Full spectrum scan question.

[K9KLC]

I have a knob position to scan sites in my State as I travel. (Starcom21 in IL)
I imported from the RR data base, and it appears to have imported the max of 256, and they all appear to be primary control channels . Will the G5 still pick up all traffic like this or will it only receive on the frequencies actually programmed.

Also I saw a video where someone enabled Full spectrum scan while doing one of the state wide systems. It was an older video so I'm not sure what's applicable now or not. I was traveling recently and did Colorado and Kansas and was pretty happy with all I heard however they did not fill up the 256 limit on the G5 for that.

Any help would be appreciated, my wife is traveling to central IL tomorrow and I'd like to make sure using wildcards of course for TG's she hears about stuff on the way.

Thank you.

 

[RaleighGuy]

Full spectrum scan is the easiest way to do this. Under System Detail enter 0 sites 0 Control enter the WACN and SYSID, enable site trunking and click on Enable Full Spectrum. Filling out the blocks like below, only using WACN BEE00 and SYSID 140. You will need to find the proper Hi/Lo frequencies and adjust frequency ranges as needed. It will scan all frequencies in the range until it finds a acceptable strength active frequency with that WACN/SYSID, sometimes (but not often) it will timeout on the scan and you must change the knob and change it back to resume scanning.

 

[K9KLC]

Full spectrum scan is the easiest way to do this. Under System Detail enter 0 sites 0 Control enter the WACN and SYSID, enable site trunking and click on Enable Full Spectrum. Filling out the blocks like below, only using WACN BEE00 and SYSID 140. You will need to find the proper Hi/Lo frequencies and adjust frequency ranges as needed. It will scan all frequencies in the range until it finds a acceptable strength active frequency with that WACN/SYSID, sometimes (but not often) it will timeout on the scan and you must change the knob and change it back to resume scanning.

View attachment 172910 View attachment 172909

Thank you very much. I see I will need to edit the frequencies to match my system. Didn't know about the zero sites. I'll give it a try thanks.

 

[K9KLC]

Thank you very much. I see I will need to edit the frequencies to match my system. Didn't know about the zero sites. I'll give it a try thanks.

Full spectrum scan is the easiest way to do this. Under System Detail enter 0 sites 0 Control enter the WACN and SYSID, enable site trunking and click on Enable Full Spectrum. Filling out the blocks like below, only using WACN BEE00 and SYSID 140. You will need to find the proper Hi/Lo frequencies and adjust frequency ranges as needed. It will scan all frequencies in the range until it finds a acceptable strength active frequency with that WACN/SYSID, sometimes (but not often) it will timeout on the scan and you must change the knob and change it back to resume scanning.

View attachment 172910 View attachment 172909

Are range 1 and range 2 just "ranges" or do they somehow correlate to something else.

 

[RaleighGuy]

Are range 1 and range 2 just "ranges" or do they somehow correlate to something else.

They cover ... Range One 700 MHz freqs and Range Two 800 MHz freqs

 

[K9KLC]

They cover ... Range One 700 MHz freqs and Range Two 800 MHz freqs

Ok thank you, makes total sense to me now. I"m so used to programming Motorola DMR radios that I was absently minded thinking transmit and receive stuff on a repeater. I am guessing that varies from 700/800 system to 700/800 system. I'll have to try and see if that's 'hopefully' published anywhere. Again, thanks.

 

[hazrat8990]

One neat feature of these pagers while using this method, is that once a CC is found, it will automatically gather all of the info for the neighboring sites. This way, it will not need to waste time "scanning" for the next site as you travel.

 

[RaleighGuy]

I'll have to try and see if that's 'hopefully' published anywhere. Again, thanks.

Look through Starcom21 in the RRDB and go through each site to find the info.

 

[RaleighGuy]

One neat feature of these pagers while using this method, is that once a CC is found, it will automatically gather all of the info for the neighboring sites. This way, it will not need to waste time "scanning" for the next site as you travel.

I was unaware of this feature, thank you for sharing. That is very helpful.

 

[K9KLC]

Look through Starcom21 in the RRDB and go through each site to find the info.

ok Thanks, that's what I figured but was hoping maybe there might be something already out there.

 

[K9KLC]

One neat feature of these pagers while using this method, is that once a CC is found, it will automatically gather all of the info for the neighboring sites. This way, it will not need to waste time "scanning" for the next site as you travel.

Thank you, had no idea. Also I had no idea about being able to do the scan the way RaleighGuy said. I always thought you had to actually at least enter one site or something. Also just so I know, CC usually stands for Color code in DMR, what are you referring to?

 

[RaleighGuy]

ok Thanks, that's what I figured but was hoping maybe there might be something already out there.

Once you find it, feel free to post it in this thread so people looking for it in the future might be able to find it.

 

[hazrat8990]

Thank you, had no idea. Also I had no idea about being able to do the scan the way RaleighGuy said. I always thought you had to actually at least enter one site or something. Also just so I know, CC usually stands for Color code in DMR, what are you referring to?

CC=Control Channel. As far as sites, I've always entered at least one for a new system that I don't have all of the info for. I simply give the site a name, and enter FF for the RFSS & Site ID's. I never knew that I could get away with the method that @RaleighGuy posted, but now I do.

This is an example of how I set mine up to monitor Utah's new system while it was still being built.

 

[RaleighGuy]

CC=Control Channel. As far as sites, I've always entered at least one for a new system that I don't have all of the info for. I simply give the site a name, and enter FF for the RFSS & site ID's. I never knew that I could get away with the method that @RaleighGuy posted, but now I do.

Problem with using FF wildcard is it will capture any system one comes across as they travel that are in the frequency range specified, in my area you'd be listening to Cary, Wake County, VIPER (NC Statewide system), Durham, Duke Energy, and maybe one or two others, unless you specify the WACN/SYSID. In the case of the OP he specified that he wanted to monitor Starcom21, hence the WACN/SYSID.

 

[K9KLC]

Once you find it, feel free to post it in this thread so people looking for it in the future might be able to find it.

I'll do that. I think I'll try the find thing and just go up thru the numbers on 700 and 800 and see what's there and what isn't. Thanks.

 

[hazrat8990]

I was unaware of this feature, thank you for sharing. That is very helpful.

I found this out by accident when I got my first G5 back in 2017. Back then, I only had a single frequency for a VHF site programmed in, but used FF for RFSS & Site ID. Even though I did not have the full spectrum scan enabled, it would still switch sites as if they were programmed in. I was able to travel across the entire state while receiving both VHF and 800MHz as long as I didn't change knob positions, or power it off. If I did, It would need to receive that particular site before it would function again.

It comes in handy when a new site pops up, or an old site switches CC's to one that's not listed. I've been able to keep the RR database updated with this neat little gem.

 

[K9KLC]

I guess one last thing this go around... let's say system has 3 control channels and I have those in there but there are 7 frequencies total. Am I going to miss traffic not having all 7 in there as long as I have the 3 control channels??(on a given site).

 

[RaleighGuy]

I guess one last thing this go around... let's say system has 3 control channels and I have those in there but there are 7 frequencies total. Am I going to miss traffic not having all 7 in there as long as I have the 3 control channels??(on a given site).

Any site, any system, will only have one active control channel at a time, which sends it to the voices channels (so you don't need to worry about them). Be aware, you may not hear the site you want using FSS. Once it stops on a site it isn't going to change until the signal strength drops below a certain point, so it may remain on one site until you are well inside an area using a different site.

 

[hazrat8990]

Problem with using FF wildcard is it will capture any system one comes across as they travel that are in the frequency range specified, in my area you'd be listening to Cary, Wake County, VIPER (NC Statewide system), Durham, Duke Energy, and maybe one or two others, unless you specify the WACN/SYSID. In the case of the OP he specified that he wanted to monitor Starcom21, hence the WACN/SYSID.

As long as the WACN & System ID are entered, the wildcard method for sites will only monitor a single system.

Sorry for any confusion from the example I posted. For that particular system, the WACN is the same statewide, but there are individual System ID's assigned for different regions and is the reasoning for the FFF for that instance. It was probably a bad example to use since my intent was to show how to use FF for the site.

It seems that either method does the same thing, and we both learned something new today!

 

[K9KLC]

Any site, any system, will only have one active control channel at a time, which sends it to the voices channels (so you don't need to worry about them). Be aware, you may not hear the site you want using FSS. Once it stops on a site it isn't going to change until the signal strength drops below a certain point, so it may remain on one site until you are well inside an area using a different site.

I've experienced the locking on a site thing. Even at my own home I can't use the statewide system I currently have programmed. It seems to lock on everything but the one I want. Programmed the exact simulcast I wanted to listen to.