FYI; 464.500 PL 210.7 I am hearing PG&E traffic in Santa Cruz. They have several Itinerant licenses on that freq. (Not in RR).
I AM hearing control digital traffic on 464.0875 which is near me licensed to Fremont Peak; WQOI747 (Interesting they run 196.6 PL along with the Digital). However, seems way TOO weak for Fremont Peak, I am line of site.
I will get my Dongle and Unitrunker going soon.
Hey Keith, that 464.0875 MHz PL 196.6 control channel you're hearing is indeed Fremont Peak. It is in the database for the PG&E MPT-1327 system here:
Pacific Gas and Electric (PGE) Trunking System Profile
www.radioreference.com
No Fremont Peak voice frequencies have been identified yet so this is a great opportunity to find them and get them submitted to the database. You may also wish to start a separate thread here in the California Radio Discussion Forum to post your findings.
When you run unitrunker on that frequency with your RTL-SDR, it should say that the Fremont Peak control channel is site number 5189 (in hexidecimal) or 20873 (in decimal), I believe Unitrunker uses hex. It will then monitor the control channel for system activity, such as user radios joining or logging off the trunking system and making voice calls. If they make a voice call, another logical channel number (LCN) will show up on screen with the talkgroup and radio ID in use.
The misc system information in the database shows a table of base frequencies and step sizes which you'll need to use to convert the LCN to an actual UHF frequency to listen to voice traffic on your scanner.
This wide area MPT-1327 system - currently under construction - will eventually contain approximately 100+ sites and serve both PG&E Gas and Electric operations. Each site has its own hexidecimal "system ID", and all sites are networked together to allow users seamless roaming through PG&E's entire coverage area. Mobile registrations are required at the site in order to make it broadcast specific talkgroups.
The Base frequencies and Step sizes are below, which should be complete, and will serve to calculate most of the channels.
Ranges | Start | End | Spacing | PL |
000-161 | 451.000000 | 453.012500 | 12.5kHz | 196.6 |
162-213 | 454.018750 | 454.656250 | 12.5kHz | 196.6 |
214-364 | 460.650000 | 462.525000 | 12.5kHz | 196.6 |
365-510 | 463.200000 | 465.012500 | 12.5kHz | 196.6 |
511-672 | 451.000000 | 453.012500 | 12.5kHz | 199.9 |
673-724 | 454.018750 | 454.656250 | 12.5kHz | 199.9 |
725-875 | 460.650000 | 462.525000 | 12.5kHz | 199.9 |
876-1019 | 463.200000 | 465.012500 | 12.5kHz | 199.9 |
Each site's hexadecimal sysid is a make-up of several MPT network identifiers. Below both Zone and Site # are shown. Each site - unless noted on the site's page - uses a CTCSS tone of 196.6. Some sites have been known to change to 199.9 and update their channel ID accordingly (see table).
The formula used to convert MPT-1327 LCN to an actual frequency is "
Frequency = (LCN * 0.0125) + Base".
In the tables above the ranges are the ranges of LCNs in that row, Start is the base frequency and 0.0125 is 12.5 KHz converted to MHz.
For example if you found LCN 161 on Unitrunker while monitoring the control channel and wanted to find that voice frequency on your scanner, you would do (161 * 0.0125) + 451.000 = 453.0125 MHz.
Good luck! The PG&E MPT-1327 system is incomplete in the database and could use some TLC, but most don't care to monitor it.
