800 Mhz Ugghhhhh

[erfpd111]

www.erfpd.org

We are a small fire district located on I-70 110 miles west of Denver, just west of Vail, CO. Unfortunately our county sheriff decided the whole county was going to go 800 Mhz. What a disaster for us all. If you can imagine an unlimited number of blind spots...not including the buildings and parking structures it sucks in. Anyway, one of the small towns we recently took over is a complete blind spot. There is little to no coverage up there. Has anyone out there used an alternative method of communications for emergency scenes? We were thinking of using the Wal-Mart type radios for the time being. This is not going to solve the problem of not being able to talk to dispatch and we hope this is for the short term. I do not think NEXTEL's will work since there is no cell coverage up there either. We tried a cup and string and it worked much better than 800!!

Thanks

[TRK4]

The only thing thats going to cure your problem is more repeaters. Sounds like someone did not do all their homework or thought they could cut corners on what their consultant told them.

Lots of stuff blocks 800 band like mountains buildings and other things. It does not work like old low band or 150 band stuff.

Oh did I mention that pine needles absorb 800.

You might try some mobile or temporary repeaters just outside of you dead zones that would relay for you

[ramseycl]

We are located in La Plata County, CO (four corners area) and our local police department is looking at the 800Mhz. We dispatch for 7 agencies and they are the only ones that want to switch. With all the rough terrain around here they would have to put towers everywhere to get them to work. They suggested that only the city police department go to the new radios, but then none of the other agencies would be able to talk to them on their new radios. Everyone at the dispatch center is against the change, we have a hard enough time with radios as it is.

[Medic946]

My entire state went to the digital 800mghz system a few years back.Boy did we have problems. The system worked fine in the vehicles, you could talk to another unit three counties away. The problem was the radios didn't work at all inside a structure. This became a real problem for paramedics trying to contact medical control for STAT orders, Police Officers with unruly subject requesting back-up and the worst: firefighters trapped inside a burning building were unable to call the fire truck that was sitting outside the house! The Governor got invovled and raised cain with the supplier who told us "We didn't say these radios would work inside buildings." Where the heck did they think Public Safety people do most of their work, out in a field somewhere? Outside had some deadspots also where you couldn't reach the dispatch center or any other radio. Long story short. The Governor threatened to withhold payment until things got straightened out and a few months later things worked better.

In PA we're on the analog 800 system which is one hundred times better than any digital system I've ever worked with, I'm not sure why, but it works fine.

[JDS911]

Sometimes I think we are the only ones that have had a successful 800mz experience. Our analog trunking system has 2 full service tower sites covering just a 24 square mile area. We have 99% coverage in medium density buildings. In short, we over built the system. To many times, those that design these systems think they can do 800mz with the same number of towers as a VHF or UHF system. The other problem is the vendors let them do it and tells them, "Don't worry. It will be OK" just so they can still sell the system.

You have to plan big for 800mz systems and hold the vendor to a VERY tought coverage plan. If you do that, 800mz can be great to work with....

[TRK4]

Just thinking off my earlyer reply. A mobile repeater should take care of all your on scene problems.

It does not take a lot to do that. I know of a couple of them being used around here

[Freebie]

If there are believers in these portable 800mhz repeaters, please share the venders and users so we can contact them. Montgomery County, MD is set to go on line in late November and there are issues in our larger structures. Plz respond. /s/ JBF

[mark440]

800 sucks! Paid job uses it in the whole county, I hate it for all the above mentioned reasons. You cannot put paging tones on the 800 either. So we carry a low freq pager and a 800 radio. The dispatchers have to simulcast over both 800 and low freq when they dispatch.
The volly department is not on the 800. The county wants to go to it, but the cost to outfit 12 poor volunteer departments would not be fiscially wise. So, they haven't done it, and are fighting it.

*Mark