Wausau, WI - New radios get cool reception

[Thunderbolt]

WAUSAU, Wis. -- Marathon County is paying an overseas company millions of dollars to improve the effectiveness of its emergency-radio system, but some firefighters worry the new equipment is unreliable and could endanger lives.

New radios get cool reception | wausaudailyherald.com | Wausau Daily Herald

 

[SCPD]

WAUSAU, Wis. -- Marathon County is paying an overseas company millions of dollars to improve the effectiveness of its emergency-radio system, but some firefighters worry the new equipment is unreliable and could endanger lives.

New radios get cool reception | wausaudailyherald.com | Wausau Daily Herald

Well there is nothing in the FCC database about a trunked system being licensed to Marathon County, WI.
I assume they are supposed to be using MPT-1327. Anyone have any info on this new system?

 

[newald]

It's going to be conventional P25.

 

[kayn1n32008]

I assume they are supposed to be using MPT-1327. Anyone have any info on this new system?

Tait has been around for many years and make decent gear... i wonder if the cool reception to the new equipment is because it is not motorola

 

[OpSec]

It's going to be conventional P25.

What band? VHF?

On page 2 of the article, it said 20 tower sites in the county. 20?!?! I hope that is typo, or the person who wrote the article doesn't have any idea what they are talking about.

 

[newald]

VHF

If its anything like the Tait system installed in Oneida County, law enforcement will be digital and fire will remain analog.

 

[N_Jay]

Was it bid?
If it was why not get the RFP and see what was asked for?

EDIT:
Did some searching but did not put in much time.

http://www.taitworld.com/main/index...-County-chooses-Tait-for-P25-network-solution

http://www.iafcsafety.org/fullstory.php?95571

 

[ozzie]

They speak of the upcoming federal mandate which I assume is to move to narrowband. Don't the radios they currently have, have that ability? I think they can be reprogrammed.

 

[N_Jay]

Some can and some can't.

Often the base and repeaters are significantly older than the field equipment and can not be narrowbanded.

Additionally, there is a range loss that needs to be accounted for in the new design.

AND, public safety radio systems that have been operating all along at 70% to 90% on-street, are now expected to provide 95% in building coverage.

Then, you need to be P25 compatible for most grant funding.

Hence, what starts as a narrowbanding project ends up being a new system.

 

[millrad]

Monoporola?

Cry me a river. Motorola has a tizzy everything it loses a contract. However, the Fire Chief's concerns over the page-out feature with the Tait radios does seem quite valid. Could be that Tait isn't used to providing for volunteer fire services, where the Minitor line of pagers has dominated for so long.
Here in CT where most of the fire departments are volunteer and P25 is becoming all the rage, municipal officials learned very late in the game that page alerting tones require an analog radio transmission to work correctly. Oops.

 

[N_Jay]

Cry me a river. Motorola has a tizzy everything it loses a contract.

Such is life.

However, the Fire Chief's concerns over the page-out feature with the Tait radios does seem quite valid. Could be that Tait isn't used to providing for volunteer fire services, where the Minitor line of pagers has dominated for so long.

Should be interesting to watch.
The consultant should have identified all the needs and made sure the proposed system met them, but . . . .

Here in CT where most of the fire departments are volunteer and P25 is becoming all the rage, municipal officials learned very late in the game that page alerting tones require an analog radio transmission to work correctly. Oops.

That often happens when you rely on your in-house "experts". :roll:

 

[jackj]

Once again our tax dollars are sent off-shore to support foreign companies while American workers are laid-off because of a lack of business.

 

[N_Jay]

Once again our tax dollars are sent off-shore to support foreign companies while American workers are laid-off because of a lack of business.

What about all the Tait employees in the US?

Do you think it is significantly different with much Motorola and Harris (Tyco-M/A-COM) equipment built elsewhere?

 

[OpSec]

Once again our tax dollars are sent off-shore to support foreign companies while American workers are laid-off because of a lack of business.

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So what about the Motorola products made off-shore and imported? Israel, Singapore and Tawain all come to mind, and these are mid-to-high tier radios. At this point, /\/\ may as well be a foreign company.

 

[citylink_uk]

Cry me a river. Motorola has a tizzy everything it loses a contract. However, the Fire Chief's concerns over the page-out feature with the Tait radios does seem quite valid. Could be that Tait isn't used to providing for volunteer fire services, where the Minitor line of pagers has dominated for so long....

It also looks like another case of poor communication between officials and personnel 'in the field' about how the new system will work. Staff may have seen the new radios and thought that would solve their problems, unaware that they were still using the same old infrastructure.

Tait always seem willing to modify radio software, especially for its Public Safety customers who it wants to keep happy so I'm sure they will come up with something. Surely volume and length of alert are all things that can be easily changed.

They converted about 400 new Tait T2020 radios to AM modulation for our legacy 70MHz systems a few years ago and their T800 base stations had been untill recently used for about 10 years around the country in Quasi-Sync simulcast UHF systems for the Police.

 

[citylink_uk]

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So what about the Motorola products made off-shore and imported? Israel, Singapore and Tawain all come to mind, and these are mid-to-high tier radios. At this point, /\/\ may as well be a foreign company.

Very true, Which multi-million $ company doesn't make its products off-shore. I'm struggling to thing of many nowadays.....

I think Tait are trying to get more heavily involved in the US market, especially with narrow banding. This gives them a healthy market of 'lower end' customers to aim at, ones who want to go narrow band and P25, but don't want to pay big bucks for something they don't need i.e 800MHz Trunked.
Tait expands to new campus in Houston - Tait Electronics Ltd - North America

 

[kayn1n32008]

Once again our tax dollars are sent off-shore to support foreign companies while American workers are laid-off because of a lack of business.

And last time i checked the whole world is in a recession, and it is a world economy now so get over that money is going to a foreign country. The more money that is moving the better off the whole world is going to be. There are a few states and federal entities that purchase Daniels Electronics repeaters that are designed and built in Canada, and my guess is that it is because they are as good or better than most other repeaters on the market, rather than be childish and 'buy American' for the sake of buying American.

 

[N9NRA]

Hey there, i`ve had more-or-less a ringside seat to this digital radio thingy for a while now, as i cover the County Board meetings for the local cable access station, and i can tell ya from what i saw during one of the first meetings where they first presented the new system and even brought in sample radios from both Motorola and Tait, that it was, for lack of a better way to say it...intresting to watch...when the thing was over and i was striking (taking down) the camera all i could think was, "They just presented this new P25 system to 38 people that know almost NOTHING about two-way radio...and these folks are gonna use our tax dollars to get it, and there`s a chance it might not work". I also was thinking, "If they`re gonna be protecting us citizens, then i would be hoping that the radios at least will WORK properly". Think on it for a moment, the officer gets to the incident/service call, and tries to call into dispatch and his radio won`t reach the repeater, then someone gets hurt/killed...can we say "lawsuit"? What i would have liked to have done is to get a hold of both the Motorola and the Tait radios and at least see for myself what`s up, like i said, if they`re gonna be protecting us, then at least make really sure the thingy works, don`t wait till after the horses are outta the barn and in the neighbor`s field, so to speak. N9NRA

 

[N_Jay]

Of course what you witnessed was probably the vendors responding to a RFP.

Someone (usually a lot closer to the user agencies) defined what was requested. (Hopefully with the guidance of a qualified consultant)

The subscriber equipment that everyone focuses on is way less than 1/2 the real issue.

What were the two companies proposing?
How well did it address the County's request?
How well did each of the companies do in pointing out issues the County may have missed in their request?
What guarantees or assurances did each company offer?
And of course, what was the bottom line, or "apples-to-apples" cost to the County?

 

[N9NRA]

Wausau`s new P25 radio system.

Of course what you witnessed was probably the vendors responding to a RFP.

Someone (usually a lot closer to the user agencies) defined what was requested. (Hopefully with the guidance of a qualified consultant)

The subscriber equipment that everyone focuses on is way less than 1/2 the real issue.

What were the two companies proposing?
How well did it address the County's request?
How well did each of the companies do in pointing out issues the County may have missed in their request?
What guarantees or assurances did each company offer?
And of course, what was the bottom line, or "apples-to-apples" cost to the County?

True, but the funny thing is, while i was doing this meeting (running a live brodcast of it), i found it strange that no one on that 38-member board asked even ONE SINGLE QUESTION about the system, they all just kinda sat there, and the rep passed around the radios to a few of them (unfortunatly not all of `em got their hands on the radios), they seemed to be like..."okay, now what are we `sposed to do?". That`s why i`m not suprised at what`s happening, and another bit, from what i`ve been told by a friend and fellow ham op that works in the fire service and knows the person that`s actually setting up this thingy that now it won`t happen till NEXT YEAR now. Intresting eh? N9NRA