Astro Spectra VHF newbie guidance

[k9wkjham]

Good day all!
i found this lovely rig in the bottom of a bin of cables and such i got from a auction locally
i did some reasearch and lots of reading
and was able to hack at the control head to make it a front unit so i could use the power switch to power it up
as it seems this was from a ambulance or fire truck with dual heads and the interconnect cable didnt have the ignition power wires on it

i made up a Google collection that shows all the data i have on the rig
just asking for a bit of guidance
i know these are farily common radios so im sure one of you fine folks can point me down the right path
here is the link to the collection https://plus.google.com/u/0/collection/MbWpFB there are plenty of pix and commentary

thank you so much for the great forum!

de k9wkj

[jmr061]

What are your specific questions? You have an analog 146-174 VHF W9 110 watt radio. It will go down to 144.

[k9wkjham]

well looking for confirmation on what rib,software and such
the notes that i put in the collection gives a bunch of info

de k9wkj

[k9wkjham]

read the radio
and have started messing with the codeplug
why is it so hard to work with?
i exported a personality in .csv format
and brought it into google sheets
its all there and i can work with it
but ohhhhh myyy what a bunch of typing to create a amateur personality or 2
and yes i backed up the original codeplug in several places.....

[tuckerm]

Why is it hard? Because it's a public safety radio and not a Yaesu?

[jackhackett]

why is it so hard to work with?

It's not.
I'm not sure why you would export it to google sheets instead of doing it in CPS. Seems like unneeded obfuscation.

Setting up a couple of personalities should be easy, create a conventional personality, enter frequencies and PL codes, go to zone channel assignment and assign the personality to a zone. Adding a conventional channel to an Astro Spectra only takes a couple of minutes. Beyond that you might need to tweak some of the settings from defaults, and set up scan lists, but there's nothing really hard to do.

Is there something specific that's giving you trouble?

Also, it's better to post the information on your setup here instead of linking to it on google, that way it stays with the post even if the google doc goes away, and people don't have to open a link to get the info they need to help you.

[k9wkjham]

i should restate my comment
it isnt hard its tedious

it would be swell to copy and paste a list into cps
but you have to type every darn thing in

thats okay ill have all 255 personalities filled up soon
i was able to whittle down the public service channels in it
as many were just the same receive freq with different split or tone
so i saved over 20 personalities that way
then ill move to the scan lists
im not sure about zones it seems that there maybe some feature that isnt tuned on or in the radio or im just a dullard
this is just a conventional radio
maybe im missing something

now i need to find a key for the tray lock
it isnt on the tray so at least i can mount it without the key

thanks for the encouragement
and ill keep you posted

ohh today i ran across a CM200 45 watt K split 4 channel ( i know silly radio ) but it was almost free
and after i clean it up, it looks new!
and i have it talking to the computer now to get it to take a freq below 146mhz......

[rainbowpenguin]

The tray lock will use the common Motorola 2135 key

[motorola_otaku]

I assume you're using Windows CPS and not DOS RSS, so... build your first conventional personality how you want it and select "Current" instead of "Default" when adding additional personalities. That will copy the settings from the first to all of the new personalities, requiring only minor tweaks.

[k9wkjham]

select "Current" instead of "Default" when adding additional personalities

it took me a bit to find that out
but a great tip
one of the things that really causes issues for newbs is
the Zone channel assignment window
dont delete single zone channels with the lower set of controls!!!! poof the whole zone is gone
use the upper set its safer up there!