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natedawg1604

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Why would they be moving to UHF? Is Federal VHF really crowded in some areas?
 

RaleighGuy

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what about the Louisville Ky and the Lexington Ky. what about the knoxville area

Which is another reason you need to go down there with your scanner and find the frequencies for us. Remember the RR database is based on verified submissions from users just like you! We are counting on you to find the information, submit it to the database and tell the rest of the world.
 

INDY72

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Yes, plus 400 MHz will travel well in corridors.
And... UHF has far less tendencies to play with the electronics and avionics of aircraft. One of the reasons that "most" businesses involved with airports all use UHF. While yes, VHF does tend to propogate better at longer ranges, it for some reason does NOT play so well with the systems on aircraft. (At least those in FM, possibly another reason why you won't see FM in use in commercial aircraft.) Military aircraft, and US Government aircraft do use FM rather heavily in comparison. Possibly better shielding? (I have always wondered about this since they always use that as a trump card when it comes to radios and scanners on aircraft...)
 

Pacmannion

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Why would they be moving to UHF? Is Federal VHF really crowded in some areas?

Well, the old TSA VHF frequencies were part of the FAA block/bank of frequencies, so that's one reason. The second reason is better signal penetration especially down in baggage areas.
 

ecps92

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RR Data is user sourced, if you are close enough to the airport search
162-174 for the potential they have not moved.
400-420 for the new pairs.

Depending on the size of the airport and traffic, it might be best to figure out the PEAK hours of Departures and search 1-2 prior
i don't know because they don't have no record on the radio reference database
 

murphcc1

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I can confirm at least TSA BOSTON is P25 encrypted.
Can NOT confirm what freq though.
 

ecps92

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and even then, which was VHF, Boston was still a mix of CLR and ENC
that was from monitoring 172.9000 $040
Not being a jerk, but the only thing you can confirm then is in 2018 everything was encrypted. Things can and do change.
 

INDY72

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Back when TSA was not ALL federal employees sworn blah blah.... And they still had contractors doing things.. Yes, the contractors were in the clear on analog even, and the "actual" TSA folks were mix of clear and encrypted craptacular analog (yes analog is crap when encryption is applied), and P25 clear and encrypted. From what I gather, there are NO contractors doing TSA stuff anymore, and there is only maybe a very very few analog radios even in the stockpiles anymore. (Yes the P25 ones can do analog if programmed for it, and DO have the analog interop freqs programmed in them, but don't count on those EVER getting used b y TSA!) Now 99% of the TSA is fully Federal employees and uses P25 almost exclusively, and yes "mostly" Encrypted with some in the clear. (If Homeland Security heard them not encrypted, there would be NASTY memo's going to folks from D. C.!)
 
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Pacmannion

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Back when TSA was not ALL federal employees sworn blah blah.... And they still had contractors doing things.. Yes, the contractors were in the clear on analog even, and the "actual" TSA folks were mix of clear and encrypted craptacular analog (yes analog is crap when encryption is applied), and P25 clear and encrypted. From what I gather, there are NO contractors doing TSA stuff anymore, and there is only maybe a very very few analog radios even in the stockpiles anymore. (Yes the P25 ones can do analog if programmed for it, and DO have the analog interop freqs programmed in them, but don't count on those EVER getting used b y TSA!) Now 99% of the TSA is fully Federal employees and uses P25 almost exclusively, and yes "mostly" Encrypted with some in the clear. (If Homeland Security heard them not encrypted, there would be NASTY memo's going to folks from D. C.!)

There are still some contractors around, mostly at smaller airports (SFO and MCI being larger exceptions).

But yes, there is a directive from DHS saying that all radios must be encrypted. Although due to various things such the lovely O/Ø switch on P25 radios such the old XTS5000s or the RELM/BK KNGs which had the same exact switch (along with an option to zero out the encryption key that was left user accessible in the menu on the RELM radios) along with a lack of radio training leads to communications in the clear.
 

dlwtrunked

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And... UHF has far less tendencies to play with the electronics and avionics of aircraft. One of the reasons that "most" businesses involved with airports all use UHF. While yes, VHF does tend to propogate better at longer ranges, it for some reason does NOT play so well with the systems on aircraft. (At least those in FM, possibly another reason why you won't see FM in use in commercial aircraft.) Military aircraft, and US Government aircraft do use FM rather heavily in comparison. Possibly better shielding? (I have always wondered about this since they always use that as a trump card when it comes to radios and scanners on aircraft...)

Very little military and government are FM-those which are, are for other specific reasons. (I worked for DOD in an aviation assignment for many years). And no, VHF does not propagate better ranges. (If you are thinking ground-ground rather than line-of-site ground-air, that is different. Businesses use UHF near airport because there are no appropriate allocations on VHF.
 

FD101

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what about the Louisville Ky and the Lexington Ky. what about the knoxville area
Lexington is still VHF as of 1/12/23, and Louisville as of the Kentucky Derby according to my notes. Can't speak to Knoxville....
 
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