ATCS Monitoring - BNSF Seligman - Scheduled Downtime (11/10/2018)

[Jeff]

On 11/10/2018, Christina and I will be going out to Parks and Flagstaff for some maintenance on the ATCS sites.  Below is the tentative plan:

Downtime: 4:00pm - 7:00pm Estimated

1) Flagstaff Area - Test out different antennas and radios to see which give us the best signal out there with BCP Signals planned.
2) Parks Area - Swapping the PC to higher performance to handle SDR Integration for use with the BCP Signals or Install Radio to Get the BCP Signals.

This post will be updated as we progress through the sites:
https://www.railfanaz.com/index.php?topic=4419.0

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[Jeff]

Just got back to Mesa.  Flagstaff is looking better on reception of the data.  BCPs are coming in clear.  Still working on the MCP signal.

[Jeff]

Christina and I did the following tests.  Walked around the area for 2 hours at different spots of the host site.  Christina mentioned by her observation lets try the fence which is about 20 feet SW of the house and original location of the antenna.  Using NO Pre-AMP, just the antenna and the laptop, we were picking up Flag W to Winslow E MCP indications (Not Controls).  There were only a couple of dead spots but looked better.  I placed the laptop on the ground and let is sit for 1 hour to test it.  Error rate was down to 20% and most of the MCPs were coming in pretty good, better than on the roof.

Checked the PC and Swapped the SDR with two Pro97s (MCP and BCP) radios.  Still not seeing anything.

We moved the main antenna at that spot close as possible (cable to short at the moment, the host is going to see if he can get more cable slack).

More to come as we work on this site a little more closely.