GRE HELL

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jdaniels704

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I am currently in gre hell. I am a Deputy working on two scanners for my Sheriff. Both of these are gre 600, one new out of the box and the other is from his residence. I have a Pro 163 at my residence that is working like a champ, it as well had an oddity occur. All three continued to receive the Sheriff's Office Primary, Air Ambulance and DPS, but lost the ability to receive Fire and EMS. The two gre units still will not receive fire and/or ems despite all of the programming being checked and rechecked, but will received SO Primary just fine.

The system here is a narrowband digital P25 with a NAC of 186. Someone please be of assistance before I turn any grayer.

Thanks,

Joe
 

hiegtx

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I am currently in gre hell. I am a Deputy working on two scanners for my Sheriff. Both of these are gre 600, one new out of the box and the other is from his residence. I have a Pro 163 at my residence that is working like a champ, it as well had an oddity occur. All three continued to receive the Sheriff's Office Primary, Air Ambulance and DPS, but lost the ability to receive Fire and EMS. The two gre units still will not receive fire and/or ems despite all of the programming being checked and rechecked, but will received SO Primary just fine.

The system here is a narrowband digital P25 with a NAC of 186. Someone please be of assistance before I turn any grayer.

Thanks,

Joe
Hi Joe
I just re-checked the county (thought I was seeing Fort Worth on your location, actually, it was Imperial, in Pecos County).

I did see this thread about Pecos County not too long ago, but unfortunately, it does not give much in the way of details.

Is there any chance that one,or both, of these agencies have moved to the Permian Basin trunked system?

While Fort Stockton Fire is listed as analog on 154.4300, they are licensed to use digital. Try changing the squelch mode for that frequency to :Search", and see if you pick them up now using digital (you'd see the NAC in the display).

Imperial, which is not shown on the database page, shows to be on 154.355, and is also licensed for digital usage. That also applies to Sheffield on 154.385.

Iraan, on 154.415, only shows licensing for analog usage. They are also not in the database listing. Remember that if you can confirm any of these frequencies, or trunk system usage, including NAC or PL toneDCS code, please submit the information so that it can be updated.
 
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Try removing the NAC and running your freqs in Search mode. It might be possible that different/ multiple NACs exist.

(Sorry, I don't know the specify GRE terms for running an open search)
 

jdaniels704

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I just changed my location having realized I haven't in quite awhile. MEA CULPA. I am trying to monitor Fort Stockton Fire and Pecos County EMS Glass. I got my scan list from our radio programmers and it had been working great ever since we went digital several months ago and then just boom, no mas fire or ems. Other people's scanners still working great, just these two having issues.
 

jdaniels704

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On the two gre 600s I even changed modulation from nfm to fm to broaden the band a bit and to no avail. Sorry, forgot that in the original post.
 

hiegtx

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I just changed my location having realized I haven't in quite awhile. MEA CULPA. I am trying to monitor Fort Stockton Fire and Pecos County EMS Glass. I got my scan list from our radio programmers and it had been working great ever since we went digital several months ago and then just boom, no mas fire or ems. Other people's scanners still working great, just these two having issues.
So THAT"S why I saw Fort Worth the first time. ;)

See my suggestions above (I edited it for the corrected geographic location).

Are you using software for the PSR-600's? If not, see this if you need help making changes.
 

jdaniels704

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No, we are not using trunking systems, only went digital. Those freqs are right and our nac is 186. By the way, from talking to our programmers, every County's NAC is it's State assigned County number. These are all the codes for each County and the corresponding number is/should be their NAC if they follow standard nomenclature.

https://www.applytexas.org/adappc/gen/countycode.WBX
 

jdaniels704

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I use ARC500 for my programming and do little tweaks and personalizations inside of there before uploading. I know it isn't the file with the data in it as I downloaded it from my home scanner which is working famously and then uploaded to the others. This is killing me.
 

SCPD

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HEY

I use ARC500 for my programming and do little tweaks and personalizations inside of there before uploading. I know it isn't the file with the data in it as I downloaded it from my home scanner which is working famously and then uploaded to the others. This is killing me.

Did you try resetting the scanner THEN adding the programming from Radio Reference from your scanner program?

Can you post your file?
 

Ensnared

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Pecos SO on P25 Permian

I am currently in gre hell. I am a Deputy working on two scanners for my Sheriff. Both of these are gre 600, one new out of the box and the other is from his residence. I have a Pro 163 at my residence that is working like a champ, it as well had an oddity occur. All three continued to receive the Sheriff's Office Primary, Air Ambulance and DPS, but lost the ability to receive Fire and EMS. The two gre units still will not receive fire and/or ems despite all of the programming being checked and rechecked, but will received SO Primary just fine.

The system here is a narrowband digital P25 with a NAC of 186. Someone please be of assistance before I turn any grayer.

Thanks,

Joe

Pecos SO is listed on the following system: Permian Basin Regional Interoperability Network Trunking System, Midland, Texas - Scanner Frequencies

When I travel to Big Spring, Texas, I always attempt to monitor this system. I might add that there is a likelihood that all of the various talk groups are not yet identified.

For instance, the last time I visited Midland, I found two talk groups that were not listed, 301 & 341. On the latter, I heard LE surveillance in Midland. Since I didn't stay long enough to identify the source of said transmission, I did not submit it. Recently, I discovered a way to deal with these unidentified talk groups, using the Wiki.

I recommend loading all of the system frequencies for your area in case the AC/CC changes. From what I'm seeing, the Pecos SO is in the clear, but one is not. There are also Fire/EMS talk groups listed. If you are programming a lone conventional frequency with P25 & this frequency is part of a P25 TSYS, it might be difficult.
 
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ScannerSK

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Hi Joe,

Were you able to determine why the Pro-163 started to work again after not working temporarily on Fire and EMS?

The GRE scanners have been known to be insensitive at times to CTCSS tones (esp. when other noises are present on the transmission) and the same may apply to NAC codes. Possibly a change was made at the radio tower and the NAC codes being carried on the transmission were reduced in strength and only the GRE scanners are having difficulty picking out the lower strength NAC code than other scanners.

My gut instinct is the problem is being caused by the GRE scanner not properly decoding the NAC code. For troubleshooting purposes, I would temporarily disable the NAC and in place of "186" set it to "search" by pressing default (F3 button).

I would also "tune" one of the PSR-600 scanners to either Fire or EMS and see how it responds when the station (either Fire or EMS) is active and whether the screen shows P25 and the NAC code of 186.

Shawn
 
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Hi Joe,

Were you able to determine why the Pro-163 started to work again after not working temporarily on Fire and EMS?

The GRE scanners have been known to be insensitive at times to CTCSS tones (esp. when other noises are present on the transmission) and the same may apply to NAC codes. Possibly a change was made at the radio tower and the NAC codes being carried on the transmission were reduced in strength and only the GRE scanners are having difficulty picking out the lower strength NAC code than other scanners.

My gut instinct is the problem is being caused by the GRE scanner not properly decoding the NAC code. For troubleshooting purposes, I would temporarily disable the NAC and in place of "186" set it to "search" by pressing default (F3 button).

I would also "tune" one of the PSR-600 scanners to either Fire or EMS and see how it responds when the station (either Fire or EMS) is active and whether the screen shows P25 and the NAC code of 186.

Shawn

I suggested the same thing earlier, of setting to search. OP said he knows the NAC is 186 and hasn't/ doesn't change. FYI
 

buddrousa

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What I see is why a PRO-163 non P25 digital scanner is picking up the signal at all? The 600's are P25 digital and should be picking up the signals. Also you can not put a NAC in the Pro-163?
 

ScannerSK

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I suggested the same thing earlier, of setting to search. OP said he knows the NAC is 186 and hasn't/ doesn't change. FYI

I was hoping Joe understood that even though the NAC may be correct and has not changed in order to troubleshoot the scanner the NAC code may need to be temporarily removed. I'm thinking the GRE scanners are having difficulties receiving the NAC code. Removing the NAC would allow all P25 transmissions to be heard and would assist in verifying the GRE scanners are having problems decoding the NAC code.

buddrousa said:
What I see is why a PRO-163 non P25 digital scanner is picking up the signal at all? The 600's are P25 digital and should be picking up the signals. Also you can not put a NAC in the Pro-163?

Good point! How can the PRO-163 receive Fire and EMS if it is not capable of receiving P-25 signals or NAC codes? Are the GRE scanners being programmed as P-25 with a NAC code of "186" when the signals are not P-25 or NAC?
 
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