Hate to bump such an old thread, but I recently completed a map of their sirens; my curiosity of ATI's rotating and oddball omnis found in Whitehouse, TX and Tuscaloosa, AL got the best of me.
Map Link
They never really replaced these sirens, just the heads and maybe the "front panels" for the controllers. While investigating I was quite surprised to find that from the time the HPSS32Rs were on the poles to the time that the omnis were installed the installations remained identical for the most part. Even the flex conduit on them remained in the same place. Also you might be shocked to find that before the ATI HPSS32Rs were... WHELENS! They apparently had an older system of Whelen WPS-4004s, installed in the early 90's, and added onto that system a bit later on. During the process of replacing the old system they must of restructured the coverage or had some that were already taken out of service, because out of the ones I could find only 2 showed up in the not-so-important areas (downtown, parks, etc.). These were discovered when I took a look at the StreetView and dialed the time back to August of 2007 (take note of that year). This first one is an old style 4004 installed next to an HPSS32R. The ATI is actually a bit bigger. They are located at E 9th Ave. and Pace St.
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StreetView Link
Google Maps Link
This one is on S Hover Rd. near the intersection of Nelson Rd. and sported what appears to be an ATI solar panel and possibly an ATI controller. I already cringe at the sight of a Whelen with a Federal UltraVoice, but if this thing had an ATI React controller driving it... :sick: The solar panel on it is the exact same one that's on it now and the same model as the ones on the rest of the ATIs in the system. Notice they reused the old pole for the HPSS32. I'm not too sure what came of the the Whelen, but chances are they replaced the head with an HPSS32R eventually though.
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StreetView Link
Google Maps Link
I want to point out that this system initially went up in 2006 from the looks of it. Through Google Earth's Historical Imagery you can find some of the first of the ATI's being installed as early as the 29th of April that year. This one is behind the Longmont Reservoir.
StreetView Link
Google Maps Link
There are a few areas that were unfinished at the time of the StreetView in 2007. This one below shows a metal pole stub without the upper portion of the mast installed. It's located at 12182 Ute Hwy.
StreetView Link
Google Maps Link
So at the end of the day turns out that they could have had a functional system of Whelens. With a front panel upgrade and replacement of blown drivers these 4004s would have been just as loud and reliable as a brand new one rolling off of the assymbly line, but instead they unknowingly went with ATI and dug a hole. They completed the installation in 2007 and had issues the year after having them installed as uncommonsense mentioned before. This answers the question as to what they meant by "The new speakers emit warning tones at 3200 watts, twice as loud the old ones." They then turn around and replace the arrays on the poles without really messing with the installations overall
six years later!
uncommonsense wrote:This is a tale of what you really might not want to do if your siren system breaks down.
So, I was browsing the internet and came across this photograph from Longmont, CO:
CAPTION: Jay Jahrman holds cables to help guide old tornado siren speakers as Dan McAmis (not pictured) lifts them with a crane near the intersection of Nelson Road and Hover Street on Tuesday. Jahrman and McAmis, employees of Kellem Electric LLC, have been replacing the speakers at all 17 tornado sirens in Longmont. The new speakers emit warning tones at 3200 watts, twice as loud the old ones.
Source:
http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_20525 ... ado-sirens
...The rotating ATIs only came about during the last decade as far as we all know. So these sirens are probably no older than 10 years old.
In this thread, the OP even commented that the sirens looked new, and that was 2007!
http://airraidsirens.com/forums/viewtop ... t=longmont
Of course, its seems by 2008, the sirens were not functioning well at all.
June 5, 2008:
http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/lo ... t-for-some
Original thread (yes, I realize it degenerated and got locked):
http://airraidsirens.com/forums/viewtop ... nt&start=0
And by last year, the system had essentially failed.
Eamon said the old system in Longmont had just become too expensive to keep in shape, with upkeep running about $30,000 a year.
"The maintenance costs on the old system, they're just too much," Eamon said. "We didn't want to put any more money into a used car."
Source:
http://www.timescall.com/news/ci_20273985/newstip
Ahh, the innocence of youth.
