Cape Cod trunked system

[reddog1970]

I'm wondering if anyone else is having any issues listening to the trunked system on Cape Cod. The fire departments use the Mass State Police Motorola trunked system. I have 2 scanners, an BCT-15 and a BC346XT. Starting Saturday, both scanners started doing the same thing. They scan, then stop on a talk group when someone transmits. But then, it sounds like an open mic and the scanner stays on that talk group and starts picking up every transmission on the system until you manually hit scan. I know rebanding is supposed to be taking place very soon, but I thought it wasn't until after the 1st of the year. So I don't know what the issue is or how to solve it. I haven't been able to find any other posts about it.

Mike

 

[KC1UA]

Rebanding has not started yet, and as I monitor the system it is perform as it always has. I'm not sure what your issue is but it works fine for me on multiple scanners in multiple locations.

 

[reddog1970]

What part of cape are you on? I'm wondering if it is effecting certain areas of the system. I have spoken with a few others having the same issue today all in the mid cape area. But I spoke with someone on the outer cape who is not having the problem. It is effecting both my BCT15 and my BC346XT, so it is not a scanner problem.

 

[W6KRU]

It sounds like you might have a repeater that is stuck on. If that happens and you don't have End Code option set to yes, the symptoms are exactly as you describe.
Easier to Read BC346XT Scanner Manual

 

[KC1UA]

Check as DDan suggests. I assure you there is nothing of the sort happening with the system. I am in the mid-Cape area and have been monitoring it for years. Nothing has changed in the last several days to reflect your problem.

 

[Junior08]

No issues to report from my location in Sandwich.

 

[reddog1970]

Dan and Scott,

I set end code to yes, it was on ignore. That worked, so i'm guessing you might be right that there is a repeater stuck open. I have emailed a friend that is a radio tech for the sherriffs dept. that there might be a problem. Thank you very much.

Mike

 

[KC1UA]

Dan and Scott,

I set end code to yes, it was on ignore. That worked, so i'm guessing you might be right that there is a repeater stuck open. I have emailed a friend that is a radio tech for the sherriffs dept. that there might be a problem. Thank you very much.

Mike

I still doubt there is a repeater stuck open, but we'll see what you come up with. I'm sure I know the same techs that you're referring to. I'm not only a listener to the system, but I'm also an "end user" of it. To my knowledge there are no such issues currently. Good luck.

 

[reddog1970]

I too am an "end user" and same thing, the FD radios are not affected. However, when I spoke to the tech, he said the scanner at the shack was hanging up also. In any event, I changed the setting from ignore to yes on the scanner and it is now functioning properly.

Mike

 

[W6KRU]

We had a stuck repeater on the local system. It was in that state for a couple of weeks. As far as I know, there were no ill effects for the system users. We had several scanner owners who were affected and it took a few days to sort out the issue. After they set the end code option, everything was fine.

 

[KC1UA]

I too am an "end user" and same thing, the FD radios are not affected. However, when I spoke to the tech, he said the scanner at the shack was hanging up also. In any event, I changed the setting from ignore to yes on the scanner and it is now functioning properly.

Mike

Well I'll be damned.

I use a BCT15 to run my scanner feed for this system, as provided via this website. I just turned around to look at it...and lo and behold it is "stuck" on Dennis PD. Dennis PD is not transmitting. My Uniden Home Patrol does not have the issue, nor does my recently acquired Radio Shack PSR800. Another person I'm chatting with online reports his BCD996XT is working fine.

If there's a mod that can move this thread to the MA forum that would probably be best at this point; I think we obviously have a system-specific as well as maybe scanner specific issue here.

 

[KC1UA]

To add to the above, I just reviewed my Freescan programming by downloading the scanner info into the program. "Use Motorola End Code" is checked off as it always has been. I sent the system back to the BCT15 and now it seems to be running properly. Given that I did nothing other than that....well this is a weird one.

Mike, sorry if I came across like I thought you had two heads....but I really thought you had two heads! Not sure what to make of this one. .... yet.

 

[reddog1970]

Scott,

No problem and no offense taken. It is very strange. Both my scanners are working fine since setting end code to yes. So it does give weight to what Dan suggested might be going on. Any scanners set to yes would never know there was a problem. The weird thing with my BCT15 was that it appeared to already be set to yes, but I had to manually go in and do it again before it started to work ok.

Mike

 

[KC1UA]

The weird thing with my BCT15 was that it appeared to already be set to yes, but I had to manually go in and do it again before it started to work ok.
Mike

Yep, and that's the same thing I discovered, only difference being that I "fixed" it via software. We know that the 996XT, HP-1, and PSR-800 are not suffering from this issue. A weird one indeed.

Some things we may nevah know....

 

[reddog1970]

At work today, the system went into fail soft mode this afternoon. A short while later, a message went out over county that the State Police where working on the system. Seems to be functioning ok now.

 

[KC1UA]

Discussion has been ongoing at SNE about this as well. It reared its bizarre and ugly head again on me last night. I manually went in, disabled end code, re-enabled it, and still had the same problem. I repeated that, turned off the scanner, turned it back on, and it was fine.

I noticed that 859.2125 was the culprit frequency. Today, during the site trunking event, 859.2125 had a steady carrier. I left work at 1605 and it dropped a few minutes prior, but site trunking was still displayed on my XTS2500.

Tonight, as you state, all seems fine from the scanner end.

The oddness of it all is that it only seemed to effect certain scanners. That has to be one hell of a coincidence or I just can't figure the reason. Go figure...