I am the one that has been programming our Kenwood portable radios for our search and rescue organization and we previously have been using TK-2170 portables and recently acquired a cache of TK-2180s. I have had my own TK-2180, to go with my TK-7180 mobile, for many years but I don't THINK I have come across a feature I was asked about tonight in our communications meeting.
In our meeting tonight, someone mentioned that another SAR organization had the ability to select only a small handful of channels to use. When you cycle around in the tuning knob, it only switches between THOSE channels. For example, on our primary channel bank, we have around 18 channels programmed into the bank with two of them law enforcement channels, an air-to-ground channel, and then we have 12 different repeater channels (different input tones) plus a "direct"/simplex channel (repeater output frequency). Our county is VERY rugged, mountainous terrain, so we have 11 fixed-location repeaters and a portable repeater. All of our repeaters use the same frequency on input and output with just the CTCSS tone being different on the input. Yes, I know we could use an OST function but I think that would make things too complicated for the level of volunteers that we have. On some searches, we tell our searchers that some areas are better covered by "Peak A" but "Peak B" may work too in other areas of the search (these are not what we call them but using letters for illustration) and they may also use the simplex. I was told in our meeting that there is a way that they can lock out all of the other channels except for the ones planned. I was told that you could select through the channels and mark the channel as being locked out or not locked out, and then cycle only through the non-locked-out channels. I had never heard of this capability and I'm looking through the KPG-89D software and help guide and don't know what terminology they would use for this function. If this sounds familiar to anyone, what is it called? If I knew what it was called, I could research it myself.
In our meeting tonight, someone mentioned that another SAR organization had the ability to select only a small handful of channels to use. When you cycle around in the tuning knob, it only switches between THOSE channels. For example, on our primary channel bank, we have around 18 channels programmed into the bank with two of them law enforcement channels, an air-to-ground channel, and then we have 12 different repeater channels (different input tones) plus a "direct"/simplex channel (repeater output frequency). Our county is VERY rugged, mountainous terrain, so we have 11 fixed-location repeaters and a portable repeater. All of our repeaters use the same frequency on input and output with just the CTCSS tone being different on the input. Yes, I know we could use an OST function but I think that would make things too complicated for the level of volunteers that we have. On some searches, we tell our searchers that some areas are better covered by "Peak A" but "Peak B" may work too in other areas of the search (these are not what we call them but using letters for illustration) and they may also use the simplex. I was told in our meeting that there is a way that they can lock out all of the other channels except for the ones planned. I was told that you could select through the channels and mark the channel as being locked out or not locked out, and then cycle only through the non-locked-out channels. I had never heard of this capability and I'm looking through the KPG-89D software and help guide and don't know what terminology they would use for this function. If this sounds familiar to anyone, what is it called? If I knew what it was called, I could research it myself.
