Not hearing NJSP suddenly

[W2PSK]

I've noticed recently that I stopped receiving the NJSP. I've had no issues hearing them with my BCD996P2 scanner. I'm still hearing the turnpike maintenance/road crews but no activity on the NJSP groups. Did they move or change to secure or something?

 

[rr60]

Not sure how you have scanner set up. I believe Turnpike Maintenance has their own P25 system and Troopers on a different system, NJICS.

Could you have a system toggled off or a department or site off?

 

[trentbob]

NJICS has not worked better for me, I monitor C3-10 comm.. NJSP Marine units constantly. I'm just south of Trenton on the PA side of the river and I just use the Bordentown simulcast site. Excellent reception.

 

[Skypilot007]

No changes noticed here, everything receiving NJICS just fine.

 

[Whiskey3JMC]

Hearing NJSP just fine via the Berlin Simulcast (from Montgomery County, PA at that!)

 

[GM]

I'm receiving NJSP just fine with my SDS100 scanner on the Rutgers, Telegraph Hill, Union, West Orange, and Bordentown sites.

 

[jimmie13]

NJICS is hard monitor sometimes in some areas

 

[richee2000]

get an SDS100 or SDS200. I monitor the NJICS from all over NJ and NYC, no issues,,,,

 

[W2PSK]

Ok so here I am again, the state police stopped being received here again. No changes to settings on my scanner. Still scanning the Monmouth County and the New Brunswick simulcast sites from South River, and nothing is being heard there. Picking up the Turnpike maintenance talkgroups on the Woodbridge site without an issue. If I manually go through the frequencies, I hear noise on the current data channel, full scale showing on the meter for both the New Brunswick and Monmouth County sites.

 

[bunangst]

100% going to be Simulcast Distortion.

NJICS New Brunswick and Monmouth County are both multi-site Simulcast Cells. NJ Turnpike Authority System is all single sites, no simulcast.

Simulcast Distortion - The RadioReference Wiki

wiki.radioreference.com

 

[W2PSK]

100% going to be Simulcast Distortion.

NJICS New Brunswick and Monmouth County are both multi-site Simulcast Cells. NJ Turnpike Authority System is all single sites, no simulcast.

Simulcast Distortion - The RadioReference Wiki

wiki.radioreference.com

That's going to take some slow reading and maybe some googling to understand. Let me ask an easy question: Should the BCD996P2 be able to hear these groups? Why would it change from being able to receive it to no longer being able to receive it? Has something changed in their system that might affect it?

 

[W2PSK]

Ok, first question in regards to my Google search.. it says:

"To find the best P25 Threshold on a BCD996P2, you need to monitor a specific system with the threshold set to "Auto" and observe the error rate, aiming for the lowest value that gives clear audio."

If I'm not receiving anything at all, I can't observe the error rate... so how do I set this?

 

[rr60]

Your question has no one size fits all answer.

The answer can be many things.I have 996P2 and it is terrible at decoding P25 PII Simulcast. Dive into your radio specifics here on RR in the Uniden forums. Use the search, there are many many threads over many years.

If your radio was working and decoding 100 percent of transmissions 100 percent of the time and it stopped, figure out what you may have done. Something as simple squelch setting being increased might change things. Zero or One best for me.

Good luck!

 

[Whiskey3JMC]

If I'm not receiving anything at all, I can't observe the error rate... so how do I set this?

Experimentation is key, grasshopper. This is the nature of the simulcast distortion beast

 

[W2PSK]

If your radio was working and decoding 100 percent of transmissions 100 percent of the time and it stopped, figure out what you may have done. Something as simple squelch setting being increased might change things. Zero or One best for me.

The answer was squelch!