Are there any IMBE frequencies in Chicago area

[Hightower]

Are there any digital APCO-25 IMBE signals (frequencies) in the Chicago area. Looking for anything from Chicago and/or Chicago south-side. I can't seem to find anything but plain old analog. Frequency range will have to be limited to 136-174 and 403-470 [470+ frequencies are welcome, just not higher than 480 ].

Would like to at least use the RX IMBE, ever since my only IMBE friend moved, I have no one to talk digital anymore. Still have many analog friends though.


Thanks in advance for any input

Stay safe Batlab folks!

[ASTROMODAT]

The Chicago Motorola Amateur Radio Club (MARC) operates an excellent wide area coverage Quantar, running P25 IMBE. It's programmed for ASTRO Squelch, and it's a 440 Mhz machine. I've got the freqs (and PL, in case you run analog FM) somewhere in my office, if you need them. The Chicago 440 MHz MARC machine works extremely well, and you can get OUTSTANDING help if you check into their machine. These particular Hams are EEs at Motorola Schaumburg, and they live and breathe Quantar, since it's their daytime job. Most of these guys are in the Schaumburg Base Station Group, plus some of them work in the Motorola SP Base Products Group. These latter folks see all sorts of way KEWL stuff, too!

The MARCs in Dallas/Ft Worth and Ft Lauderdale also have fine Quantar IMBE machines, and they are also operating on the 440 Mhz Ham band. I bellieve that the Dalls/Ft Worht Motorola Hams operate both UHF and VHF IMBE Quantars. QST had a recent write-up discussing the Motorola Ham Dallas/Ft Worth Quantars.

There are also IMBE Quantars operating on the UHF Ham 440 MHz band in Denver and Seattle.

There are several IMBE Quantar Ham UHF repeaters in the NJ area, as well.

There's a pretty good internet site that lists all of these Ham IMBE Quantars, and it gives all sorts of details of the involved Ham clubs that operate them. There are a few Ham VHF Quantars running IMBE, but by far and away, most of these machines are operating in the Ham 440 MHz UHF band.

Good Hunting! (I assume you are a Ham, since you mentioned that you are talking to others, etc.)

Larry

[willbartlett]

What's the webpage detailing the IMBE active ham clubs?

Will

[ASTROMODAT]

I don't recall the URL off-hand (I didn't bookmark it-darn!). I seem to recall that it was fairly easy to find. I did a Yahoo search with "Ham+APCO25+IMBE+repeater," or something similar to that.

Good Luck!

Larry

[Cipher77]

There is also a UHF apco machine in Schaumberg on 442.900 (FishFar) it is a stand-alone machine that is on the same talkout as the analog system in the same location (multi UHF/VHF talkout linked system for nothern IL, S.E. Wisc. & N.W. IN). It is up for testing purposes right now but does work really good. Another is CatFar in Northbrook on 443.150 both analog & APCO. works REALLY good as well as IRLP. I really don't know that they will have portable coverage on the south side (Mobile coverage - probable).

[Hightower]

I often wondered about the repeater in Schaumburg IL. I figured it was run by the Motorola folks - being in Schaumburg, and registered in the AARL directory by Motorola. When i'm up in the area, I will try hitting it with the AS3. Yes, I do have my ticket.

How about any public service or commercial APCO25 repeaters in the chicago area? I find it hard to believe that in a huge city like Chicago, there are so few APCO25 (IMBE or VSLEP) systems. I mean, come on, its /\/\otorola country around here and no digital??

I show 443.725 for the Schaumburg system, so I should set my digital squelch for CSQ. Right? and C4FM for the modulation type?

Thanks guys

[batdude]

from what i understand - there is ZIPPO ZERO NADA squelch tail when u key up an IMBE machine...

so don't evpect to hear any tail at all when u key their machine up



doug

[ASTROMODAT]

batdude, you are correct. That's why I posted here some time back about this issue and how to get RSSI working on a conventional XTS 3000, so you could get around the no hang time issue. So far, everyone says No, if you are conventional.

[apco25]

current apco systems are as follows

Midway Airport T-band trunked 9600 baud control channel.

Northwest Central Dispatch 800 Trunked on 1 analog and 1 digital 9600 baud system

That's it.

Other than conventional apco25 CAI on fed freqs.

We have 3 EDACS systems and bunch of Type II smartnet systems around, Cook county sheriff is a building a Smartzone system on 800.
Schaumgburg is supposed to be upgraded to digital at some point from their anolog type II.

Illinois State Police is trying to builda statewide vehicle only coverage system like Michgan did with in car mobile repeaters. They aren't even beyond the conceptual stage yet. They're calling it StarCom 21. I don't expect them to be done in less than 10 years. System will be 98 % mobile only coverage outside of Chicago.

We're drowning in T-Band police systems. Tons of it here. Fire is about 98% on VHF high band.

[hvacesu78]

If anyone can post/advise of that web site indicating APCO ham repeaters in the NY Metro Area that would be great.

Cool Stuff !

i will continue the hunt as well.

thank you !
John

[ASTROMODAT]

NJ Ham UHF Conventional ASTRO Quantar IMBE CAI repeater Output Frequencies (INPUTs are both +5 MHz offset, of course):

1) 443.450 MHz (ASTRO ID default of 293), and

2) 443.750 MHz (ASTRO ID default of 293)

Don't forget that there's no hang time on ASTRO repeaters, so you won't know if you are making the machines.

Don't know where you are located in NY, so I can't say if you will make it in.

Larry

[jnglmassiv]

FishFar, Schaum MARC and the "CatFar" repeaters are all that I'm familiar with in the Chicago area as far as ham stuff goes. This was recently (1/1) confirmed to me by someone I was speaking to on the Northbrook system who seemed familiar with the systems.

Not that 3 astro ham repeaters is anything to sneeze at, even in a city the size of Chicago. Southern coverage does seem a bit lacking, however.

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