The Siren Board

Is it going to have battery backup? I don't think so, but let me know what you think.

I highly doubt Federal really intends to completely reproduce the same siren. It will probably look slightly reminisent of the old tbolt we know and love, and maybe sound similar.

It wouldn't be too hard to make any Thunderbolt run on battery power. All you'd need to do is find a couple of DC motors that can drive the blower and rotator and find an inverter capable of driving the Model 2 chopper. Federal could modify the Model 2's motor to run on 48VDC and use that as a chopper motor. They could also use the rotator from their current rotating sirens to rotate the horn. It wouldn't be too hard to do, but would they be willing to invest in it is the question. Keep in mind that the 2001 was built to replace the Thunderbolt in the 80's and is way simpler and easier to install, and with both the Equinox and 508 being offered at the moment there wouldn't be any reason to go with the Thunderbolt unless you'd want the killer sound. Most EMA's don't care about how the product sounds as long as it works and gets good range. This is one reason why there are hardly any new Modulators being installed dual toned, aside from the ones in Hawaii, or running at a custom pitch. It's the same with electronic sirens from Whelen, which can be set up to run at any pitch or be dual toned, and other manufactures. Another thing to look at is how they would price such a siren. Federal might charge a high pice for it being that it's a new product. I can somewhat see a dealership pushing the siren out there over the other models available like some do the 2001-130 over the 508 and Equinox, but if the price of the siren is too high to justify purchasing it over other sirens, it won't sell well as the customer will move on to something cheaper like a 2001 or say screw it altogether and go to some other dealership that sells Sentrys or whatever... that is, unless the customer says "screw the price, give me some sirens that scare people S***less" and has the money to blow on the project (I'm looking at you Ft. Benning with your near $50K 2909's and tower mounted 2001s).

Well single toned sirens can be identified as just urban noises in some cases but it's hard to mistake the Thunderbolt.

A lot of times when I forget it's test day I think the 2001 is mom vacuming in the other room.

I don't see how Thunderbolts are more "electrically and mechanically complex than newer sirens". It would probably take me 10 minutes to wire up a Thunderbolt from the schematics. Give me a newer Whelen or 2001 and I'll be sitting and staring into the control box for hours not knowing what the heck I am looking at. (I know more people are getting into the newer model sirens but I haven't yet and I'm not in a big rush to do so.) But the only thing making it more complicated that I can think of is it uses three separate motors...that's it. Everything else is just plain-jane switches, relays and timers. However, with that comes very limited to no possibility of silent testing, and the ability to monitor each siren's components from a central location. I'm sure it's possible, but it would need an entirely new control setup.

That being said I still stand by my previous statement.

I'd say that it's complicated in the way it has to be installed vs the electrical side of things. I haven't built an RCM before, but I can look at one and understand how they work. From what I understand it is harder to erect one than something like a 2001 because of dealing with the installation the blower. Federal, and ACA come to think of it, shrunk their blower sizes down in an attempt to make it more compact. The B and C series blower is smaller than the three versions of the A series blower setups. I don't know about ACA, but Federal downsized the blower from the 6M pig to the 4M without hurting performance too much. It makes me question why they didn't push sales of the 10/12 500 as much, since, from what I've heard, they are on the same level of the Thunderbolt and used only one motor to drive it. Pneumatic sirens from Germany followed the same trend. The first version of the Pintsch Bamag housed its components in a bunker underground, while the second one had it's components in a built-in vessel and used its mast as an air tank. The Rickmers Werft housed its tank under the installation. Hörmann changed their head design of the HLS line of sirens to slim it down. What makes them different from federal in regards to their mechanical sirens is that they took it a step further and started make electronic sirens as replacements, because they are WAY easier to deal with as compared to what they used to have as high powered sirens, especially when it came to the engines, are more compact, and can be installed just about anywhere.

If you drive a Thunderbolt off a FC like a 2001 using a relay for the chopper and another for the blower an rotator, it would be able to do somewhat a silent test running the blower and rotator with no chopper. Not so silent, but the blower isn't too loud either. You can also monitor a Thunderbolt with a two way FC. If I'm not mistaken Jefferson County, AL uses Two way FCs to drive their sirens. Lee County runs their 3T22A in Auburn on a two way controller of sorts, and I'd be willing to bet that their other 3T22's used to run on the same controller before being phased out with 2001's.

I thought the FC controller was basically an updated ARCH. All of Moore's Thunderbolts and 2T22's are run off FC's but still have the original siren motor starters. It allowed them to integrate the older models with the Modulators they got in 2001. In fact, one of the FC's on a 2T22 welded itself shut and the siren went for about 20 minutes before someone shut the disconnect off. If I had known I could, I'd have just walked over and done it myself.

Bumpity, bump.


I sent a message to Jeff about the Thunderbolt project and asked if it was still in the works or if it was dropped completely. He told me that they were still working on it. He said that they were having issues with the DBc output on the siren which we knew was going to be a big issue at first.

Not only that but I found the post that started this by Jared Harrel, and I quote...

Jared Harrel wrote:‪#‎bringbackthebolt‬ So I had a eureka moment for the 'bolt reboot. Use the 7-horse 48vDC motor found in your current mechanical siren range as the blower motor, a universal (AC/DC) 2 or 3-horse chopper motor, and the 508/2001 rotator. Do you think your engineering guys can make it work?

If I'm not mistaken we came up with these ideas years ago didn't we?

I'm not sure if this has been mentioned, but I know one problem is the fact that the rotator is belt driven. When the belts wear out, the rotator stops rotating, and then someone has to get up there and repair it, which is hard to do. in my opinion, they need to make the rotator a direct drive. That will (hopefully) eliminate the problem of worn out rotators. Also, does anyone know if the new one will have a blower?

gman 1 wrote:I'm not sure if this has been mentioned, but I know one problem is the fact that the rotator is belt driven. When the belts wear out, the rotator stops rotating, and then someone has to get up there and repair it, which is hard to do. in my opinion, they need to make the rotator a direct drive. That will (hopefully) eliminate the problem of worn out rotators. Also, does anyone know if the new one will have a blower?

There is no point in making a new Thunderbolt without a blower, they are. Also, definitely will not be belt drive.