Waterloo Regional P25 System

CDTbolt10033

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Does anyone know what TG 1020 is? it popped up on the recent talkgroup list in SDR trunk but I wasn't able to catch it in time to see what was being said on that channel.
 

CDTbolt10033

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So with more listening, I have determined that the CFD channels 1 to 6 (TGID's - 1021 to 1026) are Training Fire Ops channels and TGID's 1031 to 1035 are Training Tac channels.

Training Fire Ops:
Training Ops 1 - TGID 1021
Training Ops 2 - TGID 1022
Training Ops 3 - TGID 1023
Training Ops 4 - TGID 1024
Training Ops 5 - TGID 1025
Training Ops 6 - TGID 1026 - (Not sure if there is a Trng Ops 6)

Training Tac Channels:
Training Tac 1 - TGID 1031
Training Tac 2 - TGID 1032
Training Tac 3 - TGID 1033
Training Tac 4 - TGID 1034
Training Tac 5 - TGID 1035
 

Forts

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That just doesn't seem right to me... I can't imagine why they would need upwards of a dozen training talkgroups. And if it's a training talkgroup you don't really need OPS/TAC.

And if these are training groups, what are the normal response groups?
 

CDTbolt10033

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The City fire departments and Township fire departments all use the training channels and they sometimes need their own channel for the training exercise that they are doing and during Monday nights the township FD's do training so a couple of FD's need their own channel. Sometimes they work with their neighbouring department(s) in the townships to do a training exercise. For example, St Jacobs is doing training with Elmira.

Honestly, I'm not sure why they need a Training Fire Ops as well.

These talk groups are accessible by both City FD's and Township FD's so they can talk to each other on a call
Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge, Woolwich Twp, Wellesley Twp, Wilmot Twp, and North Dumfries Twp.

The normal FD response groups are:

Fire Tac Channels:
Fire Tac 1 - TGID 1001
Fire Tac 2 - TGID 1002
Fire Tac 3 - TGID 1003
Fire Tac 4 - TGID 1004
Fire Tac 5 - TGID 1005

Fire Ops Channels:
Fire Ops 1 - TGID 1011
Fire Ops 2 - TGID 1012
Fire Ops 3 - TGID 1013
Fire Ops 4 - TGID 1014
Fire Ops 5 - TGID 1015

If you look at the EDACS TG set up before the new system went online there were 2 training channels and 2 tac channels for each Township and City FD. The new system allows all FD's within the Region of Waterloo to use these channels.


Old Woolwich Twp EDACS channels.
105708-041AWFD DispDispatch Fire Dispatch
105808-042AWFD TAC 1TAC 1 Fire-Tac
105908-043AWFD TAC 2TAC 2 Fire-Tac
106108-045AWFD Train 1Training 1 Fire-Talk
106208-046AWFD Train 2Training 2 Fire-Talk
106308-047AWFD AdminAdministration Fire-Talk
 

CDTbolt10033

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Just a small update about TG 1020 I was talking about before I am hearing someone on that TG doing some voice testing saying things like "testing testing" not sure the purpose of the TG 1020 yet.
 

CDTbolt10033

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Has anyone started taking down Radio ID's of trucks, portables, and stations on this new system?
I have started taking down radio ID's I have got most of KFD, CFD, WFR, Woolwich Twp, Wellesley Twp, Wilmot Twp, and North Dumfries Twp but I have not got all yet like KFD/WFR/CFD Hazmat and their portables.
 

Gymbag

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Can’t seem to get the new system to work very well on my TRX-1. I was getting Cambridge Fire a few months ago but nothing nowadays. Wildcard pops up and I’ve seen some group ID's pop up, but no audio.
 

Lexxx

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Does the control channel show or does it keep trying to find the control channel?
I don't actually know the exact definition of what the difference is between Primary and Alternate control channels, but although RadioReference has it listed as an Alternate control channel frequency, for the last several month's 866.975 has remained strong and unchanged for the new Project 25 Phase II system in Waterloo.
 

CDTbolt10033

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I have seen it switch to 868.1375 before but yeah it looks like maybe 866.975 is the main control channel. I believe primary means that it is the main control channel and alternate means that they use those channels as a backup control channel. That's what I think.
 

gary123

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Close. Depending on how the system is configured, the CC can sit on a specific freq all the time and only revert to the secondary if there is an issue with the primary. This is the most common configuration.

It is chosen so that there are no dynamics added to the signal strength or coverage. The different transmitter and the slight differences in tuning and coupling to the antenna can introduce minor variations in signal strength these variations are eliminated using the same transmitter all the time.

Other systems are set up so that the CC rotates through a group of frequencies. This is usually a four freq group but can be more or less. The advantage of this configuration is that the heavy TX load is shared through the four transmitters rather than on just the one.
 

CDTbolt10033

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5/28/21
Did anyone in the Waterloo Region area hear about the P25 system failure?
Sometime in the afternoon, the P25 radio system started having problems (unknown of what specific problems) (I saw on SDR Trunk and my Uniden BCD996P2 the Control Channel dropped out for some reason) but the radio system is working again. However, the fire dept's were advised that the radio system is not stable at the moment of writing this (6:52 pm) but to continue using it as normal.

Do they even have a backup radio system?
 

gary123

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Back up control channels. If the actual controller crashed, rebooting would take a bit of time and you would hear more Comm Centre to department tests to verify they are accessing properly.
 

CDTbolt10033

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So the TG 1020 showed up again today (8/6/21) and they mentioned training dispatch (I think that's what I heard). I think the TG 1020 is Training Dispatch. I heard KFD Hazmat 11 talking.

I forgot to mention that the TG is not very active at all. Once in a while, you might hear something on it.
 

gary123

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From the described information it might be a training simulation TG complete with dispatch and realistic radio chatter. Not a bad idea for a large system covering many departments.
 
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