR systems using the Pro-97, never for EDACS. Maybe I've been missing out?

 

[RolnCode3]

I've only heard of that for LTR systems using the Pro-97, never for EDACS. Maybe I've been missing out?

D'oh. I don't have either type up here...maybe that's what it was. Nevermind.

 

[linuxwrangler]

Thanks, inigo88. I needed to hit the sack before I could figure out the rest of the system. I made the changes this morning and will see if I can confirm that it is working. So far so good. First transmission I heard was a report of shots fired.

Reporting party was a Richmond officer...

...who had his window shot out...

...in front of the PD.

Understaffed by dozens of sworn positions. Handling 11 shooting victims since Tuesday - 3 of whom (so far) have died. Regularly held over for forced overtime. And now they are shooting at you. Must be loads of fun working there right now.

The 867.8 frequency is listed on Richmond's license. I'm wondering if that means that BART relinquished it or that it could be a shared frequency for interagency coordination. Any ideas?

 

[trooperdude]

EDACS doesn't have an equivalent to Motorola's Failsoft mode. EDACS is either trunking or it's off the air.

Affirmative on the former.

This post disputes the latter:
http://www.radioreference.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-67845.html

Yes the reversed F means failsoft. In M/A-COM systems there are two different levels of Failsoft. Failsoft 1 means that there is no Site Controller (or SIM in newer systems) present or it is not functioning. Without the Site Controller, no unit or group validation is performed but wide-area multi-site calls are still possible. Failsoft 2 means that the link between the site and the IMC (Integrated MultiSite Controller) is down. Normal trunking operations still continue but wide-area calls are no longer possible. In fact, sites with a Site Controller will still continue to do unit and group validation even in FS2. If the system has C3 MAestro consoles attached, there is a visual indicator on the screen. In normal operation with Site controllers operational at all sites, the screen displays TRNK, in failsoft 1 it displays TRFS (Trunking Failsoft) and in Failsoft 2 it displays FS2 and audible alarms are emmited from each console. (Dispatchers HATE this)

 

[Dragon911]

Thanks, inigo88. I needed to hit the sack before I could figure out the rest of the system. I made the changes this morning and will see if I can confirm that it is working. So far so good. First transmission I heard was a report of shots fired.

Reporting party was a Richmond officer...

...who had his window shot out...

...in front of the PD.

Understaffed by dozens of sworn positions. Handling 11 shooting victims since Tuesday - 3 of whom (so far) have died. Regularly held over for forced overtime. And now they are shooting at you. Must be loads of fun working there right now.

The 867.8 frequency is listed on Richmond's license. I'm wondering if that means that BART relinquished it or that it could be a shared frequency for interagency coordination. Any ideas?

They took a Sten gun (WWII British SMG) off a suspect yesterday...

Shooting IFO the PD? I think the locals are a lil pissed off.

 

[linuxwrangler]

After listening for a while I'm seeing the same thing on 860.7125 and the system overall seems a bit more flaky (static, beep-tails and such). But I'm also hearing "radio-tech test 1-2-3-4-5" so apparently the upgrade is a work in progress. I'll have to ask the guys at the coffee-shop when I see them.

 

[linuxwrangler]

...minus 867.8 which is part of the BART TRS...

So as a double-check I have been listening to 867.8000 and all the traffic on it is BART. Dunno why it's also licensed to Richmond but it doesn't appear to be a current part of their trunked system. So far, inigo88, the config you posted seems to be working fine - actually better than the trunked system itself is running at the moment. They are still having the problem on 860.7125.

By what process does the new info get merged into the master database?