Melbourne F1 2023 frequencies in use

[frazjam]

The last few days I’ve been at Albert Park in Melbourne to watch all of the motor sports happening around the F1 race (this afternoon!). Thought this would be the perfect place to try out my new ubcd431pt.

Found the following frequencies of interest.

-462.075 sky commentary (paddock)
-462.575 sky commentary (race)
-462.675 cameras
-462.8 cameras
-462.8625 DMR (some sort of transport service, might not be F1 related)
-462.875 cameras
-462.9375 cameras & control sky

-463.1 cameras
-463.25 something

-463.575 kiwis
-462.625
-463.85 cameras
-463.925 cameras
-464.05 dcs 051
-464.1 race control?


-463.6125 Marshalls/race control
-464.225 cameras?
-464.4 dcs065 cameras maybe
-464.6375 sky
-464.9875 foreign commentary

-467.4625 sky

-472.2625 super car team radio?
-472.8125 broadcast of some sort


Interesting that most of the commentary related frequencies stay open the whole time (remember to set a timeout during discovery!). This leads me to believe that maybe they are used for presenters’ body packs so that maybe they can tune in when needed. Occasionally other voices (presumably broadcast crew) would chime in over the top of the commentators with other instructions or information on these channels. (Any insights on this are appreciated).

Most of the camera frequencies are more for the camera operators to listen to instructions from the control room about which car to focus on, what types of shots to get etc. Mostly one way comms on these channels.

Race control was very interesting to listen to if there was ever an incident on track as the marshalls coordinate the removal of any crashed vehicles and repair of the safety barriers etc. before allowing the race to continue.

There was some more stuff transmitting up around 500MHz (it sounded broadcast related) but I probably won’t get around to listening to all of that to figure out what it is. Race day today!!

Cheers!
FJ

 

[racingfan360]

Hi. Try the Williams freqs listed here for the race:

Formula 1 (F1) - The RadioReference Wiki

wiki.radioreference.com

The others will be TETRA and McLaren will be encrypted

 

[speedway_navigator]

Many freqs are constant duty as you noted. One is program audio the announcers monitor so the producer can interrupt to have the so called talent (announcer) ask a question, let the announcer know to throw the program to a pit reporter or do a countdown to a commercial break.

Truck intercom systems also interface with wireless users on what's called a PL or program loop. When I was doing PGA golf shows for ABC and ESPN we usually had 4 UHF freqs in use. One was for the audio techs, one for us on the RF crew, then the camera PL where the director talked to the camera operators and the director's channel so he could talk to the talent.
We in the tech field also have talent but the production side of the house usually refers to us at the tech crew.

Sometimes a 'clean' program channel is used that does not have IFB audio mixed in.

 

[Ubbe]

I've built maybe 5 or 6 of those transmitters that they use for mobile Outside Broadcast trucks. I fitted XLR connectors and a channel selector 0-10 where setting 1-10 would start the transmitter and select one of 10 duplex frequencies in the 460MHz band that all OB companies shared.

They connected the RX and TX audio directly into their main audio mixer console so that they could listen and also send audio from their console mic to any transmitter. And as the mixer would have a aux send audio channel they could route the audio in a loop to create a repeater with some of the RX audio going out to the TX line, but often they just had their mic constantly mixed in and never muted so that the speakers audio could be heard acoustically thru the mic and that where enough of an audio level for the camera crews to hear each other.

It was low power 5W or 10W transmitters that where connected into a combiner to use one antenna on a mast that also had the wireless mic and camera antennas and I believe they only had two or three transmitters in each truck.

/Ubbe

 

[speedway_navigator]

In the late 80s the ABC RF techs asked to put a voting receiver in my office in gasoline alley at the Indy motor speedway. Their wireless mics would drop out if a reporter went into a garage due to the concrete construction. They put a 2nd receiver in pit lane and it worked great.
My office was in the N building, the other 2 were called W and E based on compass headings.

While the tech was on the roof setting up the antenna I heard a 'yellow shirt' as the safety patrol is known call his boss about a man on the roof. Had I known how hilarious the conversation was going to be I would have recorded it.

The yellow shirt called Fred Johnson, who headed the pit and garage area patrol, telling him 'there's a man on the roof'. When Fred asked which roof he replied 'the N building'. Fred asked 'which end?' and the reply was 'he's in the middle'.

Fred asked 'how can he be in the middle if he's at the end of the building?', not understanding the guy was on the N building.
This was repeated at least once before Fred came up to speed.