We have our node connected to a simplex radio. The radio transmits to the input of a repeater and receives on the repeater output. The current repeater/simplex setting =0. We would like to have the node send a courtesy tone to the repeater on node user unkey. I have tried various repeater/ simplex settings and all bounce back to the repeater in a continuous loop. What we need is for the repeater not to rekey the node.
1.Is this possible?
2.What settings are needed in addition to the repeater /simplex settings?
I have read the Managing Courtesy Tones document but it really does not answer this question.
Thanks to anyone who may be able to help.
Wayne
WA5LUY
Try setting rxondelay in simplusb.conf or usbradio.conf.
Did you You mean rxaudiodelay? That was the only stanza I found in simplusb.conf. That did not work. I think the repeater squelch tail and courtesy beep is longed than the allowable delay. Any way we want to hear the repeater courtesy tone over the Allstar link. I know that’s not recomended but we don’t have an extra port to set up for no tones.
Wayne
Hmm, you really DON’T want to hear your courtesy tone on the link, or at least, just about everyone else on the network doesn’t want to hear it. The reason is because the tone causes a number of timing issue from blocking other users to potentially creating a loop (if there’s two systems with the same problem). You’ve seen a local example of this yourself with the ping ponging between the repeater and the link radio. - treat that as a warning of what could happen!.
The ideal way to do it is make the AllStar node the repeater controller, but the downside is you need to be able to have Internet at the site. Second best (as you implied) is have a dedicated link, but your controller doesn’t have a second port for the link radios.
The next solution is to have your repeater transmit CTCSS only when there’s a signal on the input. This would solve both your local loop issue, as well as keeping unwanted hang time out of the network.
I’m not sold on having the courtesy tone come back from AllStar, as that can potentially block your local users from quickly breaking into a conversation between overs.
Anyway, just some thoughts on the subject.
As I said hearing courtesy tones and repeater ID is not what you want on Asllstar. However, there is no way to get around this on this repeater and node connection. The users are a small group mainly using a cell phone voip app. Because there seems to be no way to resolve the pulse back problem with the Allstar software I have developed a courtesy tone system for the connected node radio using a 566 timer which will transmit a courtesy tone on node unkey.
Easy to do as your original post.
1 turn off all telemetry and tag on the repeater.
2 set duplex to 1
This will have your simplex give you the tone you want (on the repeater but not over the network) but you will get the ping pong. It is caused by your simplex node hearing the repeater when it unkeys so…
3 set rxondelay in simple usb to a NEGATIVE number.
This tells the simplex radio to ignor the repeater being keyed for however many milliseconds you set it for but only when the node was keyed. So setting it to -50 will cause the simplex to ignor the repeater for 50milliseonds IF the node was keying the repeater not if it was a user on rf. Simply increase the number until the ping pong stops. I usually add 5 to it at that point. Mine is at -145 now. The worst that can happen is if someone hot keys the repeater (rf) side then the network will miss about 1 second of their key up.
Thank you Tony.
Thank you for your help.
That actually worked for the normal squelch tail from the repeater. However, the repeater is a remote base and when remote connections are made there are tail messages longer than the norxdelay can handle.
I have come up with a hardware solution involving one 556 timer which will be easy to incorporate. It will produce a short courtesy tone when the link radio is unkeyed. This will let folks on the repeater know when a station is coming in on Allstar.
Wayne