bchris
Member
I need some help from you folks in the North and West to further refine my UCAN programming. This post might also be helpful for some people to get more set up ideas. For those who are interested, I have listed below some background info on how my scanners are set up at the moment.
For each site I entered the Control Channels and the backup CCs. I use the ‘CC mode only’ setting, so I did not enter any voice channel frequencies. A few sites are busy enough to justify being set up as their own system in my scanner (using Closed/Scan mode) while the rest I can just put all together in one system, run it in Open/Search mode and listen to all traffic from that site whenever I am close enough to receive it. For this discussion I am talking about Uniden models BR330T and BCT15. Later on I plan to adapt it to my GRE PSR500.
To increase scan speed and minimize entering the same TG’s many times in my scanner, I would prefer to combine more than 1 site together into the same system, as long as I do not exceed the 250 TG limit of my scanner. An example of when this works especially well is for my system named East&West. It contains all local talkgroups for the Tooele & Heber & Park City areas, plus all Statewide and Corrections, and the total is still under 250.
When my scanner cannot detect any control channel from a given site, it does not use any time looking for TG’s from that site. For example, while in Tooele I don’t waste a full second every scan cycle looking for TG’s on the Park City site, even though neither site is locked out. (It might still use a fraction of a second per site looking for the control signal.) This works even better on my BCT15 w/ the GPS, because the distant sites are locked out and then automatically unlocked just before the site is in range.
SIMULCAST AND/OR VERY BUSY SITES:
Some of the UCAN sites or areas are busy enough to warrant their own system in my scanner. These busy sites would overwhelm the other, less active sites if they were all left in the same system. For these busy systems I only want to hear certain select talkgroups, not all traffic on that system. Therefore I will use ‘closed/scan mode’ instead of ‘open/search mode’. For example, I don’t care to listen to Layton’s busy water department on it’s already busy site, but an occasional comment from a small town’s water dept on a not-busy IR site is fine. The areas that I have right now set up as their own system are Salt Lake County, Davis/Weber & North, Utah County & South, and East & West. All other sites are grouped together as ‘IR sites’.
SYSTEM NAME
PRIMARY SITES
SECONDARY SITES
TALKGROUPS INCLUDED
SL County
01,02,03,04,11,18
06,09,10,25,36
Statewide, SL County, SL Cities, Corrections
Davis & North
01,02,03,11,53
06,07,08,09,10,14,22,39,40,42
Statewide, Weber, Davis, Cache
UT County & South
03,04,11,18
21,24
Statewide, UT County & South, Provo&Orem, UDOT
East & West
11,24,30,32
06,07,08,09,21,22,25,31,35,36
Statewide, Tooele & West, Park City & East, UDOT, Corrections
IR Sites
Specifically Excluded: 01,02,03,04,11,18
All Others
Most active 250 based on statistics from multiple sites received from my location.
ALL OTHER UCAN TRUNKING SITES:
BCT15 ONLY:
Since my BCT15 uses a GPS to lock and unlock sites automatically as I travel, I also entered the center and radius of each coverage area. To define the coverage areas, I entered every site’s LAT/LON and radius into MapSource, then adjusted them until they looked to me like they matched reality. (MapSource will draw a circle on the map according to my settings.) The center of the coverage area is usually not exactly where the tower is located, and my chosen radius depends on Tx power output, terrain, and how far away the site’s neighbors are. I wanted to use Google Maps instead of MapSource, but I could not figure out how to make it work like I wanted it to. Any help here would be appreciated. For sites near the busy metro areas I use a smaller radius to avoid having too many busy systems enabled at the same time, and for the outlying sites I use a larger radius than I actually expect to receive.
BR330 ONLY:
This scanner will stop on the first control channel it finds, ignoring all others in that system until it loses the signal, at which time it will look for another. I divided the IR sites into 4 groups, and created a separate IR system for each group. Rather than putting all sites for a given AREA into the same group, I did quite the opposite. I analyzed the location of each site relative to each other, and attempted to arrange them such that only 1 site from each group could possibly be detected from any given location in Utah. Since each of the 4 systems are always trying to find a signal from one of the sites in it’s own list, I will be monitoring up to 4 separate IR sites at a time, no matter my location.
Here is an example. Lets say I am driving through the Heber area. The area’s simulcast system is not scanned as an IR site, so forget about it for now. I am still surrounded by the sites Lewis Peak, Clayton Peak, Strawberry Peak, and Daniels Canyon. If these were all in the same system, my scanner would choose only 1 site at a time, and would ignore the others until it lost the first signal. On the other hand, since these sites are each in a separate system, my scanner will choose 1 site from each system, and I will hear any and all traffic from each of these sites. Note that South Mtn, Logan Peak, and Gunnison could all share the same system along with any site near Heber, because there is no chance of receiving any 2 of them at the same time. A while back when I tried to set up each IR site as a separate system, it took too long to scan and since each system uses it’s own list of talkgroups I ran out of memory way, way too soon.
COMMON TO BOTH SCANNERS:
Even though I will run this system in ‘open’ mode (by this I mean ‘search’ mode, as opposed to ‘scan’), I want the scanner to display the name of the Talkgroup, not just the TGID#. My scanner capacity is 250 talkgroups per system, so I used Unitrunker to monitor all the systems I can receive from my house (one at a time) to determine the 250 talkgroups I am most likely to hear. Now if the active talkgroup is one of the 250 it displays the name, if not it just displays the ID #. 95% of the time I see the name.
The decision to exclude 01,02,03, & 04 from the IR sites is pretty obvious. 11 & 18 were excluded because I can RX them from my home so I knew they both carry a high volume and a wide variety of traffic. Surely there are other sites in the northern areas that are busy as well, but I need help from someone in those areas to identify them. Specifically I need to know which sites they are and what agencies use them on a regular basis. Note that 11 & 18 are not set up as their own system, but they are used as an alternate site within other systems. Also note that they are specifically excluded from being monitored as an IR site while I am traveling.
Thanks Everyone
-BC
For each site I entered the Control Channels and the backup CCs. I use the ‘CC mode only’ setting, so I did not enter any voice channel frequencies. A few sites are busy enough to justify being set up as their own system in my scanner (using Closed/Scan mode) while the rest I can just put all together in one system, run it in Open/Search mode and listen to all traffic from that site whenever I am close enough to receive it. For this discussion I am talking about Uniden models BR330T and BCT15. Later on I plan to adapt it to my GRE PSR500.
To increase scan speed and minimize entering the same TG’s many times in my scanner, I would prefer to combine more than 1 site together into the same system, as long as I do not exceed the 250 TG limit of my scanner. An example of when this works especially well is for my system named East&West. It contains all local talkgroups for the Tooele & Heber & Park City areas, plus all Statewide and Corrections, and the total is still under 250.
When my scanner cannot detect any control channel from a given site, it does not use any time looking for TG’s from that site. For example, while in Tooele I don’t waste a full second every scan cycle looking for TG’s on the Park City site, even though neither site is locked out. (It might still use a fraction of a second per site looking for the control signal.) This works even better on my BCT15 w/ the GPS, because the distant sites are locked out and then automatically unlocked just before the site is in range.
SIMULCAST AND/OR VERY BUSY SITES:
Some of the UCAN sites or areas are busy enough to warrant their own system in my scanner. These busy sites would overwhelm the other, less active sites if they were all left in the same system. For these busy systems I only want to hear certain select talkgroups, not all traffic on that system. Therefore I will use ‘closed/scan mode’ instead of ‘open/search mode’. For example, I don’t care to listen to Layton’s busy water department on it’s already busy site, but an occasional comment from a small town’s water dept on a not-busy IR site is fine. The areas that I have right now set up as their own system are Salt Lake County, Davis/Weber & North, Utah County & South, and East & West. All other sites are grouped together as ‘IR sites’.
SYSTEM NAME
PRIMARY SITES
SECONDARY SITES
TALKGROUPS INCLUDED
SL County
01,02,03,04,11,18
06,09,10,25,36
Statewide, SL County, SL Cities, Corrections
Davis & North
01,02,03,11,53
06,07,08,09,10,14,22,39,40,42
Statewide, Weber, Davis, Cache
UT County & South
03,04,11,18
21,24
Statewide, UT County & South, Provo&Orem, UDOT
East & West
11,24,30,32
06,07,08,09,21,22,25,31,35,36
Statewide, Tooele & West, Park City & East, UDOT, Corrections
IR Sites
Specifically Excluded: 01,02,03,04,11,18
All Others
Most active 250 based on statistics from multiple sites received from my location.
ALL OTHER UCAN TRUNKING SITES:
BCT15 ONLY:
Since my BCT15 uses a GPS to lock and unlock sites automatically as I travel, I also entered the center and radius of each coverage area. To define the coverage areas, I entered every site’s LAT/LON and radius into MapSource, then adjusted them until they looked to me like they matched reality. (MapSource will draw a circle on the map according to my settings.) The center of the coverage area is usually not exactly where the tower is located, and my chosen radius depends on Tx power output, terrain, and how far away the site’s neighbors are. I wanted to use Google Maps instead of MapSource, but I could not figure out how to make it work like I wanted it to. Any help here would be appreciated. For sites near the busy metro areas I use a smaller radius to avoid having too many busy systems enabled at the same time, and for the outlying sites I use a larger radius than I actually expect to receive.
BR330 ONLY:
This scanner will stop on the first control channel it finds, ignoring all others in that system until it loses the signal, at which time it will look for another. I divided the IR sites into 4 groups, and created a separate IR system for each group. Rather than putting all sites for a given AREA into the same group, I did quite the opposite. I analyzed the location of each site relative to each other, and attempted to arrange them such that only 1 site from each group could possibly be detected from any given location in Utah. Since each of the 4 systems are always trying to find a signal from one of the sites in it’s own list, I will be monitoring up to 4 separate IR sites at a time, no matter my location.
Here is an example. Lets say I am driving through the Heber area. The area’s simulcast system is not scanned as an IR site, so forget about it for now. I am still surrounded by the sites Lewis Peak, Clayton Peak, Strawberry Peak, and Daniels Canyon. If these were all in the same system, my scanner would choose only 1 site at a time, and would ignore the others until it lost the first signal. On the other hand, since these sites are each in a separate system, my scanner will choose 1 site from each system, and I will hear any and all traffic from each of these sites. Note that South Mtn, Logan Peak, and Gunnison could all share the same system along with any site near Heber, because there is no chance of receiving any 2 of them at the same time. A while back when I tried to set up each IR site as a separate system, it took too long to scan and since each system uses it’s own list of talkgroups I ran out of memory way, way too soon.
COMMON TO BOTH SCANNERS:
Even though I will run this system in ‘open’ mode (by this I mean ‘search’ mode, as opposed to ‘scan’), I want the scanner to display the name of the Talkgroup, not just the TGID#. My scanner capacity is 250 talkgroups per system, so I used Unitrunker to monitor all the systems I can receive from my house (one at a time) to determine the 250 talkgroups I am most likely to hear. Now if the active talkgroup is one of the 250 it displays the name, if not it just displays the ID #. 95% of the time I see the name.
The decision to exclude 01,02,03, & 04 from the IR sites is pretty obvious. 11 & 18 were excluded because I can RX them from my home so I knew they both carry a high volume and a wide variety of traffic. Surely there are other sites in the northern areas that are busy as well, but I need help from someone in those areas to identify them. Specifically I need to know which sites they are and what agencies use them on a regular basis. Note that 11 & 18 are not set up as their own system, but they are used as an alternate site within other systems. Also note that they are specifically excluded from being monitored as an IR site while I am traveling.
Thanks Everyone
-BC
