CARLA - Technical 13

C.A.R.L.A. System 13 Technical Notes and Tidbits

Planning a trip to the Shasta Lake area? Carla 13 will keep you company on I-5 and I-99 through Shasta County as well as down on the lake itself.

Technical Data for System 13

Repeater Type: Motorola MSF-5000

Controller: SCom

TX Power: 50W

Main Ant Type: Diamond X-300 Omni

Main Ant Gain: 7dB

Link Ant Type: Y4066 Yagi

Link Ant Gain: 10.2dB

Local PL: Yes

How the Local PL Works

This particular repeater in the CARLA system has a dual PL. If you use the 'link' PL, your audio is carried over the entire CARLA system of repeaters and you will be able to hear the audio from any and all other repeaters in the CARLA system. If you wish to have a local QSO on the repeater just use the 'local' PL. Your audio will come out only on the local system and you will not hear link audio coming from other repeaters in the system. When you finish your 'local' QSO, the link will re-establish itself several seconds later. A couple of things to keep in mind:
1) If you pause for an extended time during your local QSO the link audio may come back. Just key the local PL to mute incoming link traffic and continue your local QSO.

2) Remember, if there is a QSO in progress elsewhere on the CARLA system you will not interfere with it if you hold a QSO on the repeater while using the 'local' PL.

3) If you want link audio to come back right away just kerchunk the 'link' PL.

4) There is a different courtesy tone for local traffic and incoming link traffic so you'll be able to distinguish from which direction the audio traffic is originating.

If you want a more in-depth explanation of the dual PL scheme complete with graphics, download the Dual PL pdf file.

CARLA 13 Coverage Map

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