New England Digital Emergency Communications Network
NEDECN

Blog

  • New Repeater Map 2025

    Thanks to David Wyatt, W1DMW, for this contribution to  NEDECN: Click the link below.  Then Zoom-in and Click on a pin for further info. 2025 Repeater Pin Map  

  • Upcoming Events

    4/20/2026: 6 AM-9PM: Boston Marathon Communications (Tests begin prior Friday evening, Saturday and Sunday on DMR) 5/1 and 5/2/2026:  NEAR-fest at New Boston, NH – Hillsboro County Fairgrounds

  • NEAR-fest May 1 and 2, 2026 and AREDN Demo

    NEDECN will again have a table inside the Vendor Barn at the Hillsborough County Fairgrounds in New Boston, NH.  Our Joint Venture partner, Merrimack Valley Amateur Radio Assn. will be demonstrating the AREDN Mesh Microwave Network at several locations around the fairgrounds.  See the layout map at NEAR-fest.com The AREDN mesh microwave provides an alternate…

  • Interstate 89 and 93 Coverage

    Since the DMR repeater site change in Bow (NH), we have been curious to hear how coverage to the NW might have changed.  Today, Doug, N1OEI, drove from Concord to Lebanon.  Coverage seems to be the same for a 30 watt mobile.   He last reported in after the Grantham Exit 13.  His signal was intermittent…

  • Breaking News

    The AREDN Mesh Network has now connected 3 States!  A work session on Friday, 6/26/24, at the Shapleigh, Maine hub, made the connection to NH.  Four microwave dishes were installed on the K1DQ 120′ tower.  The team of NH and ME participants were K1DQ, W1BKW, NX1P, K1EHZ, NE1B and Nik of VC Towers.  Previous installations…

  • Mesh Status Today

    Today, March 9, 2024, the team of K1EHZ, N1MYY, KX1B and KD2BEC along with tower climbers, installed microwave dishes at the Haverhill DMR site.  This now connects the Mesh network from Chester to Haverhill to Westford.  All signal levels are strong and solid, providing an alternate route for repeaters and other amateur services. Sites in…

  • Mesh Networking in New England Continues to Expand

    Mesh Networking in New England Continues to Expand

  • Hot Spot Server Talk Groups

    Current access to the NEDECN IPSC-2 Hot Spot server provides the following Talk Groups: 759 Skywarn 3109 CT 3123 ME 3125 MA 3133 NH 3144 RI 3150 VT 3181 NE Wide 8801 NETAC1 8802 NETAC2 8804 Capenet

  • The Wilderness Protocol

    We received an interesting email about the “Wilderness Protocol”.  There are some useful ideas here. Our simplified New England protocol would be to initially call on 1 or 2 and lastly 3.  Use a LiTZ (Long Tone Zero) on your DTMF pad : 1.  NEDECN SKYWARN/Emergency Talk Group 759 2.  NEDECN  Statewide Talk Group  31xx…

  • Amateur Radio Operators using DMR assist in NH rescue

    On Sunday December 11, 2022, “When all else fails – Amateur Radio” proved to be more than just the ARRL tagline for one older New Hampshire man and his dog.  A leisurely day hike in the Belmont area was going well, until he became lost and his cell phone battery died.  With the oncoming snow…

  • Mesh Networking

    As mentioned recently, NEDECN has signed a collaboration agreement with Merrimack Valley Amateur Radio Association (MVARA).  Under this agreement NEDECN provides space on our towers, where feasible, for MVARA microwave network equipment.  This collaborative effort provides backup and in some cases primary, network connectivity between our DMR repeaters, and tower space to extend the MVARA…

  • 9-11 Dedication

    It is not often that we have new repeaters added to the network.  However, thanks to Andy, N1MYY, and his enthusiasm, we have finally filled a coverage hole in our network!  Many of you listened in to yesterday’s 9-11 Dedication as Andy dedicated the new Haverhill repeater to the 6 Broadcast Engineers lost at the…

  • Membership and Donations

    Due to recent tax changes with PayPal,  we encourage sending any dues and donations to our Treasurer.   See details here: Membership

  • Winter at Mt. Washington @ 6288′ AMSL

    Occasionally the rime ice needs to be melted off our antenna!  Amazing what ice and wind can do at 6288′.  The wind was clocked at 231 MPH on April 12, 1934. Mt. Washington – W1IMD

  • AUDIO WATCH

    You are TOO LOUD!!  I can’t hear you, my road noise is covering your whisper and my volume is all the way up! These are some of the most common complaints about DMR.  Many of you purchase a radio, take it out of the box, program channels and do not think about the microphone default setting. …

  • Mt. Whittier Returns

    After many months with milliwatts leaking thru the defective PA, Mt. Whittier – West Ossipee, NH is back on the air. Yesterday 4/30/21, John, K1LTM, visited his Mt. Whittier site and replaced the XPR8400 repeater with an MTR3000 repeater.  It will be much stronger now!  This should cover on Route 16 south of Ossipee Lake…

  • Sudbury (MA) Repeater Improvement

    This morning, Dom, N1DM and Jim, K1IR, added a new duplexer at Jim’s site.  THANK YOU both for your donations and time invested! The results are summarized here on Jim’s Blog: K1IR Repeater Upgrade – Major Coverage Improvement!

  • MOVING! New England Digital Swap Net

    Moving from Monday at 9 PM to Monday at 7:30 PM (B4 the New England Wide Net). Please list your items FOR SALE and also WANTED TO BUY.

  • DMR Net Operators for August – November 2021

    AUGUST 2  ND1L AUGUST 9  KC1MUU AUGUST 16   KC1KAM AUGUST 23  KC1MXH AUGUST 30  N1DM SEPT 6   N1PZP SEPT 13  NE1B SEPT 20  ND1L SEPT 27  KC1MUU OCT 4  KC1KAM OCT 11 N1PZP OCT 18 N1DM OCT 25  KC1MXH NOV 1    NE1B

  • DMR NETS

    Mon. 7:30 PM – New England SWAP Net 3181 – BUY-SELL-TRADE Mon. 8 PM – New England Wide Net 3181 Tues. 8 PM- Vermont Net on 3150 Wed.  8 PM- YCCC Contesting and DX Net on NETAC1 = 8801 Thur. 7:30 PM- SKYWARN Net on TG 759 (SKY) ****NEW**** Fri.     8 PM- CT, RI?…

  • Loading and Protocols

    Over time we knew that traffic loads would migrate from DX talk groups to more local ones, once the novelty of DMR wore off.  Less QSOs on World Wide and North America TGs, more on TAC, State and Regional ones.  As such, it appears that: New England Wide has become the de facto “Calling” Channel (also used…

  • New Site Additions – RI

    The Providence Radio Association has recently added a UHF repeater to the NEDECN for coverage in Providence, RI. RPTR TX:  447.725 RPTR RX:  442.725 COLOR CODE 2 Standard NEDECN Talk Groups. See Repeater Section for Talk Group info.

  • Net Control Schedule for November-December 2020

    The Monday night 8 PM New England DMR Nets will have the following Net Control Station on Talk Group “New England Wide” (3181): Nov. 9    KC1MXH Nov. 16  N1PZP Nov. 23  NE1B Nov. 30  N1DM Dec. 7    KC1MUU Dec. 14  N1EKO Dec. 21   KC1MXH Dec. 28   TBD

  • Vermont Repeater Changes

    The Warren, VT VHF repeater, K1VIT, on Mt. Lincoln, will go off the air on 9/1/20 and be replaced by a UHF repeater formerly based in Northfield.  It is on 449.475 MHz, Color Code 5.

  • New Link Policy, Hamfest and Contest Updates

    See Updates in External Links and Hot Spots: https://nedecn.org/external-links/

  • Peconic, NY Added – Sag Harbor Deleted

    Please note the following change on Eastern Long Island, NY.  Peconic site in Southold Town has been added and it replaces Sag Harbor.  The frequency for Peconic is 449.975 MHz output (your receive).  This is different from the previous Sag Harbor frequency.  A new coverage map is in the “New York Repeaters” section of this…

  • Site Building

    It’s not easy building a site here in the winter!

  • COVID-19 Net

    COVID-19 Health Information Net on VT Statewide (3150), Tuesdays at 8 PM.  All welcome to check-in.

  • Burke Mtn, VT is now on the air today!

    Thanks to Paul, W1IMD and Chris, KI1P, who took their test gear and tools up a very cold mountain this morning!  They successfully installed the SLR5700 repeater at 3,270′ AMSL and tuned the filters for optimum performance.  Chris sent out the tower photo earlier. After leaving the mountain, Chris had mobile coverage down Interstate 91…

  • Martha’s Vineyard DMR is Back on the Air!

    Back on the network this evening (1/28/2020) after a long absence! Thanks to Mike, W1MLL, for helping with this restoration. Now let’s see some activity from Dukes County! https://www.dukescounty.org/emergency-management

  • STOP – VIEW THESE SAFETY VIDEOS

    This is a must!  If you are a ham with antennas.  Take time to view K1IR’s safety videos. https://blog.thedrivenelement.com/

  • Usage by Repeater from 2020-01-19 to 2020-01-25 (NewEng-TRBO *)

    Please support NEDECN and IPSC2-CAN-TRBO NEDECN Usage by Repeater from 2020-01-19 to 2020-01-25 (NewEng-TRBO *) RANK SECONDS CALLERS CALLS REPEATER ID CALLSIGN LOCATION C-BRIDGE 1 11477 19 588 312300 K1DQ SHAPLEIGH ME NewEng-TRBO 2 9793 21 591 310910 W1NLK NORWALK CT NewEng-TRBO-CTDARN 3 8050 11 310 313302 K1MOT HUDSON NH NewEng-TRBO 4 7637 20 407 314404 N1JBC…

  • Anytone D578 Mobile Users Group

    The following are new users: K1BOS John in Boston, MA KN4TGU Todd in Belfast, ME KV1W Ric in Westboro, MA N1BJX BJ in Kennebunk, ME N1JGB Bruce in Essex Jct., VT W1IRA Ira in Westminster, VT General comments were related to programming.  Most transferred their D878 portable code plug csv files over to the mobile…

  • Reese C. Fowler, Silent Key

    It is with great sadness that I report the passing of Reese C. Fowler, Sr., W1RCF on Friday, November 22, 2019 at the VA Hospital Community Living Center in Manchester, NH. He served his country in the US Air Force from 1953 to 1979 on many assignments from Vietnam to Germany and was discharged as…

  • The STM32-DVM-MTR2K: DMR for MTR2000s

    I’m one of probably a number of hams who have taken interest in the $475 UHF MTR2000s on eBay. They’re rated for 100% duty cycle at 40 Watts out, and, unlike the 100W models, cover the full 403-470 MHz band. Unlike its much more expensive MTR3000, the MTR2000 is analog-only. As I pondered whether I…