700 mHz radios?

[LVFD301]

Like Dave, we have an 800 system in my county and have recently switched our pagers over to the alpha-numeric ones (although a few minitor's are still floating around out there.) It is a contract through our county 911 and they did all the set up for it and what not. Our paging is done through a vendor in town and they supplied the pagers. The contract is through a company called Midwest Paging. If anyone knows anything about southwest Missouri, we get our share of nasty storms. Never had a problem, only problem is the time delay from dispatch toning and actually receiving the page.

ARRRGGGGHHHHH....

If this is the department just east of Springfield, lets be clear - this is a secondary method of dispatch. If one depends on commercial paging for their primary dispatch then next ISO inspection they find themselves rated a 9!

NFPA, and ISO do NOT accept commercial paging as a primary dispatch method. It will drop the communications part of your inspection so low that you will end up with a 9.

The folks at Midwest are fine folks, but I can point out a BUNCH of commercial paging companies that have folded in the past year, and almost every one has left a fire department who was stupid enough to use it as a primary service high and dry without a method of alerting.

State agencies here in Missouri were left hanging when a large missouri/kansas carrier two years ago folded, no notice. I removed some of their transmitters where they just left them at the towers.

To those talking about pagers for 800 and 700, Motorola used to make a voice pager for 800, but discontinued it.

LR could do their own paging system very cheap - in fact probably cheaper than they
pay for a year or two service, depending on how much coverage they needed. Then it
would be NFPA and ISO compliant.


EDIT... Geez, I just now realized how old this thread was.... Commercial paging is a hot topic
for me though.... And the post today screwed me up...

[Jonnee]

dmleblanc whatever happened to your radio upgrade?

You dug this up after almost five years in the grave???

[Acklan]

You dug this up after almost five years in the grave???

Yep. Would you have like to see an entirely new thread devoted to this subject? Then I would have been link to this thread and chastised for not using the search feature.
Just curious to see how the 700 mhz service worked out after 5 years. We moved to it about 3 years ago, form the 800 mhz, and have had few problems.

[ChiefKN]

I have to say, I'm interested in an update.

C'mon Chief, spill the beans!

[Seagravesstick]

Remember people.... if you want to have a communication system that ISO recognizes it must follow NFPA 1221 and all of ISO's requirements. Any portion of a communication system that is outside the dispatch centers control will receive no credit... Cell phones, alpha numeric pagers, unless you own ALL of the equipment will get no credit from ISO.... This includes towers, repeaters, phone lines, generators, etc.

[LVFD301]

I will bite - what does 1221 say about towers?

[Acklan]

All new radios and 7 repeaters all owned and operated by the Parish (County). No privately owned equipment.

[dmleblanc]

Wow, so much interest in this old thread all of a sudden .


OK, here's the latest. The parish has been acquiring 700 mHz radios which operate on the statewide system. We currently have 12 of them (portables). I and my assistant chiefs and a couple of captains currently have them and usually have them with us, but for our normal operations we are still using the old UHF radios. There are reasons for this.

Advantages of the 700 mHz system:

-Excellent coverage. Since it works on the statewide system, it's more like using a cell phone, i.e., you no longer have to hit the one repeater in the middle of the parish. You hit any tower on the system, including ones outside the parish (which we might actually be closer to), you get service.

-State System. I know that if anything goes wrong with any repeater tower or any other aspect of the system, someone will know about it immediately and be working to get it fixed. With our stand-alone system, sometimes we don't know right away if there is a problem and then it's up to us to find someone to diagnose and fix it.

-Interoperability across the state. Which is the whole reason they put this system in in the first place.

Disadvantages:

-Not enough radios yet. We have 30+ members and only 12 radios. So currently only a few of the officers have them, which is just like we were operating 20 years ago when I first started. Switching over to them totally would be a giant step backwards in this respect. Still working on some grants and other sources of funding to get the total number needed because they're...

-Expensive...around $2,500 a pop and we still need around 25 more just for my department

-Currently can talk to dispatch and to other 700 mHz users, but obviously cannot talk to other members of your own department if they still have the UHF radios. Big disadvantage there and the primary reason we're not using them yet for all operations.

-Still haven't come out with a 700 mHz pager, so still having to page over the UHF system. (all radio transmissions are currently simulcast over both systems)

All the parish agencies have some of the radios but not all they need so far. The sherrif's office is using them for their day to day activities but sometimes when I listen in on their channel I only hear the dispatcher and not the unit in the field because they're talking back on UHF. So they can't communicate unit-to-unit if they don't all have them, just like us.

It's a work in progress but we're still a ways off from completion.

[tree68]

Obviously funding is an issue right now, but something you may want to consider is a cross patch using the Raytheon ACU-T or a similar product.

Since we're talking single radios in such an installation, coverage may be an issue for a fixed installation, but a portable installation (in a command vehicle) might provide the interop you need for on-scene operations. You'll be limited to one or two talkgroups, but you'd be able to use your old radios with the new relatively seamlessly during your transition.

Of course, features like emergency buttons won't cross, either.

[Murphyslaw]

Our whole state is moving to 700mhz. It's part of a state wide LMR project. Forestry and The troopers have already moved over. Our towns PD is collecting equipment for the swap. They are coming from a non trunked 460mhz system. Our FD is behind them on the flop. as we are already on a trunked 800mhz system. ITs funny to think, we have a more advanced system then the PD.

[BLSboy]

Chief, why not patch it?
Keep your UHF pagers, and put a 700-UHF patch, so you can continue dispatching off them.
Many areas around here have 800 EDACS, and have a VHF patch so areas that dont have 800 EDACS can still talk to them, as well as keeping the ability to page over the voice pagers.

I know we can simulcast over 800 and VHF, so simulcasting the dispatch should be no issue.

[dmleblanc]

Chief, why not patch it?
Keep your UHF pagers, and put a 700-UHF patch, so you can continue dispatching off them.
Many areas around here have 800 EDACS, and have a VHF patch so areas that dont have 800 EDACS can still talk to them, as well as keeping the ability to page over the voice pagers.

I know we can simulcast over 800 and VHF, so simulcasting the dispatch should be no issue.

We've already discussed this possibility. However, one of the DISadvantages of working on the state system is that they are very strict about how the system is used and they won't allow patching it with anybody else's system. We've already been down that road It is technically feasible, but prohibited.

They ARE simulcasting all transmissions over both systems, so all dispatches go out over the original system and the 700. You can hear everything dispatch says over both radios (about a half a second apart, that gets annoying), but not between units in the field.

[BLSboy]

i don't understand that decision, but, it is a state that you are dealing with, common sense is long gone by that point....

[ChiefKN]

There is something nice about having a dispatching channel that is reserved for the dispatching of calls.

We had that for about 3 months when we were putting our new VHF system online. I loved it. Never having a dispatch stepped on, never getting stepped on by a dispatch.

The downside was that responding members didn't have any updates until they were at the firehouse/riding the apparatus.

[ChiefKN]

Our whole state is moving to 700mhz. It's part of a state wide LMR project. Forestry and The troopers have already moved over. Our towns PD is collecting equipment for the swap. They are coming from a non trunked 460mhz system. Our FD is behind them on the flop. as we are already on a trunked 800mhz system. ITs funny to think, we have a more advanced system then the PD.

Which state, Murph?

[Murphyslaw]

Which state, Murph?

Alaska....