Irvine, CA / Police Freq.?
br...@earthlink.net
<groun...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> Does anyone know if the Irvine PD still uses 460.600 or have they
> switched to a different frequency?
>
> Thanks!
I used to lurk in this newsgroup a couple of years ago, but got busy
restoring an old fire engine so have not been spending much time in the
usenet newsgroups. I am back tonight because of this very issue. I live
in Tustin, a town next to Irvine, and as of the first week of May I am
no longer able to listen to the local PD on any scanner I own -
including my recently purchased BC985XLT and BC245XLT trunk trackers.
I have read about 7 replies to the orignal post, and while it has been
mentioned that Irvine is among the first group of law enforcement in
Orange County CA to switch over to 800 MHz trunking, what nobody has
mentioned is that the system seems to be unmonitorable by conventional
and trunk tracking scanners (at least, the ones I have) because it is
both digital and encrypted. I am not sure all the channels are
encrypted all the time, but all of the law net is digital which just
sounds like a lot of garbage noise in both conventional scanning and
trunk tracking modes.
Does anyone know of a scanner that is capable of monitoring a *digital*
truncking system or is there software that someone has written to do
this? Has this been discussed in this newsgroup?
I am more of a fire person anyhow, so for the time being I am at least
happy that I can lock out all the DIGITAL law talkgroups (annoying
noise) and follow all the ANALOG FD radio traffic just fine. Thanks to
friends at OCFA, and Motorla, I have all the info on the different cell
sites, frequencies and talk groups now used by the FDs. Most of the FDs
are on the countywide cell, but Santa Ana FD and Costa Mesa FD are on
the South Cell, which are different (new) frequencies than the "old"
800 MHz freqs. If anyone is interested I can e-mail or post all the
info for the FDs - I don't think you can get the specific configuration
of the 5 new cell site groups out of any book yet and if you just start
programming all 80 frequencies you won't be able to properly follow the
talk groups. (Well, you won't be able to follow the law talk groups
anyhow!)
Oh, another really important thing is that the frequencies are assigned
to the talkgroups by Cell Site region (North, Northwest, South,
Southwest, Laguna, and Countywide) and NOT by agency. So, yes, the
digital law enforcement talk groups are using the very same frequencies
as the analog fire talk groups, so you can no longer get away with just
programming the 800 MHz fire freqs in one bank of your scanner and
listening to them in conventional mode (and hitting the scan button a
lot to do "manual trunk tracking" - seriously, several firefighter
friends have been monitoring the FDs this way ever since ORC went to
800 MHz). This is because the digital noise from the PDs now sharing
those freqs locks up the scanner every couple of minutes - and it is a
very annoying sound - much like a loud verison of the computer chip in
those toy firetrucks to make it sound like a diesel engine idling).
Mike Britt
Tustin, CA
br...@earthlink.net
the "To," "Cc," and "Newsgroups" headers for details. ]]
In article <393D9A8C...@newport-coast.com>, Pelican Point
<Pelica...@newport-coast.com> wrote:
<Bulk of message snipped for brevity>
> The CTIA is determind to prevent digital scanners from recieving FCC
> authorization.
> Orange County's "Law Net" is a APCO Project 25 network.
> CTIA wants congress to ban the manufacture of "APCO 25" scanners.
You are confirming what I had already heard. I was just hoping there
was new and more hopeful news on this subject!
> Everybody else is asking questions, you seem to have the answers.
> Please post any info you have!
I have a lot of info on the new fire net. The law net info is pretty
useless, since there is nothing you can monitor that you can
understand. It will take me some time to type up the useful fire net
info, so I will post that, probably this weekend.
> > Oh, another really important thing is that the frequencies are assigned
> > to the talkgroups by Cell Site region (North, Northwest, South,
> > Southwest, Laguna, and Countywide) and NOT by agency. So, yes, the
> > digital law enforcement talk groups are using the very same frequencies
> > as the analog fire talk groups, so you can no longer get away with just
> > programming the 800 MHz fire freqs in one bank of your scanner and
> > listening to them in conventional mode (and hitting the scan button a
> > lot to do "manual trunk tracking" - seriously, several firefighter
> > friends have been monitoring the FDs this way ever since ORC went to
> > 800 MHz). This is because the digital noise from the PDs now sharing
> > those freqs locks up the scanner every couple of minutes - and it is a
> > very annoying sound - much like a loud verison of the computer chip in
> > those toy firetrucks to make it sound like a diesel engine idling).
> >
> > Mike Britt
> > Tustin, CA
>
> Very informitve post, Thank You!
:-)
Chuck Rowe
http://www.latraffic.org/radioman/orange/ocfa.html
ORCFirefox
Chuck Rowe wrote:
Not quite true...
For those who listen to Orange County, CA, fire agencies, the info
currently listed on all the websites I am familiar with is no longer
completely accurate. For example, the Orange County Fire 800 MHz
trunked system listed at
http://www.latraffic.org/radioman/orange/ocfa.html is accurate, but
incomplete. It only lists the freqs for the Orange County "Countywide"
Cell group, and to listen to Costa Mesa and Santa Ana FDs, you now need
to also program (into a separate bank) the following freqs for the South
Cell group:
868.925
868.625
868.675
868.375
868.125
867.875
867.825
867.825
867.625
867.375
867.125
866.875
866.625
866.375
866.175
866.125
Note that the above frequencies are shared with the new law enforcement
net digital system, and so you will need to lock out about 30
undiscernable digital talkgroups to narrow it down just to the analog
talk groups used by Costa Mesa and Santa Ana FDs. Not much different
than the approx 50 law digital talkgroups you now have to lock out of
the CountyWide Cell group to listen to all the rest of the FD analog
talkgroups.
Now that the digital and *encrypted* law net is online and agencies are
switching over in phases (if things go as scheduled, by the end of the
year 460 MHz will go completely silent for law in Orange County, CA),
there are 5 regional cell systems plus the countywide cell system:
North, Northwest, South, Southwest, Laguna and CountyWide. Each cell
consists of many talkgroups that are either agency specific or shared.
The fire talkgroups have all their normally used dispatch and tac
talkgroups on Countywide cell or South cell (in the case of Santa Ana
and Costa Mesa). However, all fire agencies also have the capability of
using multiagency talkgroups that are located on all six cells. These
talkgroups will rarely be used, but will allow PDs and FDs and other
agencies like lifeguard to interface during major emergencies, such as
an earthquake.
(Hopefully, now that I have posted this info, all those websites will be
updated soon!)
Mike