APCO 25 Ham Systems

[SCPD]

That publication has been around for quite a while and most of what you see there is put in by the repeater owner(s). They may or may not put in a complete listing or capabilities.

I find that publication to be pretty inaccurate with very old listings that don't exist anymore.

I already said that it was an incomplete list so no surprize there....As far as outdated info. As far as the info being outdated, who cares? The truth is Even current listings have outdated info. about 40% of the info on the Fl repeaters are outdated from day one, because repeater owners change PL tones, change locations without notifing FRC, or they just plain ole disconnect the repeater for whatever reason, or the repeater is down for repairs for months. So regardless of what list you have, they will never be 100% accurate or up to date. If a listing is old, then the repeater wasn't worth trying to talk on it to begin with. Ham repeater owners are not like Commerical owners that dedicate techs to full service operations. So when I search for repeaters, i search for the ones that have been up with the same info for years & years. Those are the ham repeater owners that you know take thier hobby serious to keep the repeater on the air. Example N9EE Holiday, Fl.

Thats just my view point, anyway. If anyone has good websites with my first request. Let them be known.

 

[N4DES]

I already said that it was an incomplete list so no surprize there....As far as outdated info. As far as the info being outdated, who cares? The truth is Even current listings have outdated info. about 40% of the info on the Fl repeaters are outdated from day one, because repeater owners change PL tones, change locations without notifing FRC, or they just plain ole disconnect the repeater for whatever reason, or the repeater is down for repairs for months.

Actually much more than 40% trustees in Florida are very good about providing us any updates or changes to their repeaters because they want the ARRL Directory to be correct and we post the changes to the on-line database quarterly. So your statement is far from correct and you would know that by looking at the changes on our webpage.

As far as moving repeaters, we catch more of those than you think only because hams talk, and they talk a lot. It's hard to keep an unauthorized move a secret when guys are talking about and making internet posts within hours of it happening. Most of the time its harmless and can be re-coordinated, but we have had some move 30 or more miles and/or increase heights from 100' to 500 or more feet and they were marched right back to their original location and height with a threat of de-coordination.

With repeaters that go off the air, if it is more than 90 days without notification we de-coordinate it and open it up to someone else. We have no room for pair squatting and our local directors do check for activity when the coordination is up for renewal or we get a call asking about a status.

We do work very hard for the amateur community and yes there are some very serious repeater owners out there and we do recognize them, including those of us in the Council that have serious repeaters.

 

[ElroyJetson]

So when running IMBE on the amateur bands, what are the "standard" NAC and group codes, the "calling channels" equivalent (groups, actually) that are equivalent to 146.520 or 446.000 simplex?


Elroy

 

[N4DES]

I use the carrier squelch NAC $293 in all of the repeaters that I'm the trustee for. I think this may have to change in the future if it takes off and use recommended NAC's for different geographical areas like some do with PL tones.

http://florida-repeaters.org/ctcss.htm

I haven't heard of any P25 "calling channels" being proposed at all. I see no reason why 146.52 and 446.000 couldn't be used as long as the radio is set for mixed-mode so it hears an analog and P25 call at the same time.

 

[Grog]

I wish all areas cared enough about keeping repeater records up to date. SERA has a ton of machines that I've never heard, and can't get into (if they are actually on the air)....

 

[SCPD]

Actually much more than 40% trustees in Florida are very good about providing us any updates or changes to their repeaters because they want the ARRL Directory to be correct and we post the changes to the on-line database quarterly. So your statement is far from correct and you would know that by looking at the changes on our webpage.

Yea okay, whatever you say. I just looked at your "updated" list on the FRC website & know of 6 UHF repeaters that are not there, 2 of which have not been on the air for over a year. 4 VHF repeaters that have changed PL tones & this is just for ONE area.... Far as catching people that move repeaters thats a load of crap, I know of one repeater that has moved & noone knows. Because its a tight group & they dont rat each other out & No outsiders get on the repeater so who would know anyway? Of course, if a Club repeater moves, sure, 40 people will report it. But these are not club repeaters nor are they open repeaters for the most part.

It happens much more then YOU think. Repeater operators move repeaters without advising FRC alot. I have seen it happen hundreds of times in my 14 years of being a Ham. Furthermore there are many twisted pair repeaters that people don't even know exist.

 

[SCPD]

Quoted directly from the FRC website itself. Even they admit its a big problem!

"Many of the coordinated repeaters are inactive, or are being used for other purposes, such as simplex autopatches. Some repeaters have no inputs and their outputs are simply re-transmitting other active repeaters simply to generate activity. Some amateurs simply like to hoard repeater pairs for future use. In addition, repeater licensees are relocating their repeaters or increasing the antenna height or output power without authorization from the FRC Coordinators - in direct violation of FRC Coordination Policy. Please notify the appropriate FRC Coordinator (see the Directory of FRC Staff and Directors), if you suspect that a repeater is inactive, is no longer in its coordinated location, has an abnormally large coverage area, has no receiver, or is being used for a simplex autopatch"

And the truth is FRC has no real power to enforce anything, its all based on "peer pressure" a group that overpowers a person that stands alone to see things thier way. Coordination does not mean ownership of the frequency. All FRC can legally do is "suggest" & try to resolve disputes among repeater owners, FRC can not legally enforce anything.

 

[ElroyJetson]

By "calling channels" I was referring to the NAC code or group number, rather than the actual operating frequency.

So if 293 is the "carrier squelch" NAC code, then I will presume that's the standard "calling" NAC code.


That's what I was looking for.

Elroy

 

[N4DES]

Quoted directly from the FRC website itself. Even they admit its a big problem!

"Many of the coordinated repeaters are inactive, or are being used for other purposes, such as simplex autopatches. Some repeaters have no inputs and their outputs are simply re-transmitting other active repeaters simply to generate activity. Some amateurs simply like to hoard repeater pairs for future use. In addition, repeater licensees are relocating their repeaters or increasing the antenna height or output power without authorization from the FRC Coordinators - in direct violation of FRC Coordination Policy. Please notify the appropriate FRC Coordinator (see the Directory of FRC Staff and Directors), if you suspect that a repeater is inactive, is no longer in its coordinated location, has an abnormally large coverage area, has no receiver, or is being used for a simplex autopatch"

And the truth is FRC has no real power to enforce anything, its all based on "peer pressure" a group that overpowers a person that stands alone to see things thier way. Coordination does not mean ownership of the frequency. All FRC can legally do is "suggest" & try to resolve disputes among repeater owners, FRC can not legally enforce anything.

Well why don't you try posting the whole message to include the last paragraph:

http://florida-repeaters.org/

The FRC needs your help in locating the repeater pairs that are being used for anything but legitimate full-duplex repeaters, so that they may be re-coordinated to amateurs who will use them properly.

So instead of badmouthing us, why don't you be part of the solution and get involved. Contact your local director to see how you can help if you think that inactive repeaters are a problem in your area. I have been at this for almost as long as you say you have been a ham and have made great strides to include rewriting our whole coordination policy in the last 2 years and have re-assigned numerous dead pairs to hams that have put up repeaters in the southeastern section of the state since day 1.

http://florida-repeaters.org/frcdirec.htm

In addition, since the 1st of the year we have received over 300 updates to existing coordinations to approximate 1000 coordinated repeaters that are reported to be in service in the state and continue to receive on average 10 updates per week. It would be safe to say that the repeaters that changed the PL's did report, unless of course your the trustee and don't want to report the change. Also in Lakeland I have only 12 repeaters in the database and 29 in the areas around Lakeland so I don't know how you have seen this happen 100's of times. The numbers don't add up as you claim.

I never said we had enforcement power and I don't where that came from. We leave that process to the FCC who recognizes us as the only amateur repeater coordination body for the State of Florida.

 

[mikewazowski]

Perhaps we can take the regional repeater coordination issues to another thread since they don't have much to do with this thread?

Elroy, my repeater requires NAC 293 to get in.

Locally we don't really have enough users to warrant setting up talkgroups.

I believe F7E is actually the P25 carrier squelch equivalent. 293 was the default NAC for most older Motorola P25 radios but you could select "Digital Squelch" and hear all activity on the channel.

 

[N4DES]

Yeah I'm done and think I made enough points. I apologize if I bored everyone else.

Ditto on the $293 NAC's. The 6 repeaters that are on-line in South FL. are all set up the same way and programming TG's isn't something that we can currently justify with the 20 or so P25 users that we currently have.

 

[mam1081]

*snip*
Also just in case anyone is in the market for a P25 radio, this looks like an awesome deal...
http://www.icomamerica.com/specials/LandMobile/P25_F70Tradeup/default.asp

Mark KS4VT

It is an attractive deal...

I fell for it and got a IC-F1821D (UHF Mobile) for an "affordable" price. The radio works great in analog, but the digital side is lacking. On my P25 UHF ham repeater, the 1821D would really skip a bunch of voice. A few of us applied a new firmware revision to the radios, and they seem to work a little better. Now instead of missing a few words, you might miss a syllable. Signal strenght isn't the issue either - I can have a XTS3k sitting beside me and hear everthing while the mobile with an external antenna chops out.

It's not a bad radio, but just something thinking about this deal to think about....

Guess there just isn't a subsitute for good 'ole /\/\.

----Break idea-----
We had thought about setting up talkgroups - one main one for everything going on, and each user to have another for a "do not disturb unless you really need me" feature.

 

[16b]

We had thought about setting up talkgroups - one main one for everything going on, and each user to have another for a "do not disturb unless you really need me" feature.

Hey, that's a neat idea...

 

[SCPD]

KS4VT who said I was talking about Lakeland? Don't assume. I do not even live in Lakeland. That location is one of my Vacation homes. It goes to show how much you know, nothing. Now I'm done talking to you, your the usual tunnel visioned ham with no out of the box thinking. Your like speaking to a brick wall.

Back to the subject of P25 repeaters......

 

[WayneH]

KS4VT who said I was talking about Lakeland? Don't assume. I do not even live in Lakeland. That location is one of my Vacation homes. It goes to show how much you know, nothing. Now I'm done talking to you, your the usual tunnel visioned ham with no out of the box thinking. Your like speaking to a brick wall.

Come on now, lets all play nice. This thread has many pages of decent info in it, lets not ruin it.

 

[loumaag]

I am with Wayne on this.

Back to the subject of P25 repeaters......

This is good advice.

 

[SCPD]

I am with Wayne on this.
This is good advice.

Your with wayne on what? Didnt I already say "Back to P25 repeaters...."

The subject was already dropped before you two posted. So drop it already.

 

[loumaag]

Your with wayne on what? Didnt I already say "Back to P25 repeaters...."

The subject was already dropped before you two posted. So drop it already.

And you are the boss of this thread? Here as an interesting tidbit for you Roberto, of all of the posts in this thread, only one generated a "Reported post", want to guess which one? Aw, don't bother guessing, I'll tell you, it was #197.

As to what I was with Wayne on, was his comment right before my post (duh!) and I actually considered your ending comment great advice...I have once again learned a valuable lesson, trouble-makers are trouble-makers, even if they occasionally have something intelligent to say.

 

[n1das]

Add another ham repeater to the P25 list:

145.130(-) N1CIV/R Norwich, VT

Input is mixed mode, analog/PL100.0 or P25/NAC293
Output is analog only w/PL100.0.

I built this repeater for N1CIV a few weekends ago. It rained all weekend, so it became a repeater building weekend for us. N1CIV supplied the hardware. The receiver is an Icom F1721D mobile and the transmitter is a Kenwood 2m ham mobile. The controller is an old S-Com 6K. Eventually we may add IRLP and/or EchoLink capability. Right now the repeater has very limited coverage due to a problem found with the duplexer, forcing us to operate on separate antennas and at low power. We'll get it fixed when the weather and time permits.

We decided that a mixed mode input and an analog output would serve the local ham community the best. We didn't have a way to make a full P25 repeater with a pair of Icom mobiles because we didn't have a way to repeat the raw P25 data. If we repeated the audio the old-fashioned way by passing the recovered audio from the receive mobile to the transmit mobile, the audio would be muddied up too much and be unusable. If it were a P25-only repeater, we'd probably be the only two hams in the area that would ever use it. A $14,000.00 Motorola Quantar "real" P25 repeater for true mixed mode operation wasn't in the budget either, so we had to make do with what we had for hardware. A mixed mode analog/P25 input and an analog output ended up being the best compromise for now and was the easiest to build.

I've been bitten by the P25 bug and I'm thinking of rebuilding a 440 repeater I have in service to become a P25 repeater.

I guess there's no known cure for P25 addiction!

 

[mikewazowski]

A $14,000.00 Motorola Quantar "real" P25 repeater for true mixed mode operation wasn't in the budget either, so we had to make do with what we had for hardware.

Keep your eyes open. I picked up my VHF Quantar for $2k.