AWIN - Do we hear all ASP base/mobile comms?

[wbswetnam]

It seems to me that I am not hearing all communications from ASP Troop B, I suspect that I'm only hearing the unit(s) which happen to be using the Batesville (or in the case of Troop I - Iron Mountain) tower. Is this my imagination or is this the case? I think that if I were in Newport, where Troop B is based, then I'd hear all Troop B traffic because the base unit is there. The reason I think this is that usually when I hear an ASP unit, he refers to someplace in Independence County, and rarely any other county. Considering that Troop B covers a large chunk of northcentral Arkansas this seems unusual, and I can only conclude that I am simply not hearing the units in other counties covered by Troop B. The same seems to be true for Troop I, which I get off of the Iron Mountain tower... I only seem to hear ASP Troop I units in Stone County. Is this the case?

 

[KB5ILY]

You are correct. You will only hear the units associated a specific tower when listening to that tower.

 

[wbswetnam]

You are correct. You will only hear the units associated a specific tower when listening to that tower.

So if I were in Newport and monitoring that tower, then would I hear the traffic for all Troop B cars and the base, regardless of the county they were in, because the base for Troop B is located there? Or only those units in and close to Jackson County?

 

[wrr20891]

No, not necessarily.

The operation of the system has been described in other threads, but basically, a tower will only transmit if a mobile unit is affiliated with that tower. In other words, if a mobile unit listening to Troop B dispatch is using the tower you are scanning, you should hear all the traffic on Troop B dispatch, no matter where they are in the Troop. But, if there is no mobile unit affiliated with the tower you are scanning, the tower will not transmit the Troop B Dispatch traffic at all.

You might need to see if you can receive some of the other Troop B towers from your location to be able to monitor the majority of the traffic in the Troop.

 

[wbswetnam]

Ok thanks that helps. I kind of understand why I sometimes receive traffic from counties far away... for example, this morning I received traffic for Jefferson County Sheriff's Office - Pine Bluff is a long way from Batesville! Obviously (I think) a Jefferson County SO vehicle was passing through the county and it briefly routed traffic to him/her via the Batesville tower. Anyway it's too bad we can't pick up all Troop traffic all the time. Back in the VHF-Low days at least we could always pick up all base station traffic.

 

[03msc]

I admit that I do not understand the ins and outs of the AWIN system. I do know, however, that I pick up all of the traffic for Troop B's entire area from Batesville - I just have the control channel (and alternate) for each tower within Troop B's area programmed in as the system. Hopefully what I'm trying to say here makes sense...