New Bedford Fire now Narrowband

[KB1UAM]

new bedford fire is now operating on narrowband mode, also channel designation has changed. channel 2 is 470.5125 DPL:143 is now channel 1. and channel 1 is now channel 2 471.0375 DPL:143.

 

[zerg901]

Do I have this right?

470.5125 - old name was "Channel 2" - new name is "Channel 1"

471.0375 - old name was "Channel 1" - new name is "Channel 2"

Did they actually change the position of the freqs in the radios? Did they used to have "Channel 2" in the "F1" position in the radios? Dont they do 99% of their business on one channel - and just use the 2nd channel for the really big fires?

Peter Sz

 

[zerg901]

If anyone wants to take a stab at explaining all of this, perhaps you could list the info in this manner -

1. The radios are programmed with Ch 1 as XXX.XXX, Ch 2 as XXX.xxx, Ch 3 as xxx.xxx, etc

2. The channels are used this way - Ch 1 is used as the primary dispatch channel - Ch 2 is used as XXX - Ch 3 is used as YYY - Ch 4 is used as ZZZ - etc

In other words, the info is broken down into 2 sections - 1 is the actual programming of the radios - 2 is the usage of the various channels

Peter Sz

 

[KB1UAM]

sure i can further clarify.

CH.1 470.5125 DPL: 143 Primary dispatch
CH.2 471.0375 DPL: 143 fireground (secondary)

the old channel allocation is
CH.1 471.0375 fireground
CH.2 470.5125 Primary Dispatch

 

[zerg901]

Do you know if they actually changed where the various freqs are located in the radios? Did they actually reprogram the radios, or did they just change the words they use to describe the channels? Peter Sz

 

[KB1UAM]

i just have the information on what the channels are now, sorry. i do not know the specs of the actual consoles

 

[zerg901]

OK - thanks very much for your help. Maybe I can think my way thru this at some point. Something got changed for some reason. And it might be instructive to figure it out. Peter Sz

 

[WA1ATA]

OK - thanks very much for your help. Maybe I can think my way thru this at some point. Something got changed for some reason. And it might be instructive to figure it out. Peter Sz

I don't know why the have for years done dispatch on Channel 2 and fireground on Chan 1, but that is reverse of what most department do.

My guess is that since they needed to reprogram the radios for narrowbanding, that they took advantage and also swapped the Channel 1 / channel 2 assignments on the radio.

 

[garys]

I don't know why the have for years done dispatch on Channel 2 and fireground on Chan 1, but that is reverse of what most department do.

As I recall from when they switched from VHF to UHF (mid '90s) there was some concern about interference from or to Waltham PD. I think the fear was that Waltham might interfere with fire ground comms at a crucial moment so they dispatch and fireground channels were swapped from the original configuration. That's how I remember it, but it was about 15 years ago, so I'm not completely sure.

My guess is that since they needed to reprogram the radios for narrowbanding, that they took advantage and also swapped the Channel 1 / channel 2 assignments on the radio.

Probably. Plus, they no doubt knew that like most things, it would confuse Zerg.