Official Fire Tone-Out Discussion

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rdale

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The RadioReference database has a section in each county called "TONES" that lists the known tones.
 

ffexpCP

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BostonC75 said:
All Units:

If I have the audio piped into one of those cheapo bubble pack family type radios (via audio cable), set the radio to vox, and then put the frequency that I'm using into the 396 with the correct tones, would that work?

Yes. You could just hold up the radio to the computer speakers and it will work.
 

ems170

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does anyone know the htz of the motorola alert 1? If not would anyone have a recording of the alert tone?
 
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N9JIG

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bravo14 said:
Is there any scanners out there have FTO opitions? Thanks was looking for another one

The BC396 and BC330 handhelds and the BC996 and BC15 desktop/mobiles.
 

tyytor

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i figured some thing out of how to get "Counter" to work at least for me;
i use sound recorder, if i am at home or scan record if not,

i make a recording of the page outs, then i go back do a patch cable from the earphone out with a "Y" loop it back in to the mic input and play recorded pages and "counter"
will tell me the xxx.x hz while i listen to it in the head phones and write them down :)

(i make no claim that this will work for you, the volume has to be at the right setting to get a good HZ reading LOL)
 
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Mongoose666

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"tones"

Looked for the known tones in Cook Co., Illinois. I couldn't find the section. Specificly looking for Oak Lawn, Il. Thanks
 

N9JIG

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Mongoose666 said:
Looked for the known tones in Cook Co., Illinois. I couldn't find the section. Specificly looking for Oak Lawn, Il. Thanks

The CARMA Yahoo Group has hundreds of Fire Tone sets listed in the Database section. See http://groups.yahoo.com/group/carmachicago/ to join and get full access to the listings.

As for Oak Lawn, here is what we have (154.430):

524.6 / 2575.0 Engine 25
524.6 / 1513.5 Med 1
524.6 / 1598.0 Truck 804
524.6 / 1285.8 Unknown Use
 

bReed11091

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Could somebody send me a link to get that Counter program? it seems that the tetrascanner site was taken down, and I can't find another link.
 

amickey1979

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I do not understand what I am doing wrong. I have the proper frequency for the dispatch channel and the proper tones for my volunteer station. My station has had four alerts in the last 24, my Minitor IV has alerted, and the scanner has not alerted. If I press hold while in standby mode I can hear the radio traffic on the dispatch channel but the scanner does not alert. Any ideas guys. The County is Caroline, MD the A-tone is 584.9 and the B-tone is 339.6 and these are valid Motorola tones.
 

diveben

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I am familiar with the ScanRec and Counter programs, along with a few others, but what I'm really searching for is a program that would

Decode the pager tones (real time, not recorded)
Un-mute the computer speaker if the tones match a specified sequence
If x amount of time passes without any transmission, mute the speaker.

I think the program would be very simple, has anyone come across any programs like this or have any idea where to get started to create one?

Wouldn't necessarily have to function by muting and un-muting, there are probably better ways of doing this.
 

JHaislet

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amickey1979 said:
I do not understand what I am doing wrong. I have the proper frequency for the dispatch channel and the proper tones for my volunteer station. My station has had four alerts in the last 24, my Minitor IV has alerted, and the scanner has not alerted. If I press hold while in standby mode I can hear the radio traffic on the dispatch channel but the scanner does not alert. Any ideas guys. The County is Caroline, MD the A-tone is 584.9 and the B-tone is 339.6 and these are valid Motorola tones.

Are you using a 396T or 330T? If so, try using ONLY the A tone (or just the B tone). In addition, try putting the A tone (584.9) in the B-tone slot on the scanner (thus leaving the A-tone slot blank).
I know this sounds backwards, but if your A tone is longer than 2-3 seconds, that tone has to be in the B slot (I assume it listens longer on that slot).

I went through and figured out all the tones for my local Vol. FD this summer and due to the length of their tones, I was unable to get it working with both tones in the scanner.
The paging system here does a long 3 or 4 second base tone, then a 1 second high tone, followed by a 3 or 4 second low tone. I can't remember which tone I ended up putting in the scanner, but it was either the 4 second base tone or the 4 second low tone. Regardless, it's in the "Tone B" slot.

Hope this helps. I apologize for the scattered post. It's been awhile since I messed around with this stuff and that's what I remember off the top of my head. Let me know if I can clarify anything! :wink:
 

JHaislet

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Here's the tones I found and how I initially entered them into the 396T:

FD Fire Tone (base, HiLoooo, HiLoooo)

Base 0-3sec (2.5sec) Base (687.9Hz)
High 3-4sec (1 sec) High (1901.8Hz)
Low 4-7sec (3 sec) Low (1035.8Hz)


FD1 155.9400 FM OFF 5 sec 7 12 0.0 688.3

(NOTE The local paging system here uses a 3-tone page. However, the 396T only supports TWO tones. Since they use a different Base tone (688.3Hz) for each group on the paging system, I was able to simply program in that long Base Tone for the "Tone B" slot and it works great (no need for the other two tones as the base tone trips off the scanner and opens up the channel to hear the page).


Below is one way to program in a 3-tone system, however, I found that doing it this way caused me to miss tone-outs (so I simply have it programed in as FD1 above and that's it; 1901.8Hz & 1035.8Hz aren't even programed into my scanner).

FD1 155.9400 FM OFF 5 sec 7 12 0.0 688.3
FD2 155.9400 FM OFF 5 sec 7 12 1901.0 1036.0

Hope this helps!
 
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D

DaveNF2G

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If you're having trouble decoding tones that you know are correct, you might want to try changing the mode from FM to Auto or vice-versa. Sometimes it helps.
 
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