Question regarding simulcast

[Mikeyb101]

I'm getting back into this hobby after a very long sabbatical from the excitement. Where as I certainly miss the high energy police action monitoring the L.A.P.D. back in the 80's , 90's . I now live in Reno Nevada where we have the "Nevada shared radio system " wich leeds me to my question.
I live in a very rural part and I know that the simulcast LTE technology is utilized. Question being. Is there a way to just monitor just one of the tower locations in the simulcast? In other words, I notice that I get a really clear and strong signal from a certain tower, and my scanner is receiving really week and scratchy signal with a lot of interference and audio is very garbled from other towers. When I am in the metro area I noticed that they are using both the EDACS (conventional) and P25 ll (P25 ll is awesome) when I am home I'm too far away to receive the P25 ll and have to monitor the EDACS.
I should mention that I am using the infamous SDS100 and am using the Sentinel software to program.
Thank you all for any help and input that y'all might want to share with me

 

[hiegtx]

I'm getting back into this hobby after a very long sabbatical from the excitement. Where as I certainly miss the high energy police action monitoring the L.A.P.D. back in the 80's , 90's . I now live in Reno Nevada where we have the "Nevada shared radio system " wich leeds me to my question.
I live in a very rural part and I know that the simulcast LTE technology is utilized. Question being. Is there a way to just monitor just one of the tower locations in the simulcast? In other words, I notice that I get a really clear and strong signal from a certain tower, and my scanner is receiving really week and scratchy signal with a lot of interference and audio is very garbled from other towers. When I am in the metro area I noticed that they are using both the EDACS (conventional) and P25 ll (P25 ll is awesome) when I am home I'm too far away to receive the P25 ll and have to monitor the EDACS.
I should mention that I am using the infamous SDS100 and am using the Sentinel software to program.
Thank you all for any help and input that y'all might want to share with me

Other than using a directional antenna, pointed at a specific transmit tower, you cannot program & receive a single site that is part of the simulcast. Besides using a directional antenna, sometimes your location, or placement of the scanner in your house or other building means that signal from the other sub-sites (transmit towers in a simulcast site) is either blocked, or it's signal strength is reduced enough that it no longer interferes. But you cannot accomplish this via programming, since all transmitters are using the same frequency, transmitting the same signals, at the same time.

If you are getting 'really good' reception on one tower, but poor, scratchy, signals from the other, that would indicate two separate sites, not two sub-sites of the simulcast site. If you are getting that contrast of signal strength, it's more likely that the 'good site' is on one the two systems (EDACS or P25), and the' weak site' is part of the other system. (This also could be two entirely separate sites on the same system; one in range, the out of range or the signal is being degraded by hills, a cluster of tall buildings, or perhaps something in your house, such as metal siding, or foil backed insulation in the walls.

Incidentally, an EDACS system is not a 'conventional channel'. It is a trunked system. I suspect that what you actually mean is that the EDACS system uses analog transmissions, not digital.

 

[Mikeyb101]

Okay, thanks hietgtx! I'll look into this. Sounds like it's really elaborate. Nothing is simple anymore. Lol

 

[Mikeyb101]

I guess I was just assuming that the SDS100 would automatically pick the strongest (best) transmission tower "no joy" , as I said I live in a very rural area and yes it is a mountainous landscape, but I'm sure there has to be a way to set a favorites with just certain towers to hit.

 

[Mikeyb101]

Unfortunately I'm not able to get the P25 ll transmissions however the EDACS is good enough to monitor.

 

[hiegtx]

Unfortunately I'm not able to get the P25 ll transmissions however the EDACS is good enough to monitor.

I see several sites for the EDACS system in your county (Washoe).


For the P25 system, here is the site map for the Washoe County Simulcast:

Each of those would be transmitting exactly the same radio traffic at the same time.

 

[Mikeyb101]

EXACTLY!!! I saw that on the RR dB and the "NSRS" is quite vast as you can see. So glad you posted the tower maps for everyone to see hiegtx ,Thank you, this helps me explain what I'm attempting to accomplish. As you can see I'm out of range for the P25 ll (I live near pyramid lake) and can only monitor the EDACS analog broadcast. If I omit all the other broadcast towers will that screw up anything? Or are they necessary to keep in my SDS100?

 

[Mikeyb101]

I guess another way of asking is, does the simulcast broadcast state wide on every tower in the state for every agency? Or is it localized within the parameters of the agency's local?

 

[Mikeyb101]

The Nevada shared radio system is very complex. Ugh

 

[hiegtx]

EXACTLY!!! I saw that on the RR dB and the "NSRS" is quite vast as you can see. So glad you posted the tower maps for everyone to see hiegtx ,Thank you, this helps me explain what I'm attempting to accomplish. As you can see I'm out of range for the P25 ll (I live near pyramid lake) and can only monitor the EDACS analog broadcast. If I omit all the other broadcast towers will that screw up anything? Or are they necessary to keep in my SDS100?

Did you 'program' the system by appending from the main database in Sentinel? That will append all of the sites on the system, even if you only selected a single department, If that's the case, then no, it won't affect the reception of the site in your vicinity.

With the exception of Interop talkgroups, and possibly a few others for emergency operations, talkgroups are normally carried on the site(s) that cover their assigned territory. You would not hear units from other areas, unless someone from a different location was in your area on official business, like dropping off, or picking up, essential paperwork, or perhaps a prisoner.

 

[Mikeyb101]

Yes I did append from main dB via sentinel for my favorites . But what I'm trying to do is create another fav list for home monitoring utilizing ONE tower broadcast site that comes in 5 X 5 (loud and clear) . I am currently on sentinel trying to create a fav list but no joy. I'm trying to omit or delete towers but I can't seem to figure out how to, I'm beginning to think that it is not possible.

 

[Mikeyb101]

The only thing I can figure that seems to be working is to delete each and every frequency within the tower site? Having said that does anyone know if the frequencies are shared within towers within the system or does every tower have their own individual broadcast frequencies?

 

[nd5y]

Simulcast systems use the exact same frequencies at every site and the exact same data/audio on each frequency at every site.

 

[Mikeyb101]

Aw, geez, okay. Thanks "nd5y"

 

[Mikeyb101]

There is literally hundreds of tower sites within the Nevada shared radio system

 

[hiegtx]

The only thing I can figure that seems to be working is to delete each and every frequency within the tower site? Having said that does anyone know if the frequencies are shared within towers within the system or does every tower have their own individual broadcast frequencies?

For a simulcast site, each tower that is part of the simulcast has the exact same set of frequencies. For the EDACS system, you must have every frequency for that site in place, with the correct LCNs programmed. For most P25 trunked systems, you only need the control channel frequencies. (That's the case with Motorola systems.) However, certain systems, such as those provided by Harris, may use any frequency on a given site as a control channel, and in some cases, the control channel changes quite often,

For your SDS100, select the Favorites list that contains the system where you want to trim out excess sites. Sentinel sorts sites by their names in alphabetical order. Pull up the system on it's database page.

Click on the column header 'County' for the sites. That will reset them by county. That makes it easier to identify and winnow out the extras. You can do that in Sentinel's main window. Select a site that you do not want & <right><click> on it. That gives you a pop-up menu. Choose the option to 'remove from Favorites list' to remove the site.

 

[Mikeyb101]

Okay thanks, HARRIS is the brand that is used for the NSRS here in Nevada. But I have seen the medics with both Motorola and HARRIS radios

 

[gmclam]

I wonder if you want to hear "everything", just what's "local" or ?. While Nevada may be largely rural, Washoe county is not. The reason for my first question is that there are separate systems. If you only want "local" traffic, you could just monitor the Washoe system. If you want "statewide" traffic, then you'd want the NSRS.

This is one of the craziest places to program for. There's the old analog EDACS systems and the new P25 systems. From my point of view, I need to program at least 4 separate systems to hear all the traffic. But I do think, for example, if you only want Reno PD; you could get away with the site of one system. Of course then there's conventional frequencies and lots more.

 

[Mikeyb101]

I mainly monitor Reno P.D. , Sparks P.D. , Washoe sheriff's, as well as NHP. Also I've heard all 4 of those agencies on the particular broadcast tower I'm trying to monitor at home btw.
Yeah the NSRS is a pretty elaborate and complex system.

 

[Mikeyb101]

I mainly monitor Reno P.D. , Sparks P.D. , Washoe sheriff's, as well as NHP. Also I've heard all 4 of those agencies on the particular broadcast tower I'm trying to monitor at home btw.
Yeah the NSRS is a pretty elaborate and complex system.

Hence "shared"
NEVADA SHARED RADIO SYSTEM