grant
Member
The nature of my enquiry - is it possible to decode BSPK (binary signal pulse keying)
In my home city of Sydney I can listen to a rental frequency company called "Australian Mobile radio" who have installed a Smartrunk II system (which uses proprietorary BSPK - binary signal pulse keying) on top of the Chiefly Tower building in the city, initially in time for the 2000 olympics - it was used exclusively for the Olympic Media Transport network, then reverted to commercial use afterwards. Around the same time in Sydney Bearcom use to run a 15 channel smartunk system on 505-507Mhz at Homebush for the Olympic Roads & Transport Authority but I heard it got pulled out and relocated in Brisbane (Queensland). There appears to be other systems in Brisbane and Melbourne and possibily elsewhere, but our database doesn't actually spell out what frequencies are trunking systems (unlike the FCC system), so that they are difficult to detect
It is frustrating to listen to these 8 or 9 frequencies between 507 and 509Mhz (all showing CTCSS 114.8), knowing that you are listening to a trunking system but unable to work out who is using it, how many etc. ... careful listening tells me that there is a whole stack of users. Unfortunately to date nobody has come with any sort of discussion on a decoder, not even on Radioreference.com.
According to the Smartrunk blurb there are over 5000 systems installed worldwide, over 100,000 users in approximately 125 countries. Apparently from web blurbs on particular systems it is difficult to actually pinpoint where these systems are installed (ie there is no LTR pulse ot motorola data channel to pinpoint them). I have even written to the company but they were rather vague on those details, despite a well-intentioned attempt to answer my query. In fact from my reading many radio technical people seem to be high impressed with the versatility of Smartrunk, often called a poor man's trunking network, because of it's adapability, low cost etc.
So my question is how hard is it to decode BSPK? Unfortunately I am personally devoid of talent in this line of enquiry as my friend Opus can readily testify. From the Smarttrunk blurb they encrypt the group user ids. Despite this one russian company seems to have come with a commercial decoder for digital signals including BSPK. Given the advances made on LTR and MPT decoders in the last couple of years, is cracking BSPK to work out user groups etc a realistic endeavour?
Grant
PS I have had a quick look through the trunking database for the US and there are many unknown type systems and only a few identified as smartrunk (1 each in Oklahoma, Florida, Iindiania and Arizona). In addition i have found many web blurbs which suggests that Smartrunk is more common in the US than commonly recognised eg in San Diego California, Houston Texas etc
In my home city of Sydney I can listen to a rental frequency company called "Australian Mobile radio" who have installed a Smartrunk II system (which uses proprietorary BSPK - binary signal pulse keying) on top of the Chiefly Tower building in the city, initially in time for the 2000 olympics - it was used exclusively for the Olympic Media Transport network, then reverted to commercial use afterwards. Around the same time in Sydney Bearcom use to run a 15 channel smartunk system on 505-507Mhz at Homebush for the Olympic Roads & Transport Authority but I heard it got pulled out and relocated in Brisbane (Queensland). There appears to be other systems in Brisbane and Melbourne and possibily elsewhere, but our database doesn't actually spell out what frequencies are trunking systems (unlike the FCC system), so that they are difficult to detect
It is frustrating to listen to these 8 or 9 frequencies between 507 and 509Mhz (all showing CTCSS 114.8), knowing that you are listening to a trunking system but unable to work out who is using it, how many etc. ... careful listening tells me that there is a whole stack of users. Unfortunately to date nobody has come with any sort of discussion on a decoder, not even on Radioreference.com.
According to the Smartrunk blurb there are over 5000 systems installed worldwide, over 100,000 users in approximately 125 countries. Apparently from web blurbs on particular systems it is difficult to actually pinpoint where these systems are installed (ie there is no LTR pulse ot motorola data channel to pinpoint them). I have even written to the company but they were rather vague on those details, despite a well-intentioned attempt to answer my query. In fact from my reading many radio technical people seem to be high impressed with the versatility of Smartrunk, often called a poor man's trunking network, because of it's adapability, low cost etc.
So my question is how hard is it to decode BSPK? Unfortunately I am personally devoid of talent in this line of enquiry as my friend Opus can readily testify. From the Smarttrunk blurb they encrypt the group user ids. Despite this one russian company seems to have come with a commercial decoder for digital signals including BSPK. Given the advances made on LTR and MPT decoders in the last couple of years, is cracking BSPK to work out user groups etc a realistic endeavour?
Grant
PS I have had a quick look through the trunking database for the US and there are many unknown type systems and only a few identified as smartrunk (1 each in Oklahoma, Florida, Iindiania and Arizona). In addition i have found many web blurbs which suggests that Smartrunk is more common in the US than commonly recognised eg in San Diego California, Houston Texas etc
