Has LASD completely moved to LA-RIC's?

[es93546]

Remember back to the time when LASD was on VHF low band and LAPD was on VHF high band? LAPD radios (in patrol vehicles) had the dispatch channels set up like a repeater channel with different RX/TX frequencies, but the units could not hear each other--only the dispatcher. Supervisor vehicles had another "cheater" radio that could monitor the dispatch channel input frequency. Pretty much everyone had Tac 1 and Tac 2 as simplex car-to-car channels, Metro eventually got their own VHF simplex channel and there were a couple of other VHF channels for special units.

Handheld radios (called a "CC" unit I recall) were few and far between. There were only like 8 channels for the whole city. No MDTs. No cell phones. The old timers still knew where the (few) working "Gamewells" were. If confidential information needed to be exchanged, a pay phone had to be found.

Back when I was in high school during the late 1960's my Dad and I went to an incident somewhere near Westchester High School. There were several LAPD units there, mostly sedans. There was a supervisor on scene as well with a station wagon. This unit had a radio receiving the mobile frequency for the Venice Division as it was called then (Pacific Division now). A number of the sedans there also had a radio that just received the mobile and none of them were supervisor vehicles. I remember that there were very few Gamewells around the area. Downtown Westchester had one or two on Sepulveda Blvd. There was one at the intersection of Manchester and Lincoln and another somewhere in the northern Playa Del Rey area. They were generally mounted on utility poles and looked like a transformer or circuit box until a cop walked up to it and opened the door.

EDIT: I believe Venice and West L.A. shared a mobile frequency back then.

 

[Randyk4661]

The old Adam 12 show did that where you could only hear the dispatcher and not the units talking.
I never understood why that was if they were close together. Now I know.

I wonder what happened to the old VHF-high frequencies and if they are being used for anything today.
Anyone have an old list copy?

 

[ChicagoRadio736]

I would love to have that radio when I go back to visit I use the XTS5000 for LAPD and a XTS2500 for LAFD

 

[es93546]

The old Adam 12 show did that where you could only hear the dispatcher and not the units talking.
I never understood why that was if they were close together. Now I know.

I wonder what happened to the old VHF-high frequencies and if they are being used for anything today.
Anyone have an old list copy?

The dispatcher could patch the mobile frequency to the base frequency. They did this during pursuits so everyone could hear the unit transmitting their status and location. It always started with "all units standby, 8 Adam 11 is in pursuit, 8 A 11 your location." Followed by something like "Westbound Sunset from Sepulveda, 75 miles per hour, white Ford Galaxy, occupied times 2." "8 A 11 continuing, driven by a white male adult, red hair wearing glasses."

I only had one scanner, a Regency 8 crystal channel. I had a mobile setup in my Ford 150, with a drilled in antenna on the roof. I had to unscrew the antenna coax and two bolts that mounted the radio to the mobile mount. I then attached the base antenna and the wall wart in to bring it into the house. It was a bit cumbersome doing so and I often just didn't listen in the evening. I was commuting to Long Beach State down the 405. I had the South Bay PD's and the university PD in the scanner. No CHP, no Caltrans, no LASD and no Long Beach PD. I didn't have any fire either, even though LA Co was on VHF at the time. I had an interest in the USFS at the time, but the radio only had a 5 MHz range and 171.575 was over 6 MHz from the rest of my listening, plus I didn't know any radio techs who could retune it at the time. That came later in Arizona and as long as it was strong, like right in town, I could hear Flagstaff PD, FD and schools (my wife drove a bus for them part time while getting her masters at NAU).

Each crystal cost about $5-7 and a nationwide Police Call edition (9 editions nationwide) didn't come out until about 1975 or 1976. $5-7 was what I grossed in two hours of work then so I couldn't afford to guess frequencies or even gather them by the grapevine or rumor. I couldn't even conceive of a computer in my home, with the ability to program a bazillion channel radio like I have now. If I was on a fire that day, that only raised my hourly rate to about $3.75.

 

[prcguy]

The dispatcher could patch the mobile frequency to the base frequency. They did this during pursuits so everyone could hear the unit transmitting their status and location. It always started with "all units standby, 8 Adam 11 is in pursuit, 8 A 11 your location." Followed by something like "Westbound Sunset from Sepulveda, 75 miles per hour, white Ford Galaxy, occupied times 2." "8 A 11 continuing, driven by a white male adult, red hair wearing glasses."

I only had one scanner, a Regency 8 crystal channel. I had a mobile setup in my Ford 150, with a drilled in antenna on the roof. I had to unscrew the antenna coax and two bolts that mounted the radio to the mobile mount. I then attached the base antenna and the wall wart in to bring it into the house. It was a bit cumbersome doing so and I often just didn't listen in the evening. I was commuting to Long Beach State down the 405. I had the South Bay PD's and the university PD in the scanner. No CHP, no Caltrans, no LASD and no Long Beach PD. I didn't have any fire either, even though LA Co was on VHF at the time. I had an interest in the USFS at the time, but the radio only had a 5 MHz range and 171.575 was over 6 MHz from the rest of my listening, plus I didn't know any radio techs who could retune it at the time. That came later in Arizona and as long as it was strong, like right in town, I could hear Flagstaff PD, FD and schools (my wife drove a bus for them part time while getting her masters at NAU).

Each crystal cost about $5-7 and a nationwide Police Call edition (9 editions nationwide) didn't come out until about 1975 or 1976. $5-7 was what I grossed in two hours of work then so I couldn't afford to guess frequencies or even gather them by the grapevine or rumor. I couldn't even conceive of a computer in my home, with the ability to program a bazillion channel radio like I have now. If I was on a fire that day, that only raised my hourly rate to about $3.75.

Wow, you had a good job back then. In 1975 I was making 2.85/hr and I thought that was good.

 

[es93546]

Wow, you had a good job back then. In 1975 I was making 2.85/hr and I thought that was good.

I was a GS-3, which I think was $3.08 per hour. I had a fair amount of overtime (1.5x), hazard pay (1.25x) and Sunday differential (1.25x). I worked in fire management, with some recreation duties and was a fire prevention technician. I had to work hard on a fire hand crew to be selected for the position. It was seasonal, summer, between years in college. I needed the money for tuition, room and board for college. It wasn't an easy job, but I gave it everything I had. A little over a year after graduating from college I was selected for a permanent appointment. Yes, I was lucky, but working very hard and showing initiative is what got me the job.

 

[tsalmrsystemtech]

I still rock my EX-LAPD Astro Saber 3 on occasion. Sadly the smooth knobs are gone, so I've got the regular ones on it.

Great radio in its day and still is as well as the XTS 5000. Just some really great work horses of their day. I like the engraving of LAPD on it. Looks like in the back of your desk area you have a few more. Nice. Keep them forever. Hopefully you still can get good batteries for them

 

[PdxPaul]

The reason LASD had a busy tone is up until sometime in the 80's FCC Regulations dictated there could not be
repeaters in use on VHF-Low except for in an emergency, hence the patch.

CHP was on 42 mhz during those years and they also were not repeated.

 

[jrholm]

LASD still has a busy tone

 

[scottyhetzel]

The old Adam 12 show did that where you could only hear the dispatcher and not the units talking.
I never understood why that was if they were close together. Now I know.

I wonder what happened to the old VHF-high frequencies and if they are being used for anything today.
Anyone have an old list copy?

154.830 use to be the LAPD code 2High frequency (Aero would listen to this and Detectives)... I would hear the channel in Rancho Cucamonga as I was rolling into L.A.. Very exciting to listen too back in the day....it really was not that long ago when they dropped the frequency.

 

[ladn]

154.830 use to be the LAPD code 2High frequency (Aero would listen to this and Detectives)...

154.830 was either Tac 1 or Tac 2 (I forgot which since it's been a long time). The other tac was 154.770. There was also a Tac 3 which I think was 154.995. (I don't have an old Police Call at hand for reference). Metro/SWAT eventually got their own VHF channel, too. CLEMARS (154.920) was also sometimes called "Tac 4", but wasn't in the usual "rock bound" frequency lineup.

 

[nokones]

Remember back to the time when LASD was on VHF low band and LAPD was on VHF high band? LAPD radios (in patrol vehicles) had the dispatch channels set up like a repeater channel with different RX/TX frequencies, but the units could not hear each other--only the dispatcher. Supervisor vehicles had another "cheater" radio that could monitor the dispatch channel input frequency. Pretty much everyone had Tac 1 and Tac 2 as simplex car-to-car channels, Metro eventually got their own VHF simplex channel and there were a couple of other VHF channels for special units.

Handheld radios (called a "CC" unit I recall) were few and far between. There were only like 8 channels for the whole city. No MDTs. No cell phones. The old timers still knew where the (few) working "Gamewells" were. If confidential information needed to be exchanged, a pay phone had to be found.

LAPD also had Blue Call Boxes throughout the City. Some footbeat cops would keep a stash bottle in those boxes.

 

[nokones]

I still rock my EX-LAPD Astro Saber 3 on occasion. Sadly the smooth knobs are gone, so I've got the regular ones on it.

I have a couple of those. I really like the vintage radios. I also have a Type 2 and one Type 1. I think the Type 2 was a LA City Fire Radio so they could communicate with LAPD.

 

[nokones]

154.830 use to be the LAPD code 2High frequency (Aero would listen to this and Detectives)... I would hear the channel in Rancho Cucamonga as I was rolling into L.A.. Very exciting to listen too back in the day....it really was not that long ago when they dropped the frequency.

If I recall, the Dispatcher had control if they wanted to have the mobile transmit freq repeated or not out to the units like for hot APBs, Officer Needs Help, and pursuits, etc.

 

[nokones]

154.830 was either Tac 1 or Tac 2 (I forgot which since it's been a long time). The other tac was 154.770. There was also a Tac 3 which I think was 154.995. (I don't have an old Police Call at hand for reference). Metro/SWAT eventually got their own VHF channel, too. CLEMARS (154.920) was also sometimes called "Tac 4", but wasn't in the usual "rock bound" frequency lineup.

I still have the California Police Call and the, I believe Gene Hughes, Southern California version, somewhere in a box. I keep on saying that I need to dig those out someday.

LAPD Air Units use to use CLEMARS to communicate with the LASD and CHP Helicopters and CHP Dispatch (LACC).

 

[ladn]

If I recall, the Dispatcher had control if they wanted to have the mobile transmit freq repeated or not out to the units like for hot APBs, Officer Needs Help, and pursuits, etc.

I don't think the radio room could repeat the Tac channels, but they could do repeat mode for the divisional dispatch channels.

LAPD Air Units use to use CLEMARS to communicate with the LASD and CHP Helicopters and CHP Dispatch (LACC).

That's what CLEMARS was intended for (California Mutual Aid Radio System). There was also a CLEMARS mobile-only VHF channel, but it was pretty quiet in the LA area.

Many smaller agencies used the CLEMARS channels as a convenient secondary frequency. I remember when traveling out of the area, I'd hear these smaller municipal agencies from time to time.

Scanning was a lot more fun back in the older days!

LAPD also had Blue Call Boxes throughout the City. Some footbeat cops would keep a stash bottle in those boxes.

I remember those as a kid growing up. LAFD also had call boxes (basically just an alarm box) on a lot of street corners. The hardware was manufactured by a company called "Gamewell".

In my early days of scanning in the '70s, it wasn't uncommon to hear the dispatcher to tell a unit to "phone Gamewell xxxx". There were still a lot of older cops who didn't like to use the radio to talk to their buddies.

 

[nokones]

The other CLEMARS channel was 154.935 MHz and if my memory serves me right was designated for portables use only, no mobiles or base stations.

I had special permission to use that freq for AVR use.

 

[nokones]

The more I think about the LAPD, now I'm not sure if the Dispatcher had the ability to turn on the repeater feature, I believe that may have been done by the Dispatch Supervisor position called the "Link Position" which was staffed by the shift Sergeant that had the control and made the decision when to activate the repeat feature. Also, I believe the Link also was able to "Patch" various channels.

 

[nokones]

And the Sig-Alerts were originated by the LAPD in the mid 50s and was taken over by the CHP after the CHP took over the traffic enforcement responsibilities on the Freeways from LAPD.

 

[f40ph]

The other CLEMARS channel was 154.935 MHz and if my memory serves me right was designated for portables use only, no mobiles or base stations.

Both channels live on today narrowbanded as CA LAW1 (154.920) and CA LAW2 (154.935)