Gentlemen (and ladies),
For your consideration, I've constructed this in-house department alerting system. Now, I understand this isn't a vehicle install per-se, however I thought it might be interesting to do a write-up on it since I know it is an interesting topic among firehouses. The build consists of old fire alarm speakers, fire alarm bells and Feniex Apollos (Red/Blue). This system was created merely from scratch out of a parts bin and has evolved into an extremely efficient alerting system.
The speaker visual devices were hand painted black and assembled. We chose black because, obviously, it covered up the word FIRE and changed the color from red, so that the public, should they be visiting our station, would not confuse it with the building fire alarm system. We have 5 speaker visuals total. One is located in the bay of the Rescue Engine, the second is located in the bay of the Tower Ladder, the third is located in the first out Engine's bay, the fourth is located in the back workroom or shop, and the fifth is located in our training room/lounge. The speakers are connected to a Uniden BCT15X and broadcast a constant fire/police scan group, however are interrupted by the Motorola Minitor pager, and will then broadcast the tones and voice page.
The bells were originally planned to accompany the speaker visuals at every location, however they are louder than we first thought, so we put two up. One at each end of the station. There are plans to add a second bell between the workshop and the lounge, however it is still in the works. The bells sound for 4 seconds after the pager alerts, which is slightly longer than our pagers will normally beep for on alert.
A disconnect switch was mounted by the main office, which allows the system to be bypassed, or reset in the case of a false Minitor trip, or a "Test" page. The system is highly expandable, and uses a series of timer relays to control it's operation, driven off of a Motorola Minitor pager amplified charger, which, as most of us know, contains its own internal relay.
This has been an extremely fun project to do. I am willing to answer any questions about it's technical details. Please feel free to comment/criticize.
For your consideration, I've constructed this in-house department alerting system. Now, I understand this isn't a vehicle install per-se, however I thought it might be interesting to do a write-up on it since I know it is an interesting topic among firehouses. The build consists of old fire alarm speakers, fire alarm bells and Feniex Apollos (Red/Blue). This system was created merely from scratch out of a parts bin and has evolved into an extremely efficient alerting system.
The speaker visual devices were hand painted black and assembled. We chose black because, obviously, it covered up the word FIRE and changed the color from red, so that the public, should they be visiting our station, would not confuse it with the building fire alarm system. We have 5 speaker visuals total. One is located in the bay of the Rescue Engine, the second is located in the bay of the Tower Ladder, the third is located in the first out Engine's bay, the fourth is located in the back workroom or shop, and the fifth is located in our training room/lounge. The speakers are connected to a Uniden BCT15X and broadcast a constant fire/police scan group, however are interrupted by the Motorola Minitor pager, and will then broadcast the tones and voice page.
The bells were originally planned to accompany the speaker visuals at every location, however they are louder than we first thought, so we put two up. One at each end of the station. There are plans to add a second bell between the workshop and the lounge, however it is still in the works. The bells sound for 4 seconds after the pager alerts, which is slightly longer than our pagers will normally beep for on alert.
A disconnect switch was mounted by the main office, which allows the system to be bypassed, or reset in the case of a false Minitor trip, or a "Test" page. The system is highly expandable, and uses a series of timer relays to control it's operation, driven off of a Motorola Minitor pager amplified charger, which, as most of us know, contains its own internal relay.
This has been an extremely fun project to do. I am willing to answer any questions about it's technical details. Please feel free to comment/criticize.
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