InterceptRadio.com Forums

Quick trunk question....

I don't understand what it means when you look at all of the trunk frequencies and you see one that is listed as a primary control channel and another one listed as a alternate.

What does the the primary channel do and how is it different than then others?

866.26250
866.77500
866.80000
866.82500
867.17500
867.20000
867.41250
867.93750* Primary
868.33750* Alternate

The control channel - alternates or changes every 24 hours or so. The primary may remain in service for 24 hours and then the system -- automatically switches to use a secondary control channel for a period of time and then back to the primary. There can be as many as 4 control channels per site. Most just keep all control channels programmed -- and let the scanner "pick" which one to use -- because only one control channel is "active" or in use at any given time.

The new generation of trunked scanners only need the control ch. to receive the whole system.

Ahh, okay. Light bulb starting to come on..

So I have a BC246T. And I listen to Snohomish County. Can I use only the Primary and Alternate control channels when programming the scanner?

In other words, can I leave out the voice channels?

:D GOOD QUESTION, that was help to me also.


STEVE F.

_________________
GOD BLESS 73s

IF you scanner has control channel only mode, then you can program the control channel for the trunk system. think you can only set it up for 1 control channel.. I did that for a while the only promblem is if they change the control then you have to re-program the new control channel
Dave

_________________
born to be wild

YES. If you have a radio that does "control channel only" trunking -- like the PRO-95 or PRO-96. Only one control channel is active at any given time. Program all known control channels into the same bank. ------- You can even program different site control channels --- into the same bank -- but there is a "trick" to it. You MUST place at least one or two Non-trunked channels in between each control channel. Otherwise -- the scanner locks onto the first control channel only. This would apply to a very large system like King County. You could then follow a Seattle Talk Group in any zone they were active in -- provided you had all of the control channels for every site entered into your scanner. It will only work IF you alternate from control channel to a non-trunked channel, like a local fire channel or WSP channel. And if you have 100 or more TG's entered --- it will slow the scanning down. It works best if you limit the Talk Group IDs to just a few.