RFS Cash injection

[centralcoastscanman]

The Safer neighbourhood stuff was supposed to be rolled out last fire season when i was a member at Gosford RFS.... They had all these memo's come out saying it had to be done within 6 months...

I definately agree the only reason this stuff is being re-visited is because of the election next year...

I'm looking forward to any cash injection into the GRN as that means less excuses for my work to not move over to it, as it currently stands they are running out of excuses fast but still keep on coming up with em...

[centralcoastscanman]

Exactly.. Keneally is clutching at straws now..

Only problem is it is 100 million of our straws!

I don't begrudge any department the money, but one question arises, why are they doing it now and not earlier? No doubt some spin doctor will have an answer for that.

R

The more $$ on the GRN and blackspots the more incentive there is for the official push to move nswpol over to the GRN and stop spending the millions on multiple networks. Any paging can go through the GRN along with all other comms. just a waste of cash. Once the police shift over, there will be plenty of currently wasted cash to spend on the real needs of emerg services/rfs/ses etc

Berry,

please enlighten me as to how paging can go across the grn... as its a darn good idea

My employer would have to be the biggest user of paging in the entire state i'd imagine from a government level i'd imagine

[citabria]

APCO Packet Data. From monitoring GPT P25 site I can see someone/thing is already using it.

[astro_boy]

all services in SA use the SA GRN for their paging.
Might want to look that up.

[centralcoastscanman]

ok cool thanks guys I certainy will do...

[rustynswrail]

all services in SA use the SA GRN for their paging.
Might want to look that up.

I think the SAGRN paging network is a separate system, just administered by their GRN. It has been a while since I had to do with SA, so things may have changed.

R

PS: This is from the SAGRN site

SAGRN PAGING
148.8125 - FLEX 1600
R

[Bigfella237]

Yep, Rusty is spot on, it's a stand-alone paging network that is administered by the same dept that runs the SAGRN, the pages don't actually go out over the 4.1 network (they haven't upgraded to P25 yet).

But as citabria says, there's no reason it can't be incorporated into the GRN, it just means replacing all VHF pagers with APCO25 UHF pagers, but it would also mean you would virtually have to have one base on each site 100% dedicated to paging as all sites would have to have the paging TG active all the time (because pagers can't affiliate with the site), that would place a significant load on sites with not enough bases to begin with?

In the end it's all a pipe-dream anyway, if I know anything what-so-ever about the RFS, the money will never trickle down to where it's needed anyway! The tree is WAY too top heavy!

Andrew

[BerryV]

APCO Packet Data. From monitoring GPT P25 site I can see someone/thing is already using it.

Ive got the same results. I can see plenty of data about in my logs.

If only groups had one vision or the govt show real leadership. Cut the waste and have one network for all govt!

E.g Coles and Woolworths have one buyer for a product regardless of what division it is sold in. one set of business trading terms that attract the same discount for all product purchased. Why the govt(fed and state) does not have the same thing is crazy.

[ivahri]

Exactly.. Keneally is clutching at straws now..

Only problem is it is 100 million of our straws!

I don't begrudge any department the money, but one question arises, why are they doing it now and not earlier? No doubt some spin doctor will have an answer for that.

R

The more $$ on the GRN and blackspots the more incentive there is for the official push to move nswpol over to the GRN and stop spending the millions on multiple networks. Any paging can go through the GRN along with all other comms. just a waste of cash. Once the police shift over, there will be plenty of currently wasted cash to spend on the real needs of emerg services/rfs/ses etc

Paging via the GRN? I don't think so... 400MHz for pagers is an awful idea- even if it was something that anyone would consider. I've come from an voice-paging overlay background & it is not something I ever want to see again- only the silly Yanks stick to their awful lowband junk. 148MHz using properly engineered paging networks (which rules out the RFS doing it) is the only way to go. No UHF network will ever offer in-house coverage to every RFS volo throughout NSW to a level sufficient for a pager (which have a tenny bit of PCB as an antenna) to decode. It is all very nice to be focussed on the efficiency of a single network but your idea of what is possible from an RF coverage perspective is pure fantasy.

But the waste sickens me... all agencies are impacted by the 400MHz rebanding by ACMA but only one is getting megafunding. The rest of us will pick up the scraps. I could say more but I'll get myself in the poo. The politics of this sickens me but hey I never voted for the idiots anyway. I'm sure there will be RFS guys handing out ALP how-to-votes for this pork barrel on election day.

Cheers,


Richard

[ivahri]

Hi Andrew,

What P25 pagers? APCO25 is not designed for paging, it is designed for voice. I just googled and came up with nothing... Even if the standard was expanded to support such a feature which company today manufactures a pager that uses P25? In the US the commonly used analog (using the normal voice channel- hence called "overlay") uses a two-tone paging standard. Those tones will not work via a digital network. In Australia the standard normally used is POCSAG- again it will not work via P25.

RFS paging should either be commercialised (but given the state of the paging industry who is to say when that might get switched off) or upgraded using 148MHz, same frequency as now, but with new & hopefully improved hardware & design.

Cheers,

Richard