Programming help

[Chinto]

I have posted this in my local forum and want to post it here as well. I spent the day programming my scanner the 396t with the arc software. The conventional systems work as set up. The problem I am having is with the APCO 25 systems I programmed for the state police and the motorola I system I also programmed. I set the hold times for all of these systems for 30 seconds, however when I scan them they only hit them for 1/2 a second and then move on. Anyone have any ideas as to what I did wrong?

Thanks

Rob

 

[hiegtx]

Rob,

You set the Hold time, or the Delay time to 30 seconds? (You probably do mean Hold, but that's really long).

If it is a trunked system, & the scanner is spending that short of time on the system, regardless of what you set the Hold at, then it is probably not acquiring the control channel.
Try manually holding on the system & stepping through the frequencies. You should hear the control channel noise on on one of the frequencies (not the talkgroups, the frequencies). If you don't, either something did not quite click with the system import & load into the radio, or you are not getting a good enough signal.

What antenna are you using? How far away are you from the site(s)? What system. Somebody in your state forum would be more familiar with the system, but they'd also want to know about the antenna & distance as well.

Edit: For The Connecticut State Police system, make sure you program that as Motorola Type 2, not P25. While the System Voice line of the description shows "APCO-25 Common Air Interface Exclusive", the System Type line states "Motorola Type II SmartZone Omnilink". Programming as a P25 instead of Motorola Type 2, the scanner will not track it correctly.

 

[n2mdk]

If the scanner goes really fast through a trunked system I would guess it's not hearing the control channel. Check the systems manually and see if it's hearing the control channel.
I would set the delay between 2 and 4 and set the hold to 0