Life Expectancy of a Whelen Vortex

[500AT]

Last night, the city of Saline, Michigan suffered a failure of their outdoor warning sirens. Their system consists of two Whelen Vortex sirens that are around 12-15 years old. Over the past three years, these sirens have failed for their weekly noon test on numerous occasions. Thankfully, the repair techs have been able to fix these sirens.

Last night, there were three tornado warnings issued and both sirens failed to activate for each warning. This has some people really upset, and I mentioned that due to the age of the sirens, they may need to be replaced. Moreover, the city of Ann Arbor had a network of Whelen WS-2000-16 sirens. They only lasted 12 years before they were replaced with Federal 2001s, mainly due to activation failures. With that said, I would have to believe if your electronic sirens are 15 years or older, they should be replaced?

Here are two photos of one of the sirens in question. Are these first or second generation Vortex sirens?

[SirenMadness]

If it looks to be in good condition, keep it for as long as it stays that way, however long that may be... it better be long enough to have justified spending thousands on the product. I'm not sure about the average lifespan of speaker sirens; however, the activation failure could be due to the controls, as well. Not to mention Whelen uses lower tones on their sirens, though I doubt that would hurt it that much... but over a decade of use, maybe? Quite a shame, I like the Vortexes.

Also, how did the tornado warning go for you guys? All I got was lightning.

[Toledo 2t22]

Also, how did the tornado warning go for you guys? All I got was lightning.

Well. Down in Ohio, A tornado completly destroyed parts of lake township, which is only a few minutes drive from my home in Toledo. There was also a Tornado that hit west of Toledo in Fulton County, and destroyed some homes. It was a deadly night.

[Brendan Ahern]

Whelen claims that the life expectancy of their sirens is 30 years. There might not be anything wrong with the sirens at all. Might be radio activation problems.

[Jim_Ferer]

What everybody else said. Someone has to do some diagnostics first to find out what the problems are. The siren is at the end of the chain:

Activation system
Local controls (controls at the siren)
The siren itself

[TBOLT1000]

The life expectancy that whelen states is true but every siren is different, one siren may only last a day while others, possibly over 30 years, it varies. I know that nearby in Connecticut, there are whelens that are 20-25 years old and are still working fine but some are in very bad shape and no longer work. Also, I wonder how well they maintain them.

[kb4mdz]

On the face of it, I would say no, they should not have to be replaced at just 12-15 years. They are supposed to be rugged, shall not rust, bust, or collect dust.

That being said, it's time for some troubleshooting on WHY they don't activate; is it local mechnaical/electrical (switches, physical issues, etc), or is it the activation signal (I assume via radio).

Standard troubleshooting; divide & conquer. Can the techs set them off locally? Is the radio signal strong (strong enough RF level to unsquelch the receiver), and properly modulated (not too much, not too little)?

Bring data. Good, solid trustable data. Verifiable, repeatable data. All others shut up until the techs are finished.

Last night, the city of Saline, Michigan suffered a failure of their outdoor warning sirens. Their system consists of two Whelen Vortex sirens that are around 12-15 years old. Over the past three years, these sirens have failed for their weekly noon test on numerous occasions. Thankfully, the repair techs have been able to fix these sirens.

Last night, there were three tornado warnings issued and both sirens failed to activate for each warning. This has some people really upset, and I mentioned that due to the age of the sirens, they may need to be replaced. Moreover, the city of Ann Arbor had a network of Whelen WS-2000-16 sirens. They only lasted 12 years before they were replaced with Federal 2001s, mainly due to activation failures. With that said, I would have to believe if your electronic sirens are 15 years or older, they should be replaced?

[weasel2htm]

On the face of it, I would say no, they should not have to be replaced at just 12-15 years. They are supposed to be rugged, shall not rust, bust, or collect dust.

That being said, it's time for some troubleshooting on WHY they don't activate; is it local mechanical/electrical (switches, physical issues, etc), or is it the activation signal (I assume via radio).

Standard troubleshooting; divide & conquer. Can the techs set them off locally? Is the radio signal strong (strong enough RF level to unsquelch the receiver), and properly modulated (not too much, not too little)?

Bring data. Good, solid trust-able data. Verifiable, repeatable data. All others shut up until the techs are finished.

Well said!

[kb4mdz]

Thanks. One of these years I'll get a few more smarts about troubleshooting this 'tronics stuff.



The follow up is, get the facts first, then you can distort them as much as you want.

...................

Bring data. Good, solid trust-able data. Verifiable, repeatable data. All others shut up until the techs are finished.

Well said!

[3t22]

I know that nearby in Connecticut, there are whelens that are 20-25 years old and are still working fine but some are in very bad shape and no longer work

I know of several WS 2016s in use as fire sirens still going strong after well over 25 years of service. Our WS 2008s saw 20+ years of service in salt air before we got them, and we've had no problems with them except for an encoder not recieving tones do to an overgrown tree, which has sense been trimmed. There's even a WS 1000 in PA still going strong as a fire siren. Seems like I hear of more failure in their rotational sirens than their Omnis. Also not sure how true this is, but I believe, and I maybe wrong you can replace a WS 2000 or 3000's drivers with their current 100w vehicle siren, and I know you can change out the tone generator if they go bad.