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Network Vision/LTE - West Washington Market (Seattle/Puget Sound Region)


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6 hours ago, PedroDaGr8 said:

Seems that Sprint is still going back and selectively upgrading sites to Massive MIMO. I noticed this morning that SE52XC052 (near the intersection of the 522 and 405) is now a M-MIMO tower. 

Great find! Do you know if those sites are broadcasting NR yet?

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6 hours ago, RAvirani said:

Great find! Do you know if those sites are broadcasting NR yet?

I don't have a 5G phone, so I have no clue. I have seen sector IDs greater than 20 but not sure if that means anything besides the fact it is no longer triband. Interestingly, I can't find a permit for this change despite the fact the change is very recent. 

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13 minutes ago, PedroDaGr8 said:

I don't have a 5G phone, so I have no clue. I have seen sector IDs greater than 20 but not sure if that means anything besides the fact it is no longer triband. Interestingly, I can't find a permit for this change despite the fact the change is very recent. 

They don't need a permit to swap from an 8T8R to a M-MIMO panel. That's why a lot of sites with KMW 16-port triband antennas have an inactive 8T8R next to them. 

Any chance you were able to snag some photos of the site? If not, the mast is relatively low, and you can probably get good photos from the parking lot of Cedar Park Christian School.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 2/21/2020 at 10:59 AM, RAvirani said:

They don't need a permit to swap from an 8T8R to a M-MIMO panel. That's why a lot of sites with KMW 16-port triband antennas have an inactive 8T8R next to them. 

Any chance you were able to snag some photos of the site? If not, the mast is relatively low, and you can probably get good photos from the parking lot of Cedar Park Christian School.

I will try at some point to get some photos, I am not over in that section very often. Anything in particular you want photographed? 

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They don't need a permit to swap from an 8T8R to a M-MIMO panel. That's why a lot of sites with KMW 16-port triband antennas have an inactive 8T8R next to them. 
Any chance you were able to snag some photos of the site? If not, the mast is relatively low, and you can probably get good photos from the parking lot of Cedar Park Christian School.
Here's a picture from my phone:

ntW7Krh.jpg

Not the best quality but the best I could do at the moment.

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11 hours ago, PedroDaGr8 said:

Here's a picture from my phone:

ntW7Krh.jpg

Not the best quality but the best I could do at the moment.

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That's totally good - I was curious how they compared to the RFS antennas size-wise. 

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  • 3 months later...
The L2500 EARFCNs in the Seattle market were changed today. Before we had 40978/41176/41374; now we have 41094/41292/41490. I presume this is to make room for NR. 
That gives them 100-120Mhz for NR based on my estimates.


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14 hours ago, PedroDaGr8 said:

That gives them 100-120Mhz for NR based on my estimates.


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Actually more than that since Sprint/T-Mobile controls the entire 2.5Ghz block (all 194Mhz) for the entire metro Seattle region. This allows them to use the J and K guard bands as well, since they control the blocks around them in their entirety. The K guard band (2614-2618) in particular was why the B41 20Mhz channels started at 2628MHz (until yesterday). As such, that would leave 130MHz for 5G communication if they wanted.

Relevant License Links:
B413 - TDI Acquisition Sub, LLC (shell company of Clearwire)
L000002361 - Clearwire Spectrum Holdings II (shell company of Clearwire)
L000007381 - Clearwire Spectrum Holdings III (shell company of Clearwire)
L000007382 - Clearwire Spectrum Holdings III (shell company of Clearwire)
L000007383 - Clearwire Spectrum Holdings III (shell company of Clearwire)
L000031135 - American Telecasting of Seattle - Sprint acquired this spectrum in 2018. 


 

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  • 3 weeks later...

Came across a strange small cell broadcasting on only low B41 EARCFNs. It's on top of the Overlake Sprint store in Redmond. At first I thought it was the tower right behind the store but that has the usual tri-band setup (which used to be on the Sears nearby). I nearly missed this antenna, it's a small white fully enclosed small sell. You have to be far from the sprint store to see it. It only has these two cells unlike the old clearwire sites.

 

Not the first time I've seen these EARFCNs, they seem to be used a lot in the Georgetown district.

 

Edit: Checking back, most of those in the Georgetown district are also small cells but at least one is on a regular tower. Not sure why the Georgetown district has so many of these.

ea96b2cc6eab3745959e677689319f9e.jpg

 

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3 hours ago, PedroDaGr8 said:

Came across a strange small cell broadcasting on only low B41 EARCFNs. It's on top of the Overlake Sprint store in Redmond. At first I thought it was the tower right behind the store but that has the usual tri-band setup (which used to be on the Sears nearby). I nearly missed this antenna, it's a small white fully enclosed small sell. You have to be far from the sprint store to see it. It only has these two cells unlike the old clearwire sites.

That site is a temporary small cell until the tower behind it is turned on. It's LTE-relay backhauled. 

Small cells that are LTE-relay backhauled broadcast at 39874/40072. 

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  • 4 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...
On 7/27/2020 at 1:42 PM, Terrell352 said:

You sure did!

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Went by there today and confirmed it is broadcasting 3x20MHz b41 carriers (2518.4MHz, 2538.2 MHz, and 2558.0 MHz), and a single n41 carrier (2588.4 MHz, BW: 40 MHz). That means all 100 MHz from that antenna is accounted for. The allocation is odd considering the nearby Sprint tower is still broadcasting 3xB41 (2640.4MHz, 2660.2MHz, and 2680.0MHz). That means there is technically 120MHz (our of 194MHz) allocated to B41 in that area, 40MHz n41. This leaves a gap of around 30Mhz in the middle and 12Mhz at the low end left unallocated. 

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8 hours ago, PedroDaGr8 said:

Went by there today and confirmed it is broadcasting 3x20MHz b41 carriers (2518.4MHz, 2538.2 MHz, and 2558.0 MHz), and a single n41 carrier (2588.4 MHz, BW: 40 MHz). That means all 100 MHz from that antenna is accounted for. The allocation is odd considering the nearby Sprint tower is still broadcasting 3xB41 (2640.4MHz, 2660.2MHz, and 2680.0MHz). That means there is technically 120MHz (our of 194MHz) allocated to B41 in that area, 40MHz n41. This leaves a gap of around 30Mhz in the middle and 12Mhz at the low end left unallocated. 

Perhaps another 20Mhz for small cells?

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  • 2 weeks later...

FYI I just drove past the main T-Mobile/Sprint Woodinville tower (near Target) and there were workmen on the T-Mobile rack. It looked like they were installing n41 panels. I'll confirm tomorrow.

 

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2 hours ago, PedroDaGr8 said:

FYI I just drove past the main T-Mobile/Sprint Woodinville tower (near Target) and there were workmen on the T-Mobile rack. It looked like they were installing n41 panels. I'll confirm tomorrow.

Nice find! I'm unsurprised that n41 is going up on that site given T-Mobile has already deployed massive MIMO midband panels there. 

I'll try to stop by tomorrow as well!

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Nice find! I'm unsurprised that n41 is going up on that site given T-Mobile has already deployed massive MIMO midband panels there. 
I'll try to stop by tomorrow as well!
Confirmed n41, though it's not live yet.43b3a73b2c8ee715511e2fb867787f45.jpg

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On 9/25/2020 at 5:03 PM, PedroDaGr8 said:

Confirmed n41, though it's not live yet.43b3a73b2c8ee715511e2fb867787f45.jpg

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We can only hope that T-Mobile plans to take full advantage of its full b41/n41 spectrum. This is a very good sign.

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We can only hope that T-Mobile plans to take full advantage of its full b41/n41 spectrum. This is a very good sign.
If you consider the recent Samsung FCC filings, I think the B41/n41 roll out is going to occur faster than expected.

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On 10/4/2020 at 2:19 AM, RAvirani said:

SE03302E is finally going from L2100 to a full build, including NR2500. This will relieve a huge amount of congestion in a rather busy area. 

https://imgur.com/a/5TsEPxS

Is this the Bridle Trails powerline tower that was being worked on this weekend? 

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  • 2 weeks later...

The powerline tower at Kirkland/Rose Hill (47.67565, -122.17482) got upgraded to n41 as well.

 

I noticed n41 on the 405 in an area where I have never seen it before and eventually found the source (there aren't a lot of TMobile towers in that area). That tower location makes huge sense if they intend to keep Sprints 2.5GHz towers online (either as B41 or n41) because it is located in a gap in Sprints B41 coverage.

 

Interestingly, it seems to be 60 MHz n41 BW, rather than 40MHz I saw at Canyon Park. I will go back in the next few days to check the n41 frequency and to see if it is broadcasting any T-Mobile B41.

 

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On 10/13/2020 at 6:11 PM, PedroDaGr8 said:

The powerline tower at Kirkland/Rose Hill (47.67565, -122.17482) got upgraded to n41 as well.

 

I noticed n41 on the 405 in an area where I have never seen it before and eventually found the source (there aren't a lot of TMobile towers in that area). That tower location makes huge sense if they intend to keep Sprints 2.5GHz towers online (either as B41 or n41) because it is located in a gap in Sprints B41 coverage.

 

Interestingly, it seems to be 60 MHz n41 BW, rather than 40MHz I saw at Canyon Park. I will go back in the next few days to check the n41 frequency and to see if it is broadcasting any T-Mobile B41.

 

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Went by there today, it is broadcasting two 20MHz B41 carriers: 2538MHz and 2558MHz. The 60MHz n41 carrier is at 2597MHz.

Tmobiles plan for the 2.5GHz spectrum makes far more sense now. Irrespective of bandwidth:

2508MHz to 2568MHz: TMobile B41

2568MHz to 2628MHz: TMobile n41

2630MHz to 2690MHz: Sprint B41. 

This gives them freedom to reallocate either B41 portion to make a contiguous 120MHz n41 allocation.

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