Halton Region EDACS

[mciupa]

I'm starting to play around with the HomePatrol V2 Extreme features. One of my favourite things to do is to check out the LCN finder and also monitor a system's Current Activity. When a new talkgroup is detected it displays as green in the log.

Today the activity log shows 01-030 which is an unpublished group in the RR DB. Another thing I've noticed is that t/g's 01-021 3-Burlington and also the 4-Spare talkgroup are being displayed when I monitor the Halton Hills tower.

I'm wondering if some talkgroups have been changed lately? I guess it's time to get back to actually listening to it again, rather than reading activity logs. :wink:

 

[SCPD]

halton edacs

not sure the first one you mentioned is 152 in decimal form and it is not used, the second is burlington
3 district police dispatch, usually they use 01-024 148decimal the "spare dispatch" channel.


quite often burlington police is patched with the North police ch to save on a dispatcher usually you then can hear it on one of he patch channels like decimal 2043 or 2044 (15-153 & 15-154)

I know there is also an ID which is a patch to OPP, I heard them testing it once but by the time i got up to see the ID they stopped and I missed it.

 

[Muxlow]

Give it a shot on a sunday moarning between 8-10am. That seems to be the OPP to other police service radio testing time. Iv always herd OPP and london police testing, same with chatham-kent

 

[SCPD]

opp patch to halton

i will do that ,



thanks Mux

 

[ATCTech]

I have to take you to task there. The 3 district (Burlington) dispatch desk has never been regularly patched to the 1 district north desk in the many, many, many years (decades) I've been monitoring Halton, even pre-EDACS. A very long time ago the 1 district (Milton/Halton Hills) and 2 district (Oakville) dispatch groups were regularly patched. What you're seeing is the 3 district north t/g which uses the tower on the Niagara escarpment at Milton for coverage in rural Burlington, The same tower is uses full-time for the north but not the same dispatch desk. The confusion is you'll hear both 1 and 3 district calls on that tower.

Bob

 

[mciupa]

Hi Bob, I'm hoping you can help identify the 01-030 talkgroup that was coming up.

Halton Hills is on the fringe of my monitoring capabilities from NW Toronto while using an all-band antenna. It is just unusual for me to see anything Burlington at home .

If I go mobile with the HomePatrol, I can start picking Burlington up around Dundas St.W in south Etobicoke

 

[ATCTech]

I agree completely, even from Milton the 3 district tower on Brant St. south of Dundas is a pain without using the directional yagi here. It's quite low in elevation from anything north and east of there which makes it a rough capture. Downtown Burlington is in a lake level bowl compared to much it's surroundings.

I've never been able to identify that t/g 98 (01-030). I've certainly logged it many times in ETRUNKER but never actually heard audio to identify what desk or district was active. Ltely my focus has been the P25 system exclusively, but over the weekend when it's not being worked on I'll go back to the EDACS setup and see what's changed.

Bob

 

[exkalibur]

The new HP shows patches on EDACS differently. Previously, it would only show the patch ID. Now, it shows that and the patched groups. Ericsson radios don't use this patch business the same way scanners do - they listen for the patch announcement, and that is what the HP is doing now.

IE, the system will send an announcement saying "TG 146 and 148 are patched on TG 1670".

 

[SCPD]

thanks bob

from time to time i still hear the north patched to the same dispatcher though. So why is Burlington always
dispatched from the "SPARE DISPATCH" id 148 ?

and anything new with the p25 system? I guess they will switch over to Motorola from edacs? I see the new antennas up - they look like the old CB superscanner antennas but with blue bottom dipoles.

so i guess this new batch of freqs in the 800s and them testing? the data channel sounds a bit different - not really like fleetnet and even though i get the data channel at 99% signal it still sounds a bit noisy even after I put an attenutator on it?


cheers from Old Oakv

 

[ATCTech]

The P25 system is narrowband 9600 baud like Metrolinx on their 400MHz system, not the 3600 baud system of Fleetnet so yes, it doesn't sound the same on the control channel. Not sure what antennas you're referring to. Here in Milton and up in Georgetown they're blue omnis, 2 of them per site. I haven't checked east Oakville, but I did see the same arrangement on the Bronte FD tower at Rebecca/Bronte a couple of months back. There are also EDACS system antennas there.

Please let me know what control channel frequency you have selected when you hear 1 & 3 District PD patched. I'm really curious! Right now 3 District PD is on TG 0094 (hex), no patch in place.

Bob

 

[EJB]

The new HP shows patches on EDACS differently. Previously, it would only show the patch ID. Now, it shows that and the patched groups. Ericsson radios don't use this patch business the same way scanners do - they listen for the patch announcement, and that is what the HP is doing now.

IE, the system will send an announcement saying "TG 146 and 148 are patched on TG 1670".

Absolutely true, one the 'old' HP I only saw the Police activity on one of the patches, ever the District 3 (Burlington) or District 2 (Oakville) talkgroups. The fire department was different, they sometimes appeared on their proper talkgroup and sometimes on patches.

 

[mikewazowski]

I guess they will switch over to Motorola from edacs?

Motorola supplies P25 equipment but so does a lot of other manufacturers.

The new system could be Harris, Motorola, EADS or any other manufacturer that supplies P25 gear.

There's a good chance they went with Harris since Harris took over the old GE.