radio frequency types

chrismartin1701

chrismartin1701

Senior Member
Member
Aug 1, 2011
608
Ballston Spa NY USA
(wasnt sure where to put this)


im curious as to what other types of radio frequencies are out there. my county uses low and high band frequencies and narrow band on the Ambulances for hospital communications. from what i have been told, low band is big time outdated. im curious as to what other states/countries use instead.
 
chrismartin1701 said:
(wasnt sure where to put this)

im curious as to what other types of radio frequencies are out there. my county uses low and high band frequencies and narrow band on the Ambulances for hospital communications. from what i have been told, low band is big time outdated. im curious as to what other states/countries use instead.
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Narrowband would apply to all high band VHF and UHF, except the T-Band which very few PS agencies use anyway outside of some large metro areas. You can't think of narrowband as being different now. Only low band was not included in the narrowband mandate.


Many parts of the US are using 800 Mhz or UHF, too.


We haven't even touched on digital, trunking, mototrbo, and lots more newer technologies beyond conventional analog.
 
Jarred J. said:
you couldnt have searched for this?

http://elightbars.org/forums/f23/what-radios-do-you-use-42127/


there are 4 types of frequencies public safety agencies can use...


vhf low


vhf high


uhf


and miocrowave (700-900)
Click to expand...

because im tired and didnt feel like looking around. :D


honestly i had very little indication to knowing what types there were. i only knew of high, low and narrow band and i only heard of narrow band recently when the radio in our ambulances were being switched from high band to narrow band for hospital communications. what are microwave frequencies used for typically?
 
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Jarred J. said:
you couldnt have searched for this?

http://elightbars.org/forums/f23/what-radios-do-you-use-42127/


there are 4 types of frequencies public safety agencies can use...


vhf low


vhf high


uhf


and miocrowave (700-900)
Click to expand...
If you'd read the thread, you'd see it's actually geared more towards types of radios, as opposed to frequency types. There's nothing wrong with a good, solid reference thread.

chrismartin1701 said:
because im tired and didnt feel like looking around. :D
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That reply is completely selfish, and rather stupid. Because you were tired, the board members should have to take the time to answer you, report the thread, making the Mod team have to delete/move this thread? Take the extra 30 seconds and consider the rest of the world.


Back on topic: As Jarred was saying, there are 4 major types of frequencies you'll encounter:


VHF Low (I'm not sure where that is exactly on the spectrum, but it's usually two digits, i.e., XX.xxx)


VHF High (From 136-220)


UHF (400-470)


UHF High (470-527)


800 Mhz (Not sure where this is on the spectrum as well)


Those that are more qualified will belong along shortly to help.
 
chrismartin1701 said:
because im tired and didnt feel like looking around. :D

honestly i had very little indication to knowing what types there were. i only knew of high, low and narrow band and i only heard of narrow band recently when the radio in our ambulances were being switched from high band to narrow band for hospital communications. what are microwave frequencies used for typically?
Click to expand...

Narrow ban is a not a type of frequency, it's a lesser frequency, so to speak. Instead of using 136.000, now you're getting additional frequencies like 136.005 (An example, I didn't do the math).
 
narrowbanding is not a frequencies. its limiting the radios ability to use only a cetain amount of a particular frequency


VHF/UHF Narrowbanding FAQs


What is the purpose of Narrowbanding?





Currently, the majority of UHF and VHF LMR licensees operate using 25 kHz efficiency technology. However, the UHF and VHF frequency bands are congested with limited spectrum available for system expansion or implementation of new systems. The migration to 12.5 kHz efficiency technology will require licensees to operate more efficiently, either on narrower channel bandwidths or increased voice paths on existing channels. This will allow creation of additional channels within the same spectrum, thereby supporting more users.


just a heads up.. 6.75 steping is on the way next.
 
Jarred J. said:
narrowbanding is not a frequencies. its limiting the radios ability to use only a cetain amount of a particular frequency
Click to expand...
That's kinda what I tried to say, but keeping it real simple. Let me try again:


Narrowband is not a separate frequency range. VHF high and UHF were subject to narrowbanding to decrease each channel's footprint. Each one uses a narrower piece of the spectrum. All VHF is now narrowband for the purposes of this discussion, and to follow the KISS principle. (I know there are exceptions, but for public safety purposes, we'll keep it simple and understandable.
 
Jarred J. said:
and miocrowave (700-900)
Click to expand...

While 700-900 MHz might be considered microwave in the broadest technical sense, most RF folks don't refer to it that way. They consider microwave to start at around 1 GHz, and just call 700-900 MHz UHF as well.
 
understandable but amateur radio operators (me) call it microwave cause thats what the fcc tells us to do... :D
 
EMT-BLS said:
That reply is completely selfish, and rather stupid. Because you were tired, the board members should have to take the time to answer you, report the thread, making the Mod team have to delete/move this thread? Take the extra 30 seconds and consider the rest of the world.
Click to expand...

i was actually joking around Abe. i actually didnt think to do a search. so mybad :duh: :bonk:
 
Jarred J. said:
understandable but amateur radio operators (me) call it microwave cause thats what the fcc tells us to do... :D
Click to expand...

Odd, I'm a Ham as well, and have never heard that said. Here on the Band Plan in the side-bar of this page they appear to show they define a lower limit at 930 MHz:FCC on Microwave


Of course, this is all just nit-picking.
 
in delaware county pa we use lowband for dispatch we also have a uht t band 500mhz dispatch channel we use 500 mhz for all other police and fire operations except ert and the sheriffs who have some 460 mhz channels we also have a vhf channel for the digital alaphnumeric paging system.
 
we use lowband to talk with 911 dispatch and highband to talk "truck to truck" with our agency as well as a few others and LifeNet. (medi-vac service)
 
ful-vue said:
While 700-900 MHz might be considered microwave in the broadest technical sense, most RF folks don't refer to it that way. They consider microwave to start at around 1 GHz, and just call 700-900 MHz UHF as well.
Click to expand...

True. In REAL land mobile radio (not HAM), microwave would best be exampled by the 6000 to 11000mhz microwave ring I was working on recently.


Typically, microwave is used for the transmission of data from tower site to tower site, at least in regards to public safety. The 7-site 13-channel P25 800mhz IP simulcast I'm building right now uses IP over microwave to transmit system data from site to site. The 5-site VHF simulcast system we recently built does the same thing.
 
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Ben E. said:
True. In REAL land mobile radio (not HAM), microwave would best be exampled by the 6000 to 11000mhz microwave ring I was working on recently.

Typically, microwave is used for the transmission of data from tower site to tower site, at least in regards to public safety. The 7-site 13-channel P25 800mhz IP simulcast I'm building right now uses IP over microwave to transmit system data from site to site. The 5-site VHF simulcast system we recently built does the same thing.
Click to expand...

Sounds like something we have here.
 
I explain narrowband to fire types as this.


You have been using radio voice traffic on 5" supply line for years and now the FCC wants you to only use 2.5" hand line


Voice quality and range is your water and you are losing both in the end.


:)
 
MARSMAN said:
Wow!.....I am going to keep my mouth shut on this one! :bonk:
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Yeah, that makes sense. Posting a post about how you aren't going to post. :rolleyes:

wkr518 said:
I explain narrowband to fire types as this.
You have been using radio voice traffic on 5" supply line for years and now the FCC wants you to only use 2.5" hand line


Voice quality and range is your water and you are losing both in the end.


:)
Click to expand...
So for EMS, would you say that you used to have a 4x4 gauze, and now you only have a 2x4 gauze? :D
 
800 MHz P25 trunked with 700 coming soon (MPSCS), and VHF-High in most of my state...a few municipalities still run UHF 450-470, but not many left that I know of.


VHF-Low is virtually non-existent.
 
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Trunking systems have proven to not be very reliable here in the mountains of Colorado. UHF and VHF for most of the mountain communities and rural areas.
 
I need to remind Jared J. and others that even more frequency bands are in use for public safety. What they have addressed are the common two-way radio systems frequencies.


There are data bands that are used for wifi-type communications that are exclusively for public safety in 4 Gigahertz and shared licensed wifi in the 2.4 Gig range. Law enforcement agencies in northwest Tennessee have used the licensed 2.4 GHz system to do vehicle license and driver license checks instead of 700/800 MHz systems. Also, some discrete frequencies are used for video surveillance, such as remote traffic monitoring.
 
Jarred J. said:
understandable but amateur radio operators (me) call it microwave cause thats what the fcc tells us to
do... :D
Click to expand...

Ummmm, not in the 26+ years I have been licensed. Microwave doesn't start until 2.4 GHz (when dishes start to get used). 900 MHz amateur has no provision for microwave, 1.2 GHz has a limited following for microwave, but it gets serious at 2.4 GHz.
 
ITU radio band frequency ranges


Extremely low frequency : 3 Hz – 30 Hz.


Super low frequency : 30 Hz – 300 Hz


Ultra low frequency : 300 Hz – 3 KHz


Very low frequency : 3 KHz – 30 KHz


Low frequency : 30 KHz – 300 KHz


Medium frequency : 300 KHz – 3 MHz


High frequency : 3 MHz – 30 MHz


Very high frequency : 30 MHz – 300 MHz


Ultra high frequency : 300 MHz – 3 GHz


aka "microwave"


Super high frequency : 3 GHz – 30 GHz


Extremely high frequency : 30 GHz – 300 GHz


so your saying you dont have alot of 1296'ers in yoru area?


my elmer has every band capable except spark gap... you know since its illegal and all... :D
 
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