Uniden scanner programming Problem.

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LunaScan7

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NEED HELP... I purchased my first digital scanner last week. A Uniden BCD325p2. I’m using free scan and radio reference for programming.

Here’s my problem. My location is Bergen County New Jersey. I been trying to program the scanner for 3 day’s without success. here’s the information of what I’m dealing with.

Northern Valley (Interboro) Police Bergen County Project 25 Phase ll

Interboro Police - Harrington Park, Norwood, Northvale, Closter, and Haworth Police Departments all have switched to using the Bergen County trunked radio system. Alpine, Demarest and Haworth are using TG 1202, Harrington Park, Norwood & Northvale using TG 1204,

Does anyone have any idea why I may be having a problem? Could it be I need one of Uniden’s paid software upgrade?

It seems to me when I load the software from radio reference in to free scan I do not see the correct TG tags or frequencies. I really don’t see any TG 1202 or TG 1204 tags and I do not see 155.4300 frequency listed.

Hopefully some one can shed some light on what’s going on here. Any help would be gladly appreciated.
 

ka3aaa

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Scanners will not decrypt encrypted communications which if i read the systems information correctly is what the problem is however i may be wrong.
 

kruser

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You need to use Freescan and import this trunked System: Bergen County Trunking System, Bergen County, New Jersey - Scanner Frequencies

It contains the 1202 and 1204 talkgroups as well as all others used on the system.

Don't worry about the conventional frequency of 155.430 as that is listed as no longer in use.

Several of the county law related talkgroups are encrypted like ka3aaa said but the two you want show they are not encrypted.
 

LunaScan7

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Question. When programming talk groups like 1202 & 1204 if programmed correctly no frequencies is needed?
 
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It seems to me when I load the software from radio reference in to free scan I do not see the correct TG tags or frequencies. I really don’t see any TG 1202 or TG 1204 tags and I do not see 155.4300 frequency listed.
A working Trunked System consists of frequencies and talk groups that the radios use.

You need to specify the frequency(s) within the system for it to receive anything.

If the scanner is in "ID Search" mode, it will receive whatever talk groups are active and in the clear.
 

kruser

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Question. When programming talk groups like 1202 & 1204 if programmed correctly no frequencies is needed?

Yep, if you import the trunked system, it will automatically add the needed frequencies for that system.
Those two talkgroups will also be added automatically along with many others.

If you get into programming a trunked system by hand, then you would need to enter both, the frequencies and the talkgroups.
If this system works for you, you can use it as an example to learn how to manually add new systems in the future if they are not in the database here.
 

ht396jm

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Two things I would like to add..... 155.430 is no longer used regularly, it’s a backup and is referred to as different names in different towns that have it in their radios. Secondly, don’t be surprised if you don’t get good reception of the TRS with your scanner. Bergen County uses LSM (linear simulcast modulation) and anything besides the G4/G5 and SDS series of scanners don’t generally handle this well. This problem is largely documented on the forums, if you run into that problem you’ll easily find discussions here. Good luck.
 

LunaScan7

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I purchased a Uniden BCD325p2 scanner last week. I’m using freescan and radio reference for programming. Programming analog works great. Programming digital Project 25 Phase II. Audio is APCO-25 Common Air Interface Exclusive. Not working.

I have loaded dozens of different digital Project 25 Phase II sites on to my scanner and receive nothing.

#1 is it possible I need uniden DMR, NXDN or ProVoice Software Upgrade before it will work?

#2 can it be all encrypted?

Anyone on this forum from Bergen County NJ receiving digital Project 25 Phase II Interboro Police - Harrington Park, Norwood, Northvale, Closter, and Haworth Police Departments TG 1204 Alpine, Demarest and Haworth are using TG 1202.

Any help will be really appreciated.
 

GeekNJ

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New post so you might get some responses during the day. I am in BergenCounty but don't monitor those towns but could try later if no one responds, to see what if anything I can capture on my end.

I do monitor (I have a BCD436HP) Wyckoff/Midland Park which uses TGIDs 1206 &1013 and I capture their transmissions. The local talk groups are not encrypted while the many of the county talk groups are encrypted. If you look at Bergen County Trunking System, Bergen County, New Jersey - Scanner Frequencies in the Mode column, if there's an E there, the transmission is encrypted.

You night consider cross posting this in New Jersey Radio Discussion Forum to see if someone in the area might catch your query.
 

K4EET

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@LunaScan7, I believe you are looking at monitoring these systems:


You will notice that there is a statement that says: "County Police, Sheriff, Prosecutor and Hazmat Talk Groups are all encrypted." Of course, no scanner can receive encrypted talkgroups.

You will have to take a look at those system(s) and tell us what all you would like to monitor or which ones you are programming into your scanner.

<edit> The trunking systems are at the bottom of the page.
 
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Barney6

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I monitor that system using the Alpine tower and receive those towns on their respective tgs you mentioned. No encryption heard. The upgrades you mentioned are not necessary to monitor this system. FYI: Haworth cars are 100's, Northvale 200's, Norwood 300's, Demarest 400's, HP 500's, Closter 700's, Alpine 900's. Hope this helps, Chuck.
 

LunaScan7

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Thanks guy’s for all the good information.
I’m new to this and need more help.

Maybe some one can look over my work flow loading sites onto my Uniden BCD325p2 and tell me what I might be doing wrong. I have a feeling this could be my problem.

I’m using freescan with radio frequency.

I start freescan with a blank screen.

I go to file, import, over to radio reference Trunked and select.
Now I input my location. United States, NJ, Bergen.

Go over to available systems: in the drop down window I select Bergen County (APCO P25)

Under sites and groups I have 3 choices

North Simulcast.
South Simulcast.
Stage Hill.

I keep them all checked.

Next on the right side of this window I uncheck all 20 choices and re-check one (interboro Police) and select import.

In the nest window I have a folder on the upper left which says:
(MOT)Bergen County.

In the folder I have 4 items.

(GRP)Interboro Police.
(MP25)North Simulcast.
(MP25)South Simulcast.
(MP25)Stage Hill.

Here’s where I get lost numbering.

(MOT)Bergen County. I do not number.
GRP)Interboro Police. I give it a quick key #1
The next 3 I’m not sure what to do being they have two choices. Quick key and startup key. So I just do nothing.

(MP25)North Simulcast.
(MP25)South Simulcast.
(MP25)Stage Hill.

I now save my project.

I then go to up load my project to my scanner. A new window opens. I see my project Bergen County with a checked box. Over to the right there are 8 choices.

The last 5 are checking and I leave them checked. The first 3 top choices I choose erase all systems and settings.

I then click start upload. After it uploads I see my scanning, scanning but receive nothing.

Now in the upload window On freescan I see a problem with upload status.

On the left side I see:
Systems 1
Groups 3
Channels 21

On the right side I see:
Mem full 0%
Errors 1
Skipped 0.

Hopefully some one can see a problem in my workflow and get me on track. I have viewed dozens of YouTube videos but most were for conventional programming.
Thanks ahead of time for your help.
 

K4EET

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@LunaScan7, that is a nice write-up. I'm just sorry that I do not use FreeScan. I use ProScan which does support the Uniden BCD325P2 scanner. Hopefully somebody will be by shortly that uses FreeScan that can help you out.
 

hiegtx

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Let's see if we can wade through this.
Thanks guy’s for all the good information.
I’m new to this and need more help.

Maybe some one can look over my work flow loading sites onto my Uniden BCD325p2 and tell me what I might be doing wrong. I have a feeling this could be my problem.

I’m using freescan with radio frequency.

I start freescan with a blank screen.

I go to file, import, over to radio reference Trunked and select.
Now I input my location. United States, NJ, Bergen.

Go over to available systems: in the drop down window I select Bergen County (APCO P25)

Under sites and groups I have 3 choices

North Simulcast.
South Simulcast.
Stage Hill.

I keep them all checked.

Next on the right side of this window I uncheck all 20 choices and re-check one (interboro Police) and select import.

In the nest window I have a folder on the upper left which says:
(MOT)Bergen County.

In the folder I have 4 items.

(GRP)Interboro Police.
(MP25)North Simulcast.
(MP25)South Simulcast.
(MP25)Stage Hill.

First, change the System type to P25 Standard (Digital XT).
The "Motorola Type II/P25" type was appropriate for the original 396T. For the 396XT, and now the 325P2, use the one I suggested.

Here’s where I get lost numbering.

(MOT)Bergen County. I do not number.
GRP)Interboro Police. I give it a quick key #1
The next 3 I’m not sure what to do being they have two choices. Quick key and startup key. So I just do nothing.

(MP25)North Simulcast.
(MP25)South Simulcast.
(MP25)Stage Hill.
The item Bergen County should not get a Quick Key. For the 325P2, and the other Uniden scanners capable of multi-site, you assign the quick keys at the site level, not system. The quick keys simply allow you to toggle the selected site on or off, in case yu only want to monitor only one site, or turn the system off completely if you are well out of range.

The Startup key os one where you can set one or more sites to specify whether they are enabled, or not,, when starting the scanner by pressing a number key. If you used 1 for a startup key, and then turned on the scanner while holding down the number 1 key, only systems with that startup key, and any others that had no startup key would be scanned. Any system with a startup key other than one would not be monitored,
See this for more on quick keys:

A discussion on startup keys can be read in this thread:
That is for a different model scanner, but the same basic startup key functions are the same in both models.


I now save my project.

I then go to up load my project to my scanner. A new window opens. I see my project Bergen County with a checked box. Over to the right there are 8 choices.

The last 5 are checking and I leave them checked. The first 3 top choices I choose erase all systems and settings.
.
You're talking about the normal upload choices that FreeSCAN shows:
87976
You select the system to load on the left side, which in your case is Bergen County,

The "Erase all systems..." clears any older programming from the scanner, then loads only the system you have selected.

IF you already had the Bergen system loaded, but wanted to only replace that one, but not any other systems loaded in the scanner, you could use the "Replace any existing system with the same name, and add remaining", that would load Bergen, overwriting what was already there (if any previously loaded), then it would add any other systems that you also selected to load.

"Add only, do not overwrite" would add any system you selected to upload to what was already in the scanner.
I never use this, because if I was loading other systems, I might be duplicating what had been uploaded to the scanner previously, leaving you with duplicates. I always use the 'erase all systems' options, so that I don't accidentally add the same system more than once.

The item labeled as "Send custom radio settings" tells FreeSCAN to load the details you can specify on Set Scanner Options menu (select that from the drop-down Scanner menu on FreeSCAN's main screen).
87979
Here, you can specify display options, weather SAME codes, and other items listed on the tabs of that page.

The "Don't send digital channels..." selection tells FreeSCAN not to send digital frequencies & trunked systems to a non-digital scanner. If, for example, you had a number of other systems programmed, and were using the same basic file on an analog scanner, like the BCT15X, FreeSCAN would not send any digital systems to that scanner, because it cannot monitor those.

The 'Send Global lockouts" and "Quick Key status" tells FreeSCAN to send anything you have labeled as locked out in the scanner settings (like the Broadcast screen", and also to activate any quick keys that you set as active in your file.

The last item, "resume scanning" tells the scanner to start back up scanning, without waiting for you to manually tell the scanner to resume.

Now in the upload window On freescan I see a problem with upload status.

On the left side I see:
Systems 1
Groups 3
Channels 21
That's just confirming what you loaded.

On the right side I see:
Mem full 0%
Errors 1
Skipped 0.
The Mem full 0% just gives you a rough idea of how full the memory is. Since the 325P2 has a capacity of up to 25,000 channels, you are loading well less than 1%, if the Bergen system, with one group, is all you are programming.
The "Errors 1" is usually colored as red, and if you click on it, you can see what error it refers to. FreeSCAN, when a new file is being used, often gives you an error for "band plan missing" or "Weather not set". among others. These can simply be ignored. On a P25 system, such as Bergen, the scanner gets the band plan information it needs directly from the systems control channel.
Also ignore the weather warning.

Hopefully some one can see a problem in my workflow and get me on track. I have viewed dozens of YouTube videos but most were for conventional programming.
Thanks ahead of time for your help.

I then click start upload. After it uploads I see my scanning, scanning but receive nothing.
Are you seeing an error message "nothing to scan", or are you simply not hearing anything?

You might also attach your programming file to a post, so that someone can look at it & suggest what needs to be added or changed. To do that, save your file.
Using Windows Explorer, go to the folder where your file is located.
<right><click> on the file, and you'll get a pop-up menu with a number of choices.
Select the one labeled as "Send to"
Use the one labeled as "Compressed (zipped) folder.
87980

If your original file was named as "Bergen.996" (the *.996 is what FreeSCAN uses, but it is not valid for attaching to a post), yu will now also have one labeled as Bergen.zip. That file you can attach to a post.
 

LunaScan7

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Hi Steve, You did a great job explaining the questions I had. I really appreciate it.

I created a new Bergen County file today and loaded it into my BCD325p2. I have the 325p2 scanning on for over a hour without a hit.

I wonder if the radio might be a lemon.

I attached the file I have loaded on my scanner.

If some one can check it out to see if it works or just look it over for any possible errors, I would really appreciate it.
 

Attachments

  • Bergen County #1 test try 7-10-20 .zip
    2.8 KB · Views: 9

hiegtx

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Looking at your file, I don't see anything missing or locked out, preventing reception. While a handful of the talkgroups indicate as encrypted, there are more than enough non-encrypted TGIDs that you should hear something.

Just to clarify, you are not seeing a "Nothing to Scan" message on the display, just not receiving anything. Am I correct?

When scanning, but not hearing anything, are you seeing the signal strength bars in the upper right corner of the display?
Those would 'come and go' as the scanner runs through the individual sites.
88017
This is a screenshot from my 536HP, as it shows in ProScan. While the display on your 325P2 would look different, it would still have the signal strength bars in the upper right corner. In this view, the bars are adjacent to the left side of the PRI.

If you are not seeing any bars at all, at any time, then the scanner is not receiving a signal. If, on the other hand, you are seeing very strong signals (four or more bars), yet still hearing nothing, then you may be dealing with simulcast issues.

First, though, see if you can at least hear the NWS Weather stations. You can check this in either of two ways:

Press the Menu key
Then scroll down to WX Operation and select it by pressing the E/Enter key
On the next menu screen, select Weather Scan, the first entry on that page.
Your scanner will then go through the frequencies used by NOAA Weather Radio stations. It should stop on one of them, and you should hear the transmissions. If it does not, then there is likely a problem with either the scanner or it's antenna.

Or, while scanning, press the Hold key
Now enter one of the frequencies that show as covering your county- 162.500, Hardyston, or 162.550, New York City.
Enter the frequency, including the decimal point, but do not hit the Enter key.
Instead, press the Hold key again.
The scanner should then be receiving the frequency entered. You can use the scroll knob to to move to one of the other frequencies to check reception.
Once done, then hit the Scan key to resume normal scanning.

If you do not at least hear one of the weather channels, then there is a reception problem. If you have one, try a different antenna. If you then can hear weather, your original antenna is defective. If you do not have another antenna to try, then remove your existing antenna & carefully insert a straightened paper clip in the center of the connector on the scanner. Do you at least hear weather now? If not, then probably your scanner is defective.

If you are seeing a strong signal (as noted above), then it may be a simulcast issue. If possible, try driving to within a quarter mile of one of the sites. Pull up the system in the database.
Click on the site closest to you, probably "South Simulcast"
88025

That would get you to this page:

Click on the small icon at the lower left corner of the map (on the same line as the header for Site FCC Licenses
88026
That gets you to a map of the tower locations for the South Simulcast Site.
If you click on the FCC license that you see near the upper right corner of the map, that will get you to a license page where you can see the physical locations for each marker on the map,

If, after driving to near one of the locations, you can then receive the system, you just confirmed it is a simulcast issue.
For more about simulcast, see this Wiki page:
Simulcast digital distortion - The RadioReference Wiki

If you confirm Simulcast, then you might want to have your thread moved to the New Jersey forum, where maybe someone closer to you can suggest what you might try. To do that, do not create a new thread. Instead, click on the Report in the lower left corner of one of your posts, and request that a moderator move your thread to the state forum. Someone in the area would be more likely to see it there.
 

LunaScan7

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Hi Steve. The weather station and analog channels works just fine.

If I search frequencies I have picked up a few digital channels but the audio wasn’t very good.

With the program I have attached on my last post I drove around about 4 miles out and received nothing except when I stopped at my local library I picked up a police transmission which was very choppy. I did have close call on and forgot to see if it stopped on that or my programming.

Note that my police station is located a block away from the library.

As far as seeing signal bars with no audio I haven’t noticed that with this scanner using my program.

I have noticed it on my older analog scanner at times and it’s always on the same channel. I just assume this station is now on digital audio. That is one of the reasons I purchased this newer scanner.

Anyway it would be nice if someone on this forum from northern NJ that is on Interboro police TG ID 1202 & 1204 would report back on their experience.

I was thinking of returning my BCD325P2 and getting a SDS100. From what I have read it’s like night and day when receiving digital p25 ll.

I would do it only if I know for sure it was going to solve my problem otherwise it’s a waste of time and money.
 

hiegtx

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While I'm not in your county or state, I have seen a number of comments about issues with simulcast in various New Jersey locations.

Looking at the license, it does not appear to me that one of the transmit sites is at the police station.
Here's the map:
88076

As far as I can tell, you are closest to location 5, which would be to your southeast.
88077
That's listed as on a tank (water tower) along Hwy 9W
88078
If you can drive as close as possible to that location, and your reception improves significantly, there's your answer- simulcast.
Location 6, in Paramus, shows as being at this address:

6B40.046.025.0230 E RIDGEWOOD AVENUE

(The B would indicate that the antennas for the site are on a building.)
To see if someone in Bergen County, or at least nearby & familiar with it, has addition information or suggestions, you'd have better luck if you had your thread moved to the New Jersey forum. Instructions to do that were in my comments in Post # 9, down at the bottom.

If, as I suspect, this is a simulcast issue, then you would be better off with either one of the SDS series scanners (SDS100 or SDS200), or ine of the Unication pagers, The Unications are not a true scanner, and you can only listen to one site/one system at a time. You also do not have the ability, with the Unication, to program and listen to other systems (trunked or conventional) at the same time as your simulcast problem maker.
 

LunaScan7

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Steve, very interesting.

Today I drove from Northvale NJ to Paramus NJ. Traveled through 8 towns without a hit. I had the scanner on with the program attachment posted above.. If you look at the green map above you can see all the towns I traveled through. Not even one hit came on the radio.

I was also viewing the screen for hit but nothing. Once I arrived in Paramus NJ I switch over to search mode public safety and was receiving many hits on the scanner.

Bottom line.

Maybe a problem with radio frequency not having it righ?
Or passably a defective scanner?
Or passably a problem with feescan when loading the file?
Or possibly a setting in the scanner stopping it from working?

Hopefully we can narrow this down. I know we have allot of very smart people on this forum and I feel one of them will come up with a solution. I really appreciate all the help.
 

GeekNJ

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I added TG1202 and TG1204 to my scanner. I'll let you know if I catch anything in my Proscan recorder for those. I'm located in the Allendale/Waldwick area so not sure what I might be able to hear.
 
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