DSC Alarms - again

[Robin]

Friday afternoon, every 15 minutes the alarm went for a Joburg Traffic Control message for ships in the Casquets TSS. We however are in Poole bay on our way to the Solent, over 60mls away. Every 15 minutes said alarm causes severe heart stopping, coffee spilling jerking of limbs, followed by a trip below to clear the alarm whereupon the set switches to CH80, Joburg's working channel, which is barely audible unlike the alarm!. As a result we miss the CH16 announcement from Portland CG re the local forecast, fortunately not essential listening on this occasion.

Will we switch the set off? You bet! Self defeating? You bet! There is no way to turn DOWN the alarm, the set volume is for speech only so the only control of the alarm volume is the OFF switch. Camels were horses designed by commitees they say - DSC alarms certainly give you the hump!

On our return trip today, the set was left off...

<hr width=100% size=1><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by Robin on 16/05/2004 22:12 (server time).</FONT></P>

 

[tome]

Robin

You know my feelings on this one! Bloody daft design flaw in DSC alarms, and I'm not surprised you switched it off.

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[Oldhand]

Doesn't your VHF transceiver allow you to cancel an alarm without acknowledging it? If you cancel then it shouldn't change to channel 80, which is one of your complaints.

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[Robin]

Yes, 2 choices pressing 'ENT' or 'END'. However curiosity makes you check for sure it is not a new alarm! Either way you still have to go below each time to deal with it (or put up with the racket for 2 minutes). Thing is after the 2nd 15 minute repeated alarm you realise it is now set to continue thus maybe for hours.

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[Oldhand]

Glad I stayed in the Solent, the Isle of Wight only failed to block a single Joburg Traffic alarm last weekend for me!

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[john_morris_uk]

Does this mean that its better to have a VHF setup which has a VHF and separate DSC controller? On the principle that it would be possible to switch the controller off and leave the VHF on?

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[Robin]

A previous post suggested this but apparently this is not possible in the way they are configured. In any case the cost and space of two separate boxes makes it an expensive off switch! I may decide to re-install our old non-DSC set for use on longer passages where one of us is asleep or resting below (we are just 2 on board) and then switch off the DSC set. We have a spare VHF aerial already in place on our goalposts so it would be simple enough to do and belt and braces anyway.

The point though is that having no control over the alarm volume is self defeating, they don't want you to turn the volume down but the result of this is that you turn it off!





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[Twister_Ken]

Sorry, feeling smug

I have a 2 box system - not planned, just happened that way because previous owner had installed box 1 (DSC ready) and I put in box 2 (DSC controller). To revert to one box operation (non DSC) requires two leads to be unplugged and one of them to be replugged elsewhere. Not too difficult.

Simrad BTW.

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[Robin]

Re: Sorry, feeling smug

Smugly lucky as long as you can reach the back of the st to plug and unplug. If I had heard the alarms before I bought the set and realised the implications, I might have made a different choice, not of the set itself (NASA, very good) but to remain non-DSC! Have you heard one yet?

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[Twister_Ken]

Re: Sorry, feeling smug

My Simrad set up brought a dockie down onto the marina at Berthons. When he heard the DSC alert he thought it was a burglar alarm!

No reaching around the back. An umbilical from the back of theh DSC controller (permanently attached) plugs into the mic socket on the front of the radio. The mic then plugs into a socket on the front of the DCS controller. So to disable DSC, remove mic lead from front of controller, remove controller lead from front of radio, plug mic lead into front of radio. Hey presto, no alarums.

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[Robin]

Re: Sorry, feeling smug

Nice, that would have been workable for us apart from the price difference. I'm sure this problem isn't going to go away either as more and more people make the change to DSC.

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[Oldhand]

Re: Sorry, feeling smug

That would give me withdrawal symptoms Ken. My dual station Simrad installation has no such luxury but we don't find it that loud, I have even missed it going off while nattering on the pontoon.

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