A1 Communications and East Mountain Communications

[CqDx]

Hi all,

I can pick up a mystery DMR Tier 3 system in Scarsdale and have been somewhat puzzled as to who the actual user is. If anyone is in the lower/mid Hudson valley, please search up and down the 450-470 range and see what DMR Tier 3 you can pick up. I suspect the "Grabala, Carl J" is the same as "East Mountain Communications" or "A1 Communications"

454.1250 - Network ID L13, Site 1.7 - Unknown Location
454.20625 - Network ID L13, Site 1.5 - Unknown Location

452.2125 - Network ID L13, Site 1.8 - East Mountain Communications Tinker Hill - Licensed to WRMK719 Grabala, Carl J
464.4000 - Network ID L13, Site 2.8 - East Mountain Communications Newburgh - Licensed to WRPE926 Grabala, Carl J
460.9250 - Network ID L13, Site 2.2 - near Pleasant Valley, NY - Licensed to WROT344 Grabala, Carl J

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Thanks

 

[nozzlenut83]

Carl Grabala was the owner of A-1 and Ralph Mondello ran East Mountain and worked with Carl Grabala at A-1. Carl Grabala has since retired and Ralph Mondello now operates under both names. Licenses are sometimes in both business names and both individual names.

 

[seagravebuff60]

EDIT: I believe you are actually picking up another T3 System in CT, Homeland Defence Network. New Haven Site and Trumbull site
Homeland Defense Network Trunking System, Various, Connecticut

Can you take a couple of screenshots of your signal?

 

[seagravebuff60]

Adding to my previous post. A good way to decipher the 2 systems is by the TGs. 530xxx is East Mountain while 6xxxxx is HDN.

 

[CqDx]

I am familiar with the HDN system and you can usually see affiliation or ACK messages on the system when using DSDPlus to monitor even when there is no voice traffic.

However I don't think the 454.1250 is HDN because I cannot pick up Stamford (452.3375 L13-1.8) from my monitoring location so Trumbull, CT (L13-1.7 on HDN) should be ruled out also.

 

[seagravebuff60]

Ok still a bit confused on what you are actually picking up. Are you picking up both sites 1.5 (on 454.20625) and 1.7 (on 454.125)?
Did you capture any LCNs, color codes, or traffic events to help narrow it down or no?
I would also double check that "show all traffic and background events" is checked to see the affilation and acknowledgment messages.

 

[CqDx]

Sorry for confusion, I'm picking up 1.7 - 454.1250 in Scarsdale.

Site 1.5 - (454.20625) was picked up from a different location closer to Cold Spring under a different trip.

 

[seagravebuff60]

If thats the case i suspect you are picking up HDN for site 1.7 and East Mountain for 1.5, Given the locations of both. And the fact that both system have the same SysID.

Im just trying to help but i have mentioned twice that the LCN, Color Code or Traffic Event (tg or rid format) would be a dead giveaway as to what system is wich. I have no FCC results for eaither state.

Since you formated the system ID and sites the way you did, im assuming you are using DSD+ to decode this info? Are you using FMPx to decode the signal? How is the signal strength? Usually, once DSD is tuned to an active site frequency it should display all this info, except the LCN wich needs to be calculated, and imputted into the . frequencies file.

I will imput 454.125 into DSD and let it run overnight and see what happens.

Im trying to help narrow down but am struggling to do so with the information provided.

 

[CqDx]

I will have an opportunity later this week to monitor both frequencies and will report back on what I can find.

Thanks

 

[DaveNF2G]

Frequencies like 454.20625 are refarmed from Part 22 paging blocks. I have found a number of Con+ frequencies by monitoring the top and bottom edges of the allocated blocks.

 

[CqDx]

I spent about an hour monitoring the control channel stream of 454.125 Site 1.7, no affiliation or data traffic.

 

[pro92b]

Updates for East Mountain Communications T3, submitted to the database.

 

[GTR8000]

Confirmed that 2.2 Pleasant Valley is still on 460.925, also updated site peers.

New site out there somewhere, 1.7 with a control channel of 454.125, showing as a peer to 1.6 Beekman. Happy hunting.

 

[pro92b]

Nothing received in northern Ulster County on 454.125. In post #7 CqDx reported receiving it in Scarsdale.

 

[GTR8000]

It just occurred to me that some of these systems are listed with the incorrect System ID in the RRDB. They should be DEC 13, not HEX 13. I just corrected East Mountain and will submit the correction for that system in CT.

 

[GTR8000]

1.7 in Westchester makes sense for a peer of Beekman. We don't have the peers for Tinker Hill @seagravebuff60 so you want to grab those, then check to see if you can receive 454.125 from your locations?

 

[seagravebuff60]

1.7 in Westchester makes sense for a peer of Beekman. We don't have the peers for Tinker Hill @seagravebuff60 so you want to grab those,

Tinker Hill is reporting 1.6 and 1.7 as neighbors. I don't recall it ever broadcasting any Neighbors.

then check to see if you can receive 454.125 from your locations?

Site 1.7 looks like it is receivable from my Souther Westchester monitoring location. It has a much better signal than my northern Westchester location tho

It just occurred to me that some of these systems are listed with the incorrect System ID in the RRDB. They should be DEC 13, not HEX 13. I just corrected East Mountain and will submit the correction for that system in CT.

Nice Catch! My SDS shows the system ID as Ch.

 

[GTR8000]

Site 1.7 added. Grabala has a YG DMR license at Manhattanville College in Purchase, so we'll go with that for now.

 

[seagravebuff60]

Monitored site 1.7 overnight and it seems like a dead site so far just a few radio acknowledgments on DSD+ and that's about it

 

[GTR8000]

Those running the latest DSD+ Fast Lane 2.457 (released 12/27/2023), you'll need to set this system up as TIIIStd. Here are some examples of how each file might be setup for the system. If you wish to retain existing Groups and Users coming from a previous Fast Lane release, you'll need to modify the lines to change from TIII to TIIIStd, as well as change the NetID from 13 to L13. Details are in the 2.457 release notes.

DSDPlus.networks
TIIIStd,L13,"East Mountain"

DSDPlus.sites
; East Mountain
TIIIStd,L13,1.2,"Esopus"
TIIIStd,L13,1.3,"Highland"
TIIIStd,L13,1.4,"North East"
TIIIStd,L13,1.5,"Dover"
TIIIStd,L13,1.6,"Beekman"
TIIIStd,L13,1.7,"Purchase"
TIIIStd,L13,1.8,"Tinker Hill"
TIIIStd,L13,2.2,"Pleasant Valley"
TIIIStd,L13,2.4,"Pine Plains"
TIIIStd,L13,2.5,"Catskill"
TIIIStd,L13,2.7,"Tivoli"
TIIIStd,L13,2.8,"Cronomer"

DSDPlus.siteLoader
TIIIStd,L13,0,"East Mountain"
TIIIStd,L13,1.2,"Esopus"
TIIIStd,L13,1.3,"Highland"
TIIIStd,L13,1.4,"North East"
TIIIStd,L13,1.5,"Dover"
TIIIStd,L13,1.6,"Beekman"
TIIIStd,L13,1.7,"Purchase"
TIIIStd,L13,1.8,"Tinker Hill"
TIIIStd,L13,2.2,"Pleasant Valley"
TIIIStd,L13,2.4,"Pine Plains"
TIIIStd,L13,2.5,"Catskill"
TIIIStd,L13,2.7,"Tivoli"
TIIIStd,L13,2.8,"Cronomer"

DSDPlus.frequencies
; East Mountain
TIIIStd,L13,1.2,423,452.625,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.2,2237,463.9625,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.2,2279,464.225,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.3,403,452.5,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.3,1811,461.3,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.3,1815,461.325,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.3,1953,462.1875,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.3,2251,464.05,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.3,2289,464.2875,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.4,255,451.575,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.4,443,452.75,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.4,1999,462.475,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.5,1861,461.6125,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.5,2249,464.0375,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.5,2265,464.1375,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.6,263,451.625,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.6,1831,461.425,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.6,1855,461.575,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.6,1933,462.0625,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.7,663,454.125,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.8,1763,461.0,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.8,1855,461.575,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,1.8,2353,464.6875,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,2.2,1751,460.925,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,2.4,1763,461.0,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,2.4,1857,461.5875,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,2.5,1763,461.0,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,2.5,1979,462.35,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,2.7,1751,460.925,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,2.7,1837,461.4625,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,2.8,2213,463.8125,0.0,0
TIIIStd,L13,2.8,2307,464.4,0.0,0