We have a transmit/receive site that is connected to central dispatch via wireline. We have had nothing but problems with this setup for at least the past 10 years. Are there any recommendations for a fail-safe setup? We currently utilize VHF and the state's 800Mhz digital system has decent coverage in the area. My primary concern is at least getting the two-tone QCII paging out. I have heard of a VoIP system but will that be able to push QCII tones through the VoIP or command a QCII encoder on-site at the radio?
Last weekend our site was down for almost 60 hours with the AT&T tech stating that the overall problem is the age of their system --- 40 plus years old. Also, he said that the chance of them spending a ton of cash to get us up to reliable wiring is slim. Anyone ever deal with this? Unfortunately I couldn't be on site to fire flames up his, his bosses, and their bosses asses.
My fulltime job as a IT Tech for a heavy-industry company has dealt with AT&T and phone problems. Their response has always been immediate without any BS. I can't understand why public safety is on the low end of the totum pole.
Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
Moderator: Queue Moderator
-
chipjumper
- Batboard $upporter
- Posts: 629
- Joined: Thu Nov 21, 2002 10:14 pm
- What radios do you own?: XTS5000 for work
Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
______________________________
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
One time, it took AT&T 7 whole entire days to move our service entrance from one side of the building on one pole to the other side on a different pole. The CO is across the street!!!!! I could have tunned under the road with a garden shovel and ran my own new trunk faster. Absolutely 110% incompetence. ANd its the same story every time they need to do ANYTHING with radio circuits around here. Its a total cluster f(*&. And in the in the end after they spend days fixing what is usually their own failure, they pretend like nothing was actually ever broken and claim it must have been our equipment that broke and then started working again.
The police department has FDPA wireline circuits that have not in the 10 years I've been paying attention worked properly during a major thunderstorm event. Sometimes it just stops working during the storm and starts working again. Sometimes the whole thing goes ape until someone goes and fixes it. Our fire department RTPA circuits which are the same routing from point A to point B as the FDPA lines work fine every time during storms.
So bottom line, there is absolutely nothing you can do to get better service out of AT&T. They don't care. They never have. They never will. Basically, you're screwed. But if it makes you feel any better, everybody else with phone circuits is also screwed. My suggestion would be an RF link of some kind. Are you only trying to control this one VHF radio? VoIP is not the solution because the same thing that is causing your phone troubles is going to cause you network troubles. And consumer DSL and cable is not viable for public safety VoIP communications. What is at this site that you might be able to use?
The police department has FDPA wireline circuits that have not in the 10 years I've been paying attention worked properly during a major thunderstorm event. Sometimes it just stops working during the storm and starts working again. Sometimes the whole thing goes ape until someone goes and fixes it. Our fire department RTPA circuits which are the same routing from point A to point B as the FDPA lines work fine every time during storms.
So bottom line, there is absolutely nothing you can do to get better service out of AT&T. They don't care. They never have. They never will. Basically, you're screwed. But if it makes you feel any better, everybody else with phone circuits is also screwed. My suggestion would be an RF link of some kind. Are you only trying to control this one VHF radio? VoIP is not the solution because the same thing that is causing your phone troubles is going to cause you network troubles. And consumer DSL and cable is not viable for public safety VoIP communications. What is at this site that you might be able to use?
"I'll eat you like a plate of bacon and eggs in the morning. "
- Some loser on rr.com
eBay at it's finest:
Me: "What exactly is a 900Mhz UHF CB?"
Them: "A very nice CB at 900Mhz speed!"
- Some loser on rr.com
eBay at it's finest:
Me: "What exactly is a 900Mhz UHF CB?"
Them: "A very nice CB at 900Mhz speed!"
-
Tom in D.C.
- Posts: 3859
- Joined: Tue Sep 04, 2001 4:00 pm
- What radios do you own?: Progreso soup can with CRT
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
A word about DSL. Every time there is even just a hint of a thunderstorm
in my area the damn system gets shut down. I don't know what Verizon is so
afraid of -- maybe their equipment is super sensitive to noise or static or something --
but they're a major pain in the ass and I would never, ever, rely on them
for anything having to do with public safety communications.
You might consider blowing some smoke up AT&T's a** via a high-level complaint
to your state Public Utilities or Public Service Commission.
in my area the damn system gets shut down. I don't know what Verizon is so
afraid of -- maybe their equipment is super sensitive to noise or static or something --
but they're a major pain in the ass and I would never, ever, rely on them
for anything having to do with public safety communications.
You might consider blowing some smoke up AT&T's a** via a high-level complaint
to your state Public Utilities or Public Service Commission.
Tom in D.C.
In 1920, the U.S. Post Office Department ruled
that children may not be sent by parcel post.
In 1920, the U.S. Post Office Department ruled
that children may not be sent by parcel post.
-
chipjumper
- Batboard $upporter
- Posts: 629
- Joined: Thu Nov 21, 2002 10:14 pm
- What radios do you own?: XTS5000 for work
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
It is a remote tx/rx site powered by a MTR2000. If the wireline goes down, we go down. No one has "lost their life" because of this (under 400 runs a year total run volume) but its starting to get me angry. Some folks have suggested an alarm line that would give notification if the line was broken but we find out pretty quickly. Like you mentioned, AT&T and their crappy response is the problem. Years ago I remember a few techs that would have us back up in a jiffy (common problem is that techs would use are normally idle wireline to do testing for other purposes since it was quiet 99% year round).
**VoIP. Needs reliable internet. We could go AT&T T-1 with a cable modem backup (gov. office currently uses cable).
**Microwave link --- toooooo expensive
**Link via the state's Digital 800 on a talkgroup? viable, cost effective. Slam in a astro desktrac and hook up wires with Batlabber's assistance. But how would central dispatch send out tones? Could we install an encoder in the radio cabinet at the MTR2000 and have some sort of trigger get sent via the state's Digital 800 system?
**Turn the MTR2000 into a repeater? Dump the wireline and have dispatch transmit to the repeater like any other radio would. Could they send tones or would we have to have an encoder here? Aren't VHF freq's a real :o to get today?
**VoIP. Needs reliable internet. We could go AT&T T-1 with a cable modem backup (gov. office currently uses cable).
**Microwave link --- toooooo expensive
**Link via the state's Digital 800 on a talkgroup? viable, cost effective. Slam in a astro desktrac and hook up wires with Batlabber's assistance. But how would central dispatch send out tones? Could we install an encoder in the radio cabinet at the MTR2000 and have some sort of trigger get sent via the state's Digital 800 system?
**Turn the MTR2000 into a repeater? Dump the wireline and have dispatch transmit to the repeater like any other radio would. Could they send tones or would we have to have an encoder here? Aren't VHF freq's a real :o to get today?
______________________________
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
And here I thought we were the only ones that AT&T liked to mess with. Oh look, there's no dial tone on this circuit so it must not be in use. Lets pull these silly clips and disconnect it. I kid you not, they've done it. Funny noises on the line, you know they're testing and are too stupid to notice it isn't a free circuit to play with.
I think the internet and VoIP route is going to be more effort and money than its worth for one channel. I agree microwave is too expensive again especially for one channel.
Lets say the state was kind enough to give you a talkgroup to use as a link. Problem with that is you have no control of being granted a channel or the delay associated with it. It would be front end clipping all the audio going back to your dispatch center. And if you get a busy bonk, well then what. Also, you can not send the paging tones over astro and would need to trigger an external encoder on the site. This becomes an entire new problem because you also can't send keying or dtmf tones over the link. So how are you going to trigger that external encoder?
You can't make it into a repeater without making all the other units operate on it through the repeater. The MTR is only going to listen on the repeater input so dispatch won't hear units on simplex. (Are you banging your head on the wall yet?). You need a separate link radio connected to the MTR2000 on its own discrete frequency. Assuming you only need to talk one way at a time, you can wire it all up so RX & TOR from the MTR goes to the link radio and back to dispatch. The other way around dispatch talks to the link radio with its RX and TOR connected to the MTR. With that, you can send the paging tones over the air.
I think the internet and VoIP route is going to be more effort and money than its worth for one channel. I agree microwave is too expensive again especially for one channel.
Lets say the state was kind enough to give you a talkgroup to use as a link. Problem with that is you have no control of being granted a channel or the delay associated with it. It would be front end clipping all the audio going back to your dispatch center. And if you get a busy bonk, well then what. Also, you can not send the paging tones over astro and would need to trigger an external encoder on the site. This becomes an entire new problem because you also can't send keying or dtmf tones over the link. So how are you going to trigger that external encoder?
You can't make it into a repeater without making all the other units operate on it through the repeater. The MTR is only going to listen on the repeater input so dispatch won't hear units on simplex. (Are you banging your head on the wall yet?). You need a separate link radio connected to the MTR2000 on its own discrete frequency. Assuming you only need to talk one way at a time, you can wire it all up so RX & TOR from the MTR goes to the link radio and back to dispatch. The other way around dispatch talks to the link radio with its RX and TOR connected to the MTR. With that, you can send the paging tones over the air.
"I'll eat you like a plate of bacon and eggs in the morning. "
- Some loser on rr.com
eBay at it's finest:
Me: "What exactly is a 900Mhz UHF CB?"
Them: "A very nice CB at 900Mhz speed!"
- Some loser on rr.com
eBay at it's finest:
Me: "What exactly is a 900Mhz UHF CB?"
Them: "A very nice CB at 900Mhz speed!"
-
chpalmer
- Posts: 105
- Joined: Mon Jun 17, 2002 9:01 pm
- What radios do you own?: Astro Specta, MT1500, HT1550LS
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
Do you have a path?
An unlicensed tsunami link, Motorola Canopy ect. could be made to work and if your rural enough, you wouldn't probably have to worry about other users. ... I really don't like the idea of unlicensed links but it could be put in place until funding becomes available for the licensed microwave, or as a redundant link.
Then a JPS or equivalent voip solution. http://www.jps.com/page/view/202 and there are others.
An unlicensed tsunami link, Motorola Canopy ect. could be made to work and if your rural enough, you wouldn't probably have to worry about other users. ... I really don't like the idea of unlicensed links but it could be put in place until funding becomes available for the licensed microwave, or as a redundant link.
Then a JPS or equivalent voip solution. http://www.jps.com/page/view/202 and there are others.
-
chipjumper
- Batboard $upporter
- Posts: 629
- Joined: Thu Nov 21, 2002 10:14 pm
- What radios do you own?: XTS5000 for work
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
I'm using Tsunami's at work right now, never have had one issue with them; I never even thought about using them for this application. I know that Canopy have special public safety versions on 4.9Ghz too. I'm utilizing the link estimator right now...
Results are in -- we would have an estimated 0.00865% up time using the existing tower at the station and 45.72894% if we were to erect a 100ft tower at the station (other end is 115ft). Not too promising lol.
Results are in -- we would have an estimated 0.00865% up time using the existing tower at the station and 45.72894% if we were to erect a 100ft tower at the station (other end is 115ft). Not too promising lol.
______________________________
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
Sounds like you going about this repair the wrong way. I hope you have documented the troubles over the course
of time. If I was you, I would make a phone call to your state public utilities commission and file a complaint. You
might be surprised with the outcome.
An example of this action is my home phone went out. The DSL connection stayed working, caller ID still worked,
but I had no dial tone or talk battery. A call to Verizon gave me a due date for a tech that was 7 days out. I
called repair service for the next three days and kept getting a BS story that the area was dangerous for the
technicians to get into and a major storm had caused serious problems. I asked where the lady was getting her
information from. I told her I was in the middle of the city, the traffic was flowing freely, power never went out
and there had not been any trees down in the area. To make a long story into a short one, I hung up with
the repair call and called the state public utilities commission. Had my phone back in service the following
morning.
On a different point of view, going to an IP connection to your remote site is probably no better than what you
have now. You still need a good wired connection to make the IP work. As others have stated, it may be in
your best interest to look into some form of wireless connection to the remote site. As was asked, do you
even have a line of sight shot where a microwave would function? Another alternative is to look at using
a UHF link. Here you use a pair of UHF radios to establish the connection. Put a repeater type radio at
the remote end and use a control station type of radio at the dispatch end.
Reason for using a repeater type connection at the remote end is that is the only way you can have total
control or over ride of the link. If you had a receive signal coming in your normal base station, your link
transmitter would come on to pass the signal to the dispatcher. If you had an emergency, you need to be able
to send out a transmission regardless. A single simplex radio at the remote end will not allow for this. It is
hung up in the transmit mode relaying the signal from the remote base receiver. I have used this type of
link a number of times in the past just for the same reasons your asking.
Jim
of time. If I was you, I would make a phone call to your state public utilities commission and file a complaint. You
might be surprised with the outcome.
An example of this action is my home phone went out. The DSL connection stayed working, caller ID still worked,
but I had no dial tone or talk battery. A call to Verizon gave me a due date for a tech that was 7 days out. I
called repair service for the next three days and kept getting a BS story that the area was dangerous for the
technicians to get into and a major storm had caused serious problems. I asked where the lady was getting her
information from. I told her I was in the middle of the city, the traffic was flowing freely, power never went out
and there had not been any trees down in the area. To make a long story into a short one, I hung up with
the repair call and called the state public utilities commission. Had my phone back in service the following
morning.
On a different point of view, going to an IP connection to your remote site is probably no better than what you
have now. You still need a good wired connection to make the IP work. As others have stated, it may be in
your best interest to look into some form of wireless connection to the remote site. As was asked, do you
even have a line of sight shot where a microwave would function? Another alternative is to look at using
a UHF link. Here you use a pair of UHF radios to establish the connection. Put a repeater type radio at
the remote end and use a control station type of radio at the dispatch end.
Reason for using a repeater type connection at the remote end is that is the only way you can have total
control or over ride of the link. If you had a receive signal coming in your normal base station, your link
transmitter would come on to pass the signal to the dispatcher. If you had an emergency, you need to be able
to send out a transmission regardless. A single simplex radio at the remote end will not allow for this. It is
hung up in the transmit mode relaying the signal from the remote base receiver. I have used this type of
link a number of times in the past just for the same reasons your asking.
Jim
chipjumper wrote:We have a transmit/receive site that is connected to central dispatch via wireline. We have had nothing but problems with this setup for at least the past 10 years. Are there any recommendations for a fail-safe setup? We currently utilize VHF and the state's 800Mhz digital system has decent coverage in the area. My primary concern is at least getting the two-tone QCII paging out. I have heard of a VoIP system but will that be able to push QCII tones through the VoIP or command a QCII encoder on-site at the radio?
Last weekend our site was down for almost 60 hours with the AT&T tech stating that the overall problem is the age of their system --- 40 plus years old. Also, he said that the chance of them spending a ton of cash to get us up to reliable wiring is slim. Anyone ever deal with this? Unfortunately I couldn't be on site to fire flames up his, his bosses, and their bosses asses.
My fulltime job as a IT Tech for a heavy-industry company has dealt with AT&T and phone problems. Their response has always been immediate without any BS. I can't understand why public safety is on the low end of the totum pole.
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
After 10 + years of the same thing with Verizon in NY (hear a few clicks in the console receive then a toner on the line and the line goes dead cause they stole the "unused" pair) I gave up. We where having a new phone system installed that required a T-1 line. All my radios circuits are now on the T-I and in the last 2 years it has only gone down once. They seem to be able to fix the T-1 circuits faster than the old RTNA circuits.nmfire10 wrote:And here I thought we were the only ones that AT&T liked to mess with. Oh look, there's no dial tone on this circuit so it must not be in use. Lets pull these silly clips and disconnect it. I kid you not, they've done it. Funny noises on the line, you know they're testing and are too stupid to notice it isn't a free circuit to play with.
Only problem is the last 1000 or so feet to the building from their vault is on a 2 wire circuit that is some form of DSL. During a Lightning storm it will lose sync for a few seconds. We have it alarmed in the Dispatch office so they know when it is down and if it goes up and down more than 2 times in 10 minutes they switch to the backup site that is located in the dispatch building. Not the best coverage from the backup site as it is on the outskirts of the district but better than chasing dead RTNA circuits every week. At least the T-1 circuits are supervised so we know if it is down.
Only bad thing is that when the T-1 is down all the radio circits are down, but we have the backup site to take over.
The good thing is there is no loss in the circuits, if the audio goes in at -5db it comes out at -5db on the other end. No more playing with levels every time Verizon changes something in a circuit.
Cause Motorola said so that's why
-
kb4mdz
- Posts: 282
- Joined: Tue Oct 02, 2001 4:00 pm
- What radios do you own?: Too many for the time I have.
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
Random thoughts:
seriously, this is a prime location for some sort of data-crunching; how many tickets have been generated, how many are repeats, average time to repair, & compared to time promised, things like that.
Oh, and what kind of circuit is it? 2-wire or 4-wire? Does it have any sort of specified performance terms, like maximum loss end-to-end, long term amplitude variation,
And yes, call your Public Utilities Commission, to get what the tariffs are for that kind of circuit. The tariffs define what you're supposed to be paying for.
Find out the name & phone number of the AT&T Business Manager for the account. Use it. A lot.
One other, probably off-the-wall idea: Tell AT&T you want a 2nd circuit between those two points; it will be 'new', you can give them continuous grief to get it to specs, before you accept it. Once it's proven to be reliable, cut over to the new circuit, & cancell the old one.
Have an LEO meet the you and telco tech, with a hint of 'you don't take care of this, you'll be hauled off for (make up some real or puff charges. I'm sure your imagination can be primed.
.
And you could also embarass them, & get the local paper &/or TV station to do a piece on how the phone company can't get its mess all in one bag.......
Don't take no for an answer from the phone company. Kick them in the ****, any chance you get.
seriously, this is a prime location for some sort of data-crunching; how many tickets have been generated, how many are repeats, average time to repair, & compared to time promised, things like that.
Oh, and what kind of circuit is it? 2-wire or 4-wire? Does it have any sort of specified performance terms, like maximum loss end-to-end, long term amplitude variation,
And yes, call your Public Utilities Commission, to get what the tariffs are for that kind of circuit. The tariffs define what you're supposed to be paying for.
Find out the name & phone number of the AT&T Business Manager for the account. Use it. A lot.
One other, probably off-the-wall idea: Tell AT&T you want a 2nd circuit between those two points; it will be 'new', you can give them continuous grief to get it to specs, before you accept it. Once it's proven to be reliable, cut over to the new circuit, & cancell the old one.
Have an LEO meet the you and telco tech, with a hint of 'you don't take care of this, you'll be hauled off for (make up some real or puff charges. I'm sure your imagination can be primed.
.And you could also embarass them, & get the local paper &/or TV station to do a piece on how the phone company can't get its mess all in one bag.......
Don't take no for an answer from the phone company. Kick them in the ****, any chance you get.
-
kf4sqb
- Posts: 1491
- Joined: Mon May 19, 2003 9:11 pm
- What radios do you own?: I can't enter that much....
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
The railroad I used to work for has a remote base (MSF5000) connected to a console in the dispatch office via a two-wire wireline. They have the same problems, only double. We had the misfortune to have to go through two different phone companies. IIRC, the office end is Bell South, and the radio end is Alltel. Neither company has a direct line between the two sites (so they both claim), so that's about the only choice available. Every time lightning struck anywhere near either end of the system, it went down. The situation then became a game of "its not my fault, its their's". We would always have a day or more of both companies trying to shift the blame to the other, and back again. We also had several occasions of a damaged controller in the radio from lightning, because the company on that end wouldn't install the proper lightning protection. We finally had to install our own protection on that end, and at least reduced the frequency of damaged controllers. We were looking into going to an RF link when I left them (good riddance), but I have no idea where they went with it.
kf4sqb "at" wetsnet "dot" com
Look for the new "Jedi" series portables!
Bat-Phone= BAT-CAVE (2283)
-.- .. ....- -.-. -.-- . .. ... -- -.-- -... .-. --- - .... . .-. .-.-.-
Look for the new "Jedi" series portables!
Bat-Phone= BAT-CAVE (2283)
-.- .. ....- -.-. -.-- . .. ... -- -.-- -... .-. --- - .... . .-. .-.-.-
-
kb4mdz
- Posts: 282
- Joined: Tue Oct 02, 2001 4:00 pm
- What radios do you own?: Too many for the time I have.
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
nmfire10's point is good; getting a talkgroup on the 800 system is just a band-aid; it doesn't solve the problem, just makes it go a little further away, and introduces some more. Put another way, you're just putting another covering over the problem; it's still there underneath.
What kind of RF path do you have between points? And what freqs are you talking on?
One possiblity, perhaps simplistic, perhaps realistic, is a RF link, on another band, if you can find a pair of freqs. For example, I knew of one system witha a VHF remote RX, which was UHF RF linked back to a voting comparator. Essentially a cross-band repeat function; VHF RX In to UHF TX out; at the other end; UHF RX out to the voter device.
Your instance might be single-freq. link on the other band, or two-freq, half or full duplex. Using similar setup as I just described, at Console end, UHF RX out to the console electronics, and then console TX out goes to UHF TX, and at far end UHF RX goes into the MTR2000 to become VHF TX. Verstehen?
Not really hard engineering, just picking some appropriate components & freqs.
And that's only one way of doing it.
As far as the DSL or other broadband internet connection, you need just that, a new connection to be installed. And how can you guarantee the reliability & uptime of that, and the equipment? Which is not to say it can't be done, but you're looking for a solution that is more reliable than the system you have now.
Find a local dealer for RAD equipment; they might have some solutions. And as far as cost, how much are you spending in manpower to shag down the phone company so often?
What kind of RF path do you have between points? And what freqs are you talking on?
One possiblity, perhaps simplistic, perhaps realistic, is a RF link, on another band, if you can find a pair of freqs. For example, I knew of one system witha a VHF remote RX, which was UHF RF linked back to a voting comparator. Essentially a cross-band repeat function; VHF RX In to UHF TX out; at the other end; UHF RX out to the voter device.
Your instance might be single-freq. link on the other band, or two-freq, half or full duplex. Using similar setup as I just described, at Console end, UHF RX out to the console electronics, and then console TX out goes to UHF TX, and at far end UHF RX goes into the MTR2000 to become VHF TX. Verstehen?
Not really hard engineering, just picking some appropriate components & freqs.
And that's only one way of doing it.
As far as the DSL or other broadband internet connection, you need just that, a new connection to be installed. And how can you guarantee the reliability & uptime of that, and the equipment? Which is not to say it can't be done, but you're looking for a solution that is more reliable than the system you have now.
Find a local dealer for RAD equipment; they might have some solutions. And as far as cost, how much are you spending in manpower to shag down the phone company so often?
-
chipjumper
- Batboard $upporter
- Posts: 629
- Joined: Thu Nov 21, 2002 10:14 pm
- What radios do you own?: XTS5000 for work
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
By all means the cheapest plan would be to just spit fire at AT&T when there is an extended delay in repair and for frequent outages. As kb4mdz was saying; involve the Public Utilities Commission. My goal here is to have a solid path to the remote transceiver. With our allegedly 40-year old wireline criss-crossing a couple countys to get to central dispatch, it almost seems inevitable that there will be problems in the future. I would be nice to have some sort of failover plan with ready-to-go equipment right there. Even if it isn't automatic, it would be nice to be able to switchover to Plan B in a moments notice. I understand that for RoIP to be a good idea, the plan should have our redundant ISP solutions to not travel to us via the same poles (tel and cable). There is a strong government owned wide area wireless network in the county that is on top of us (our twp is in a corner). Maybe we could beg,borrow,or deal to get a connection to that system for RoIP with automatic failover to our current cable ISP. Our county has a "county wireless" network but the coverage is garbage. I even ran Motorola's link estimator in regards to their 4.9Ghz PTP solution and it came out to like 0.00865 uptime due to obstructions.
I feel that I should fill in a little background here too. The existance of our remote tower site goes back at least 10-15 years. Some alert pagers were failing to signal properly so they installed the now existing MTR2000. There was still decent coverage in the township but not everywhere. I live in the dead center and for the longest time could still receive the distant main tower with scratchy but readable comm's (Obviously crystal-clear when from our own tower). About three years ago in an instant I could no longer receive anything from the main tower. Rarely I could hear the weakest transmissions. Today I can't receive anything from the main tower, not even a scratch. The tower maint. crews changed out the antenna with a new "better" one. We complained, and even a different vendor climbed to the top and verified that everything was up to par. Because of this unexplainable phenomena, we rely heavily on our own tower.
I feel that I should fill in a little background here too. The existance of our remote tower site goes back at least 10-15 years. Some alert pagers were failing to signal properly so they installed the now existing MTR2000. There was still decent coverage in the township but not everywhere. I live in the dead center and for the longest time could still receive the distant main tower with scratchy but readable comm's (Obviously crystal-clear when from our own tower). About three years ago in an instant I could no longer receive anything from the main tower. Rarely I could hear the weakest transmissions. Today I can't receive anything from the main tower, not even a scratch. The tower maint. crews changed out the antenna with a new "better" one. We complained, and even a different vendor climbed to the top and verified that everything was up to par. Because of this unexplainable phenomena, we rely heavily on our own tower.
______________________________
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
-
kb4mdz
- Posts: 282
- Joined: Tue Oct 02, 2001 4:00 pm
- What radios do you own?: Too many for the time I have.
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
Lots of good ideas, but I think you should also look at the basics.
When was the last time the pagers were PM'ed? RX Sense, on-frequency, etc.? What kind are they? Motorola Minitor 1? Min 2? Min3/4/5? Someone elses?
What are the RF Characteristics of the MTR2000? Is it on freq, & with good modulation? Paging tones _should_ run about 3.3 KHz, (excluding PL tone, if it's transmitted) but I've seen lots of systems where the paging tones were coming out at 4 to 4.5 kHz & above. Another related problem is how much audio your console is feeding the phone line; put in too much audio, you'll get distortion generated as the signal goes thru the various phone company offices; making the TX modulation ca-ca. Ca-ca modulation makes for poor paging; falsing, not alerting, etc.
Oh, and where are the pagers when the 'don't alert' ?? Are they on someone's hip, buried in the crack of a Laz-E-Boy, inside a sheetmetal skinned mobile home, at the edge of the county, down in the creek bottom where they have to pump in yesterday's sunshine?? (Yeah, extreme example, but I give it to prompt you to be aware of the multiple issues that you have to think of.
It's good you've looked at the antenna & feedline.
It's a system issue. You got to look at the whole system.
When was the last time the pagers were PM'ed? RX Sense, on-frequency, etc.? What kind are they? Motorola Minitor 1? Min 2? Min3/4/5? Someone elses?
What are the RF Characteristics of the MTR2000? Is it on freq, & with good modulation? Paging tones _should_ run about 3.3 KHz, (excluding PL tone, if it's transmitted) but I've seen lots of systems where the paging tones were coming out at 4 to 4.5 kHz & above. Another related problem is how much audio your console is feeding the phone line; put in too much audio, you'll get distortion generated as the signal goes thru the various phone company offices; making the TX modulation ca-ca. Ca-ca modulation makes for poor paging; falsing, not alerting, etc.
Oh, and where are the pagers when the 'don't alert' ?? Are they on someone's hip, buried in the crack of a Laz-E-Boy, inside a sheetmetal skinned mobile home, at the edge of the county, down in the creek bottom where they have to pump in yesterday's sunshine?? (Yeah, extreme example, but I give it to prompt you to be aware of the multiple issues that you have to think of.
It's good you've looked at the antenna & feedline.
It's a system issue. You got to look at the whole system.
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
Microwave is not too expensive any more.
If you have line of site, and are able to use microwave Carlson wireless has an out of box solution called trailblazer in 4.9, that costs about $7,000.00 for a hop, which gives you a a combination of 4 wire lease lines, T1, 8 two wire pots, the list goes on, very configurable. Stuff kicks ass. Rob
If you have line of site, and are able to use microwave Carlson wireless has an out of box solution called trailblazer in 4.9, that costs about $7,000.00 for a hop, which gives you a a combination of 4 wire lease lines, T1, 8 two wire pots, the list goes on, very configurable. Stuff kicks ass. Rob
Last edited by FMROB on Sat Jun 21, 2008 6:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
I must be missing something when I suggest a cheap, simple 900mhz link with yagis on each end.
It doesn't have to be exactly LOS although it helps.
You can scramble as necessary or if necessary.
Not interference immune but with yagis pointed, not likely to get that much inteference.
A lot cheaper than microwave for the limited callouts.
It doesn't have to be exactly LOS although it helps.
You can scramble as necessary or if necessary.
Not interference immune but with yagis pointed, not likely to get that much inteference.
A lot cheaper than microwave for the limited callouts.
-
N0SIH
- New User
- Posts: 33
- Joined: Sun Apr 13, 2008 4:15 pm
- What radios do you own?: Too many to list in this box
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
I work in a small rural community,population 1450 but is the county seat. Our Road & Bridge used a phone line remote base on VHF simplex no tones. Our remote site is on a water standpipe in town. Every time someone wants a new phone line or a new business comes in town it seems they discover at least one and Oh Boy-heres an unused pair. To speed repairs I obtained the identifiers for our pair from the Sprint tech. We have since gone to a repeater on VHF and now have tones to mask all the mystery PD,S and voices that used to plague us. Getting the pair identifiers really helped though .73 de Jeff/N0SIH
2-Moxy, 2 Maxar-80, 2 HT-50, 2 Maxtrac VHF, 3 SP-50, 2 P110, 1 GM-300,1 M-1225,
12 M-100, 10 MTX-HT,1 STX-HT, 1 Mostar, 1 Flexar repeater on UHF ham, 1 GR-300 UHF on ham, 1 GR-500 on VHF, 6 P-200 HT. Oh and a couple of crates of Micor junk too.
12 M-100, 10 MTX-HT,1 STX-HT, 1 Mostar, 1 Flexar repeater on UHF ham, 1 GR-300 UHF on ham, 1 GR-500 on VHF, 6 P-200 HT. Oh and a couple of crates of Micor junk too.
-
chipjumper
- Batboard $upporter
- Posts: 629
- Joined: Thu Nov 21, 2002 10:14 pm
- What radios do you own?: XTS5000 for work
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
Update: Our wireline's Telecommunications Service Priority (TSP) Program authorization code was designated as a level 05. This is a very low priority and according to our dept's communications genius, we should be at a level 03. So in a nutshell, it is in the works to get our restoration priority from a 5 to a 3. This should significantly improve the proper priority. A request has been filed with our county's communications engineering team to why this wasn't so during the latest failure and how we can get this situation resolved ASAP.
______________________________
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." -Twain
"A pint of sweat saves a gallon of blood." -Patton
Re: Wireline to remote public safety tx site always goes down
How come you haven't had a come to Jesus meeting with the phone company management. Call the trouble line
and start asking for the supervisor to call you. Best thing is to call fairly early in the day and ask that you be
kept on the line while they connect you to a supervisor. When you do get a person, request that a meeting be
set up at your office to go over the history of the line problems and what the phone company is going to do
about it. Sort of drop a hint that you have already filed a complaint with the state public utilities commission,
(make sure that you have) and sit back to see just what they have to offer.
When I was working up in MA, this action caused all sorts of grief for the phone company. Within a couple of
months, they were installing a new cable all the way from the central office. At that time it didn't hurt that
we were doing government contract work for the Air Force and had real time data line going to Colorado.
Put the heat on and keep it up. The phone company doesn't like the DPU getting involved in outages. It hurts
them when they try to go for rate increases. Second important issue is to keep the calls going into repair
service. This shows up on the manager responsible for that region. The more black marks that person gets,
the more it effects the pay raise review. They have this term of "subsequent trouble reports" that they don't
want, or like to see used. This just raises the red flag that much higher. Last time I used that term, the
lady taking the call said that it would just move out the due time on the technician being dispatched. I asked
for her operator number. When she asked why I wanted it, I told here it was going to be included as part
om my complaint to the DPU. A "subsequent trouble report" should not move out the due time and date of
repair. It should just cause an additional message to be sent to the manager handling that repair region.
The last outage I had with my home phone line kind of went through this same problem. A few days before
my phone went out, the DSL service acted up. Made a call and it was repaired the next day. Then several
days later, the phone itself went out. Called Verizon and was given a due date for the technician that was
7 days later. I had no dial tone, no talk battery, yet the DSL was still working fine and caller ID was working.
After 3 days of nothing but flap from repair, I called the DPU. That was on a Friday afternoon. By Saturday
morning before lunch, my phone was back in service. Even received a call from a lady at Verizon asking me
if my phone was working OK.
Jim
and start asking for the supervisor to call you. Best thing is to call fairly early in the day and ask that you be
kept on the line while they connect you to a supervisor. When you do get a person, request that a meeting be
set up at your office to go over the history of the line problems and what the phone company is going to do
about it. Sort of drop a hint that you have already filed a complaint with the state public utilities commission,
(make sure that you have) and sit back to see just what they have to offer.
When I was working up in MA, this action caused all sorts of grief for the phone company. Within a couple of
months, they were installing a new cable all the way from the central office. At that time it didn't hurt that
we were doing government contract work for the Air Force and had real time data line going to Colorado.
Put the heat on and keep it up. The phone company doesn't like the DPU getting involved in outages. It hurts
them when they try to go for rate increases. Second important issue is to keep the calls going into repair
service. This shows up on the manager responsible for that region. The more black marks that person gets,
the more it effects the pay raise review. They have this term of "subsequent trouble reports" that they don't
want, or like to see used. This just raises the red flag that much higher. Last time I used that term, the
lady taking the call said that it would just move out the due time on the technician being dispatched. I asked
for her operator number. When she asked why I wanted it, I told here it was going to be included as part
om my complaint to the DPU. A "subsequent trouble report" should not move out the due time and date of
repair. It should just cause an additional message to be sent to the manager handling that repair region.
The last outage I had with my home phone line kind of went through this same problem. A few days before
my phone went out, the DSL service acted up. Made a call and it was repaired the next day. Then several
days later, the phone itself went out. Called Verizon and was given a due date for the technician that was
7 days later. I had no dial tone, no talk battery, yet the DSL was still working fine and caller ID was working.
After 3 days of nothing but flap from repair, I called the DPU. That was on a Friday afternoon. By Saturday
morning before lunch, my phone was back in service. Even received a call from a lady at Verizon asking me
if my phone was working OK.
Jim
chipjumper wrote:Update: Our wireline's Telecommunications Service Priority (TSP) Program authorization code was designated as a level 05. This is a very low priority and according to our dept's communications genius, we should be at a level 03. So in a nutshell, it is in the works to get our restoration priority from a 5 to a 3. This should significantly improve the proper priority. A request has been filed with our county's communications engineering team to why this wasn't so during the latest failure and how we can get this situation resolved ASAP.