maxtrac or ham radio w/ minitor?

bayfire300 · Post by **bayfire300** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:25 am

hello everyone .......i was thinkin of getting a minitor to page the kid when its time to come home for dinner etc:........will a maxtrax or a ham rig set off the pager?.........also can i talk to the minitor?
i have no experience w/ these other than i had one when i was a vol firefighter and never cared how they worked untill now

thanks
otto

mike m · Post by **mike m** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 8:03 am

Get the kid a cell phone it'll be a lot cheaper in the long run. That way you won't have to loose sleep at night worrying about the thousands of dollars in FCC fines for transmitting without a license on a non paging frequency with non FCC certified equipment.

Mike

Max-trac · Post by **Max-trac** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 11:52 am

We used pagers for our ARES group on the Ham bands all the time.
A signaling maxtrac will send the 2-tones that most older pagers used. Plus you can then talk to the pagers that have that feature, which the minitor does.
Some repeater controllers even have the QCII tones built in.

You do want to make sure you comply with all the licensing issues however.....

bayfire300 · Post by **bayfire300** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 12:02 pm

ok great .thanks max trac....how do i know if my maxtrac is a signaling one?

otto

Max-trac · Post by **Max-trac** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 12:07 pm

Read it with RSS.

If it has the 16 pin (or 5 pin with extended memory) it either can do signaling, or can be made to with blanking/initializing.

bayfire300 · Post by **bayfire300** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 12:44 pm

ok thanks ..it has the 16 pin.....i'll poke around the software
otto

kf4sqb · Post by **kf4sqb** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 3:58 pm

Max-trac wrote:We used pagers for our ARES group on the Ham bands all the time.
A signaling maxtrac will send the 2-tones that most older pagers used. Plus you can then talk to the pagers that have that feature, which the minitor does.
Some repeater controllers even have the QCII tones built in.

You do want to make sure you comply with all the licensing issues however.....

If I'm not mistaken, FCC rules strictly prohibit the use of 'one-way transmissions' on the Ham bands. Wouldn't a message sent to a pager be one-way?

NB2E · Post by **NB2E** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 4:07 pm

"Broadcasting" is prohibited which is defined as "Transmissions intended for reception by the general public, either direct or relayed." but I don't see any reason why paging would be prohibited. It could be interpreted as a "Brief transmissions necessary to establishing two-way communications with other stations" or "Transmissions necessary to disseminate information bulletins" which would be covered under the authorized one way transmissions section. If he really wants to know if it's legal he can always drop a line to the enforcement branch for a clarification of the rules. Alot of that legality would be whether his son (the receiver) is licensed.

Ric, NB2E

Max-trac · Post by **Max-trac** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 4:14 pm

Paging is not necessarily broadcasting, otherwise if you called someone and they didn't answer, that would be one-way?

My interpretation;
If a Ham is paging another Ham, it is perfectly legal.
If a Ham is sending messages to NON-Hams, with or without a pager, that is not legal.
There are some exceptions of course....

kf4sqb · Post by **kf4sqb** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 4:23 pm

OK, perhaps I stand corrected. I never claimed to know all the details of the rule, just the fact that it exists. Just wanted to make sure Otto checked out all the angles first.

bayfire300 · Post by **bayfire300** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:29 pm

ok what about frs? thats free...........i can send a pag that wont be answered or even if it was answered ni license required...........loop hole?
otto

Osprey · Post by **Osprey** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:37 pm

You won't find any type-accepted FRS paging equipment.

Data transmission on GMRS is illegal. Don't quote me on it, but I believe MURS (154MHz part only) allows for one-way data communicitions. Ham equipment would be ineligable for MURS operation, however a Maxtrac which is Part 90 certified would be acceptable, if power was reduced to 2W TPO.

bayfire300 · Post by **bayfire300** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:42 pm

ok i understand that but the frs radios we can all buy legally at walmart for $19.99 plus tax ..has a call button which we all know rings another transceiver specific to a pl tone if the pl is turned on .....wouldnt that be considered paging?
otto

Osprey · Post by **Osprey** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:44 pm

I suppose, but it doesn't change the fact that a Maxtrac or a ham transceiver are not Part 95 certified and are illegal on FRS.

Max-trac · Post by **Max-trac** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:49 pm

Get a couple FRS units as you describe.
That should do it for ya....

kb0nly · Post by **kb0nly** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 5:54 pm

I would suggest using MURS frequencies for this, after all the pager should easily cover the 151/154Mhz frequencies, and there wouldn't be any ham band legal issues involved.

If you get a 2w Maxtrac, not many out there but they are around, then it wouldn't be a problem.

If you wanted to you could also use a 2w HT600 instead of a pager, it can decode the QCII and allow him to talk back or call you if needed. They are cheap enough today!

bayfire300 · Post by **bayfire300** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 6:06 pm

well i certainly didnt want this to get to an arguement i was just asking a question if it would work.......i did try the frs radios but they are weak and the signal dont go far so thats why i thought of the minitor .......but will a ham rig do the same thing via dtmf .,.trigger a minitor?
otto

oh and thanks for all the input and information i appreciate it
merry christmas and happy holidays to you all

kf4sqb · Post by **kf4sqb** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 7:12 pm

While it's possible, although I have no idea one way or the other, that you may be able to find a pager that is triggered by DTMF, the Minitor line will not. They are triggered by standard paging frequencies, which are not 'compatible' with DTMF frequency pairs. As for using a Ham rig to send paging tones, it should be fairly simple to interface a paging encoder to a 2m tranceiver.

NB2E · Post by **NB2E** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 7:26 pm

If I were going to use a maxtrac or a motorola transceiver at all for that matter to do the alerting I would probably use a minitor 3/4/5 set up for a single QCII tone say.. 313.0.. Heck I could bind that tone to one of the RATT buttons on my saber and transmit the tone from my portable setting the pager off and keying up the saber to talk... Of course you'd have to limit it to 2W output to stay legal but they removed the ERP limit so there's nothing saying you couldn't hook up an external antenna at 30+ feet altitude to get you the reach you need. The height limit for a MURS antenna is 60 Feet AGL / 20 Feet above structure.

Ric, NB2E

bayfire300 · Post by **bayfire300** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 7:50 pm

ok a minitor doesnt get trigger'd via dtmf ........then how does it?
i really have no experience w/ this ....what qcII?.......dont get me wrong i'm not stuck on the idea of the minitor........but you all have me curious now.......whether i were to use vhf ,uhf or the uhf frs bands at 2w how is it done?......what triggers or activates the pager
thanks
otto

kf4sqb · Post by **kf4sqb** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 8:12 pm

QCII stands for 'Quick Call 2', and is a paging format. Pagers such as the Minitor use a set of audio tones to detect a 'call'. The tones have to be pretty close to what the pager is 'set' to in order to be set off. I used to have a link to a lot of paging information, but I can't find it right now. Maybe someone else will pop in with it. In QCII, the tones are normally sent in the format of the first tone sent for one second, the second tone sent for three seconds. If you've ever listened to your local fire department's comms, you have probably already heard QCII tones.

wa2zdy · Post by **wa2zdy** » Sat Dec 24, 2005 2:40 am

GMRS could be used for this as long as the tone is followed by voice. Tone only is not permissible. In fact, of all the options, it sounds like the best available. 50w TPO, gain antenna as high as needed . . .

Sec. 95.181 Permissible communications.

(h) A station operator may communicate a one-way voice page to a
paging receiver. A selective calling tone or tone operated squelch may
be used in conjunction with a voice page, as prescribed in paragraph (g)
of this section. A station operator may not communicate a tone-only page
(tones communicated in order to find, summon or notify someone).