Radio transmissions

On my scanner I can pick up JCC, Queens, Lead and Valley towers. I've never heard Nassau or Divide. Is it my indoor antenna or are they on another frequency?

even with outdoor antenna's the reach of a VHF transmission is basically line of sight or about 6 to 8 mile radius, give or take .

BobLI, all the facilities you mentioned (except Divide) are on LIRR channel-1, 160.380. Divide Tower operates on channel-3, 161.265. VHF transmissions from a good transmitter will actually go a lot further than Dutch stated. From my house in Central Nassau County, with only an indoor telescoping antenna on my scanner I can hear Queens, Valley and Nassau Towers. Also can hear NYC Fire Dept's transmitters from Queens and Brooklyn which are also VHF and UHF. And with a roof antenna, you can hear even greater distances clearly. Nassau Tower I've noted has a very weak transmitter. So only a few miles from my house it comes in very low. That's probably why you don't hear it.

Depends on your location really - i have heard complaints of dead spots in areas like suffolk county

I am in southern/central nassau and i usually pick up the dispatch towers fairly well even with a indoor antenna - but sometimes if its a distant train transmitting i dont always pick up the train side of the convo

Also be advised that the LIRR radio system is a simplex operation so that means it is a single frequency that both the trains and dispatch transmit on so therefore unless you are fairly close to a railroad station then you may not hear much - but you generally should be able to hear dispatch if nothing else...

160.380 is the main channel so on this frequency you should hear basically any tower except for divide
161.265 is divide tower
161.445 is Jamaica/"204" aka the movement bureau - trains call on this channel any time theres a mechanical problem,etc
161.535 is train mobile radios/unit to unit so you would hear engineers talking to conductors, etc

All the channels use a PL tone of 151.4 as far as i know - however sometimes i have noticed no tone being transmitted by either both the dispatch and the train and i think that may be due to if its a busy day or whatever to therefore possibly decrease feedback/interference...

LIRR has an odd set-up with PL tones. The mobile units (trains) DO transmit PL tone. But base stations such as 204 do not xmit PL tone. Not sure if the towers transmit it; I'd have to check on that. So if you are listening to 204 on channel-2, do not enter the PL or you'll only hear the trains and not the dispatchers.

The MTA Police use another odd set-up. The base station transmits a different PL tone than the mobiles (cars). So best bet is not to enter the PL, or enter the freq. twice, using each of the 2 PL tones.

From my observations the LIRR channels do use a tone(most commonly 151.4) maybe not all of the time but definitely some of the time - as a matter of fact to add to the confusion there may even be multiple tones used at times (114.8 as well as 118.8 i think)
The only LIRR freq. that i havent seen a tone on is 161.385 and i dont even know who or what that freq is used for - i have seen it in databases as "maintenance" but according to my notes it dosent seem like such...

But i think its safe to say that you can generally run LIRR frequencies with no tone in your radios because remember that something like squelch tone is technically a type of data that the radio has to decode therefore if its a low powered/distant radio transmitting then your radio may or may not decode the tone - whether or not the transmit radio is actually running a tone...

Trains and MTA Police cars transmit PL tone 151.4. MTA PD base transmits 114.8. It's continuous, not some of the time as has been suggested above. If the signal is such low strength that your scanner can't decode it, it's probably going to be unreadable anyway. But I've found at least in central Nassau, you generally don't need to put in the PL tones for LIRR freq's as there is little or no interference from other agencies or spurious signals on their freq's.

Nassau does seem to have the occasional radio issue with trains. I have run "relay" between a train and Nassau a few times. I got a good radio! In the towers, our radios don't pick up the other towers UNLESS the operator hits the "monitor" button. After one transmits, one would have to re-key the monitor button again. I do this so I know when the channel is clear enough to talk to my guys at Hempstead. By the way, what does "banana" stand for(Just been reading the last few 3rd track posts.)?

Rob

One of the reasons why there seems to be some dead spots is due to the fact that the LIRR radio system is a full simplex system
Simplex systems run off of "links" as opposed to repeaters
So for example - if i am a train coming thru Valley stream and there is a link in said location and i am transmitting then anyone in "x radius" of Valley stream should hear me loud and clear - because i activated the link
But if i am transmitting way on the east end in say Brentwood - then you probobly wouldnt hear me in much of Nassau - unless you have a efficient/outside antenna mounted up high
I suppose this type of setup does limit interference/feedback in a sense
I would imagine most railroads operate in a simplex type setup - because repeater input for 160mhz would be around 165 or 166mhz which is federal govt. range exclusively for use by the FBI,etc...

Also the LIRR recently updated a bunch of their FCC licenses
Looks like they pretty much just deleted the old non-narrowband part of the license which i guess is a step towards the Nexedge standard - then again who knows if and when that will happen...

Blockhead98 wrote:Nassau does seem to have the occasional radio issue with trains. I have run "relay" between a train and Nassau a few times. I got a good radio! In the towers, our radios don't pick up the other towers UNLESS the operator hits the "monitor" button. After one transmits, one would have to re-key the monitor button again. I do this so I know when the channel is clear enough to talk to my guys at Hempstead. By the way, what does "banana" stand for(Just been reading the last few 3rd track posts.)?

Rob

Banana --> Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NIMBY#BANANA" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Thanks!

FYI I downloaded an app on my Samsung called Scanner Radio. It picks up frequencies in Babylon Area and MTAPD. I enjoy hearing the in/out communications between Bab Yard and Engineers. Also regarding trespassers and GN's...

^ You are probobly hearing the LIRR feed from Broadcastify

Its pretty decent quality - whoever is hosting that is in the area of Babylon i belive...

Speaking of Babylon- there is a frequency that i have been trying to track for a while but i havent heard anything to do with the MTA/LIRR on it
160.830 callsign KWH448 - it comes back to the Babylon Yard and it is also used by New Jersey Transit so i had to lock out the tone for NJT but now all i am hearing is spanish speaking?
It may just be used for low powered radios for operations within the babylon yard so i may not be in range to pick anything up - but if anyone has any input on this i would appreciate it...