Some questions about trunked systems

[dlagerveld1103]

I am new to scanning and I am confused about a few things. I have a Uniden BCD325P2 and have figured out how to import and upload to my computer, the fire depts. in my area. My confusion is that I am picking up radio traffic from units that I have not imported from Radio Reference or uploaded to my radio. For example, I recently imported and uploaded Charles County Md. trunked Fire/EMS from the Radio Reference data base. Along with these channels, I am also hearing radio traffic from units that have tags that I have not imported or uploaded to my radio. When I go to the Radio Reference data base, I find that these tags are assigned to the Charles County Sheriff and to Md State Police. I have no idea how to get rid of them because they do not show up anywhere in my files. I even down loaded Charles County from the radio back to my files to see if these tags were somehow there, and they are not. Therefore, I have no way of finding them to eliminate them. Anyone have any ideas about what is going on with this? It also seems to be happening with Stafford County, Virginia Fire/EMS

My second question is just an informational one. Most all of the fire/EMS agencies in my area are trunked, but each of them also have 1 or 2 channels still remaining on conventional frequencies that they are still apparently using for dispatch. I am importing and uploading the trunked system and also the conventional frequencies for each one. Under the conventional frequencies files that I import from Radio Reference, there is also a separate "simulcast" section. I am simply uploading all 3 to my radio (trunked, conventional and simulcast). Am I doing this correctly? It seems to be working OK, but I noticed that much of the radio traffic is coming across on the conventional channels instead of the trunked channels. Is that because the simulcast is activated? Should I be doing anything different?

Thank you for any help and advice that any of you can give to me.

 

[ofd8001]

1 - You probably have ID Search On. Turn it Off. When it is ON, you are searching for talkgrroups, even those not programmed. When OFF, it is scanning only those programmed.

2 - A little more complicated. Many fire departments who begin using trunked systems will retain conventional mostly for tone and voice paging. Members carry pagers to alert them for calls for service. Up until recently no pagers or stuff of that sort, was capable of doing tone and voice on trunked systems. They will often patch a dispatch talkgroup to a dispatch frequency on the conventional system.

They may also patch some of their operations talkgroups to conventional frequencies during a migration process, just so their members who are responding to a call, can monitor the associated radio traffic.

The Simulcast may be associated with the trunked system. It is a way of saturating coverage for metro areas with large buildings. How you program a scanner is NOT impacted by whether it is a simulcast or "regular" trunked system. Where you may find issues with simulcast is in decoding, as in hearing garbled audio.

 

[doctordialtone]

ofd8001 is right.

To change from ID Search to ID Scan it's "Function+Scan/Search"

In other words, press in the silver knob and press "Scan/Search".

Display should show "ID SCAN".

 

[dlagerveld1103]

1 - You probably have ID Search On. Turn it Off. When it is ON, you are searching for talkgrroups, even those not programmed. When OFF, it is scanning only those programmed.

2 - A little more complicated. Many fire departments who begin using trunked systems will retain conventional mostly for tone and voice paging. Members carry pagers to alert them for calls for service. Up until recently no pagers or stuff of that sort, was capable of doing tone and voice on trunked systems. They will often patch a dispatch talkgroup to a dispatch frequency on the conventional system.

They may also patch some of their operations talkgroups to conventional frequencies during a migration process, just so their members who are responding to a call, can monitor the associated radio traffic.

The Simulcast may be associated with the trunked system. It is a way of saturating coverage for metro areas with large buildings. How you program a scanner is NOT impacted by whether it is a simulcast or "regular" trunked system. Where you may find issues with simulcast is in decoding, as in hearing garbled audio.

Thank you very much. Your advice did the trick. It now seems to be working fine. Thanks again!!!

 

[dlagerveld1103]

ofd8001 is right.

To change from ID Search to ID Scan it's "Function+Scan/Search"

In other words, press in the silver knob and press "Scan/Search".

Display should show "ID SCAN".

That worked! Thank you very much!!!