Location of VA3BMC

As of November 10, 2000, a GE Exec 2 repeater is operating from a 150' tower located 700 meters from Hurontario St. or Highway 401. It operates in PL mode using 123.0 Hz. Interference from Compustar is severe. The original Micor repeater is still in operation at Weston Rd. and Finch using 103.5 Hz.

A GE Exec 2 repeater package was installed in the town of Nobleton for September through October to observe it's operation in a semi-rural environment. It operated in Carrier Squelch mode. A few times a week, miswired Compustar alarms could be heard clearly, as Compustar equipped vehicles pulled through town and had to brake.

The repeater is located on a 30 floor apartment building in North West Toronto near the intersection of Weston Road and Finch Avenue. Handheld and paging coverage is easily achieved in the North West quadrant of Toronto.

The repeater equipment is Motorola Micor base, with a Power Amplifier adjusted for 60W of RF output. This passes through a C3037 multicoupler before being radiated by a Sinclair 335-2, 6 dBd omni antenna. Effective Radiated Power is 120W.

Controller is a Zetron model 48B with a 2-line telephone interconnect. The phone patch is currently private.

To access the repeater, a PL tone of 103.5 Hz must be used. Other PL tones are occasionally activated or cross-coded for experimentation.

The starting from Weston Road, and going east, the area can be characterized as dense urban, with many apartment buildings and malls mixed with single detached dwellings. The major multi-lane highway 400 passes north/south approximately 1 kilometer east of the repeater site. Going west there is a highway right of way, and parkland in the immediate vicinity.

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