CTCSS/DCS tones on different brands of radios

[Lambing]

I have a pair of Midland GXT 1000 radios and a Radioddity GM-30. They can communicate on channels 1-22 if I do not use a CTCSS or DCS tone.

If I enter either a CTCSS or DCS tone, the 2 Midlands can communicate, but not the GM-30. I am using the CTCSS and DCS charts in the GM-30 manual, so the frequencies should be correct.

Any idea what I am doing wrong?

 

[tweiss3]

The midlands are narrowband (11k vs wideband 20k), you need to turn the GM-30 to narrowband.

[Lambing]

46 minutes ago, tweiss3 said:

The midlands are narrowband (11k vs wideband 20k), you need to turn the GM-30 to narrowband.

Thank you - that solved half the problem. When the Midland transmits, I can receive on the Radioddity.

But the Midland does not hear the Radioddity.

[BKmetzWRKZ843]

I have a couple of Motorola bubble-pack Talk-Abouts that I bought back in 2009 for a road trip. Back then I didn't know what FRS and GMRS was. After the road trip the radios were put away and forgotten. I found them, looked up the manual online, and relearned the menus. The radios have 99 privacy tones. OK, so what are the tones? I googled around and found this table, easy enough. The Talk-Abouts are on channel 5 using tone 12, which translates to CTCSS 100.0. So now all my GMRS radios can talk to each other.

I hope this helps someone.

[pcradio]

On 9/24/2021 at 1:40 PM, Lambing said:

When the Midland transmits, I can receive on the Radioddity. But the Midland does not hear the Radioddity.

The Midland is setup to only hear a privacy tone. You'll need to set it to 0, or match it on the GM-30.

[WRXS236]

Great info here on an old topic but can we please stop calling them "Privacy codes" as that is really misleading and do nothing to make your conversations private. They are filter codes as they filter out other transmissions without the code.

[nokones]

Are you aware that the CTCSS and DCS tones for the Radioddity radios are programmed using the actual tone/codes i.e. 192.8 Hz & 445; and Midland radio uses a programming code such as CTCSS 31 for 192.8 Hz and DCS 57 for 445 as depicted in the Midland User Manual? When programming the Midland you need to make sure that you are programming in the appropriate CTCSS or DCS mode.

[marcspaz]

4 hours ago, WRXS236 said:

can we please stop calling them "Privacy codes"

 

No. Absolutely not. The inventor (Motorola) named the technology Private Line, aka privacy codes. It was done to provide the operators privacy, meaning a lack of interruption from unwanted signals. Its the same concept as a privacy sign at a home or a hotel... privacy and it's literal term means to be left alone. A lot of people misunderstand the definition of privacy, confusing it with secrecy.

[WRTC928]

10 hours ago, marcspaz said:

 

No. Absolutely not. The inventor (Motorola) named the technology Private Line, aka privacy codes. It was done to provide the operators privacy, meaning a lack of interruption from unwanted signals. Its the same concept as a privacy sign at a home or a hotel... privacy and it's literal term means to be left alone. A lot of people misunderstand the definition of privacy, confusing it with secrecy.

Well stated.

[kirk5056]

I think the term "private line" was coined at the same time that US telephone customers were switching from "party lines" (line shared by many households) to "private line" phones.  So, at the time, "private line" was a term understood by most people.  As time has pasted the general definition of "private" has evolved.  I don't think anyone was trying fool anyone with the term "private".  Old labels for new times are hard to change.

I prefer to use the term "PL filter" to make it more accurate AND to avoid using longer terms like CTCSS/DCS.

[WRUU653]

I think of it like a private party across the street or a private pool at a hotel, sure you can see and hear what’s happening but if you don’t have an invitation or the code for the gate you’re not part of it. 

[SteveShannon]

1 hour ago, WRUU653 said:

I think of it like a private party across the street or a private pool at a hotel, sure you can see and hear what’s happening but if you don’t have an invitation or the code for the gate you’re not part of it. 

Exactly!

[WRTC928]

1 hour ago, WRUU653 said:

I think of it like a private party across the street or a private pool at a hotel, sure you can see and hear what’s happening but if you don’t have an invitation or the code for the gate you’re not part of it. 

It's like the "Do Not Disturb" sign on your hotel room door. It won't keep people from knowing you're in there or hearing you having noisy s*x, but hopefully it will keep them from interrupting you. 

[WRXS236]

This  is a huge misuse of the terminology here and especially if you have to "think of it a certain way" then you are ignoring that misuse.

When I first got my radios and had no idea what these so called privacy codes actually did I was expecting them to keep my transmissions from ears other than intended thus meaning my privacy. As we all know it does nothing of the sort. It is at best a filter to filter out unwanted transmissions. Privacy is completely wrong in an incorrect use of the word. "Filter Codes" is accurate and tells the whole story without having to make noobs think they are doing something than what they are actually doing.

If they meant it as a private party then they would call it a "private party" code and not "privacy codes". When you transmit on a radio and expect privacy you would expect your transmissions to go to only the individuals you share a code with. that is not analogous to being in a room expecting privacy. 

[marcspaz]

I'm sorry, but you're wrong... and that's okay. You can either accept that some words have more than one meaning depending on context and in this context the word is used correctly, or you don't. That doesn't mean the rest of us are illiterate.

[OffRoaderX]

3 minutes ago, marcspaz said:

That doesn't mean the rest of us are illiterate.

Whaooo.. Let's not get carried away! 

[WRXS236]

43 minutes ago, marcspaz said:

I'm sorry, but you're wrong... and that's okay. You can either accept that some words have more than one meaning depending on context and in this context the word is used correctly, or you don't. That doesn't mean the rest of us are illiterate.

Wow, you are taking this way too personally. I never called anyone illiterate meaning that you can't read or write, which by the way has nothing to do with this topic.

I merely wanted to point out that when someone buys a radio and sees the words "Privacy Codes" They are more than likely going to expect their conversation to be private with whomever when it will not be. If we use the term "Filter codes", which is accurately describing what is going on here, there would be much less of this confusion. 
If you do not want to be less confusing to newcomers that is your choice but I choose to be less confusing.

[marcspaz]

I'm not taking anything personally. I'm just trying to help you understand the actual context the word is being used in and what its definition is. Also, the fact that you don't understand the word literacy in the context it's being used just supports my point.

 

Edit:  I forgot to mention, if you use the term "Filter codes", you are going to be adding to the confusion because literally no one else uses that expression.  No one is going to know what you are talking about.  No one will be able to reference anything by that name in the industry, manuals, etc.

[marcspaz]

@WRXS236 

Just so you know, I am not unsympathetic to the point you are trying to make about the terminology being confusing to new-comers.  In 2022, I wrote a post here on this forum to help people who are new to radio and specifically address this confusion.  I linked it below if you or others would like to read it.

So, this is kind of interesting to me...  some manufactures use the term "Sub-Channels" to describe DCS and CTCSS, which is very wrong about what is happening, and has no technical history or definition supporting the verbiage.  Tonight I went looking for some information on Google about the use of the word subchannels (stimulated by this conversation) and both the AI response and the internet search results point to my write-up on this forum on the subject.  That's pretty cool. 

 

So, as mentioned above, anyone who wants information about PL tone should check this post out.

 

 

Couple screen grabs, which I think is pretty cool to see.

 

 

 

 

[WRTC928]

12 hours ago, WRXS236 said:

I merely wanted to point out that when someone buys a radio and sees the words "Privacy Codes" They are more than likely going to expect their conversation to be private with whomever when it will not be. If we use the term "Filter codes", which is accurately describing what is going on here, there would be much less of this confusion.

It's all good and fine for us to want to call them something else, but the fact is that the term is used by the makers and sellers of the radios whether we like it or not, and that's the term the user will see when they buy the radio. We can call them something different if we want to, but that won't make it any easier for a beginner to understand -- we'll still have to explain that a "privacy code" is really a "filter code", which is exactly what we've done here. 

[nokones]

Maybe if a new radio user really thinks that the "Privacy Tones/Codes" actually keeps the radio transmissions private so "other people" are unable to ease-drop in on the conversation like it was encrypted/scrambled, should put down and step away from the two-way radio and just stick with the use of a cellular telephone. I just don't understand what has happened to the use of common sense these days.

At least the "PL/DPL" God (Motorola) adopted the term Nuisance Eliminator Codes in place of "Privacy Codes" for their consumer FRS radios.

[nokones]

9 minutes ago, WRTC928 said:

It's all good and fine for us to want to call them something else, but the fact is that the term is used by the makers and sellers of the radios whether we like it or not, and that's the term the user will see when they buy the radio. We can call them something different if we want to, but that won't make it any easier for a beginner to understand -- we'll still have to explain that a "privacy code" is really a "filter code", which is exactly what we've done here. 

Filter Code? Another inappropriate and out of context/misuse of a word. According to Daniel, a filter is a a porous device for removing impurities or solid particles from a liquid or gas passed through it.  The last time I checked, I don't think a CTCSS decoder is filtering anything, it just either squelching or unsquelching the receiver contingent on the appropriate sub-audible function tone frequency being present on the the main carrier frequency.

[WRTC928]

8 hours ago, nokones said:

Filter Code? Another inappropriate and out of context/misuse of a word. According to Daniel, a filter is a a porous device for removing impurities or solid particles from a liquid or gas passed through it.  The last time I checked, I don't think a CTCSS decoder is filtering anything, it just either squelching or unsquelching the receiver contingent on the appropriate sub-audible function tone frequency being present on the the main carrier frequency.

I was responding to WRSX236's suggestion that "filter code" is a more appropriate term than "privacy code". My point is that whatever you call it, we'll still have to explain how it works to new users.