Yaesu C4FM Repeaters close by in beta trials

[BamaScan]

The new Yaesu C4FM Repeaters are now on the air in my area. They are also known as System Fusion. The repeaters are in beta modes right now means they have not been released to the public for sell. The repeaters that I know about are located in Troy, Alabama and in Crestview, Florida. There is Hams in Crestview testing the repeater. When the one went on the air in Crestview it caused a lot of people to wonder what is wrong with the repeater. The first thing I noticed was the double beep on the squelch tail. You may be talking with your friend and say 73' then a digital sound comes over the air. You start to wonder is my radio torn up ? Is the repeater torn up ? Is my friends radio torn up ? Nope. someone with a digital radio keyed up the repeater. The person with the analog radio can not hear the person with the digital radio. The bad thing for the analog user now is they have to program a 100 hz tone on the receive and transmit of there radio so they wont hear the digital noise. Don't get me wrong I am not against digital. I have Echolink and DStar. I am just not sure it needs to be combined on the same repeater at this point. It would have been better if Yaesu would have made a 2 channel repeater. One side receive and transmit analog and the other side receive and transmit digital. I have tried DSD and DSD Plus to receive the signal none will work on it.

 

[N4DES]

The person with the analog radio can not hear the person with the digital radio. The bad thing for the analog user now is they have to program a 100 hz tone on the receive and transmit of there radio so they wont hear the digital noise. Don't get me wrong I am not against digital. I have Echolink and DStar. I am just not sure it needs to be combined on the same repeater at this point.

No different that the APCO25 repeaters that are programmed as mixed-mode. If you have an analog only radio you will need to program a CTCSS or DPL to not hear the digital chatter and to be able to operate the repeater in an analog mode. End users with correctly programmed P25 radios are able to hear both with no user intervention.

It would have been better if Yaesu would have made a 2 channel repeater. One side receive and transmit analog and the other side receive and transmit digital. I have tried DSD and DSD Plus to receive the signal none will work on it.

If what you mean by "2 channel repeater" is one that would be frequency agile, that would be very difficult as duplexers are not frequency agile and would require a split antenna system. If what you meant is 2 slot TDMA, then DMR is already available and a design like that would be a duplication of an existing technology.

 

[slimbob]

That would be a SSB+supressed carrier repeater. One signal USB, one signal LSB. Efficient, but complex and requires linear finals and/or a finer-pitch VCO. Also, very incompatible with FM radio.

 

[kc2oon]

TDMA vs FDMA

That would be a SSB+supressed carrier repeater. One signal USB, one signal LSB. Efficient, but complex and requires linear finals and/or a finer-pitch VCO. Also, very incompatible with FM radio.

It's called TDMA. Time division multiple access. It gives two users access to the same frequency pair at the exact same time eliminating the need for two frequencies and two sets of duplexers. As opposed to FDMA. Frequency division multiple access. C4FM can use either channel method or a hybrid of both.
Yaesu fusion uses FDMA with a 12.5 kHz channel size. D-star (not C4FM) uses FDMA as well but uses 6.25 kHz channel spaces.

 

[N8OHU]

I have tried DSD and DSD Plus to receive the signal none will work on it.

Mainly because nobody has taken the time to write the code needed to decode both the basic System Fusion protocol AND the full-rate AMBE it uses.

 

[canav844]

I saw a fusion repeater at AES Milwaukee right under their DSTAR repeater last week, it clearly wasn't turned on yet, but I suspect it may be on the air before too long. I'm a little more focused on getting back into DSTAR right now so I didn't interrogate as much as I should have; but that's an excuse to go back in a few weeks. That and when I found out they weren't going P25, I decided to sit back and wait to see how it all rolls out first before getting too involved. I'd be curious to see how the repeaters roll out, there seems to be a fair number of the C4FM radios out there.