[aprssig] VA and Freq pieves....

[Bob Bruninga]

> This is one of the biggest problems I have with 
> the many Kenwood rigs floating around our area.  

That is the "proximity Alert" function of Voice Alert.  When you hear one of those packets it alerts you to the fact that someone is in simplex range AND is listening with CTCSS 100 for a voice call.  Its like an automatic VA CQ.  This way even in passing at a mutual 140 MPH on the highway and only being in rnage for 5 minutes, you will become aware of each others presence.  WIthout the PL encode on packets, VA would be no better than 146.52 for finding contacts where you have to make a voiec CQ evrey 5 minutes if you hope to find someone coming the other way.

FRUSTRATION #1. Now if they are pinging VA packets but are not listening, then you really do have an issue.  Nothing worse than them pinging Voice Alert and not listening. Fuss at them. 

What they did ws turn down the VOLUME on their APRS channel.  But they should never do that!  Here is how to operate APRS and ALWAYS be listening for VA (if you are TXing VA). We recommend not using the built-in VA alert function all.  The way to do it as to set up 4 APRS channels with the names as shown here:

144.39 no tones  "APRS raw"
144.39 CTCSS 100 "APRS VA"
144.39 CTCSS xxx "APRS mute"
144.39 +600      "APRS aux"

Then you can ALWAYS LEAVE THE VOLUME TURNED UP on the APRS channel.  And  you can easily switch between all of the above options with just a simple change of the channel.

I operate APRS VA 99% of the time, the power-up APRS channel.  I switch to APRS RAW if I want to actually hear the traffic load for troubleshooting.  I switch to APRS MUTE if there are a lot of Voice Alert locals in range and I do not want to hear them for a while.  Notice that the volume still remains up, but since you have your own private CTCSS XXX, then you wont hear anyone, and  they will not hear your PL XXX packets.  This is EQUIVALENT to turning off the speaker, but you can still be contacted with CTCSS XXX by those who know you. 

The APRS AUX is for special events where there is a local APRS digipeater with an AUX input on 144.99 to give better reliability to hearing participatnts using +600.

This is all detailed (I think) near the top of APRS.ORG.

ISSUES #2.  NO FREQ DATA!

I see 3 out of 4 D710's and FTM350's without any frequency in their packets.  Therefore I have a few PRE-STORED MESSAGE phrases:

1) I don't see your Voice freq in your packets?
2) On D710, set FREQ in your STATUS #5

When I have a few minutes, I scan the STATION LIST and every D710 or FTM350 without a freq, I try to send them a message.

STUMP-OFF!

Bob, WB4APR