The Siren Board

Hey folks. Not often I pose a question around here, but I have one.

What do we know if ATI siren installations prior to around 2003?

ATI first really came to the attention with the siren community with their winning of the Nashville contract (which I believe was 2003). We knew of them before because the work they'd done in Garland, TX (including sticking their boxes on the Hurricane and the DSA style speakers that were going up around it).

I feel like it must have been around the Nashville job that ATI switched from the DSA style speakers to the Kingstar model as installations from prior 2003 seemed to feature the DSA speakers.

Now, I only know of 2 of those DSA-style installations: Garland, TX and rural Ventura, CA (see: https://airraidsirens.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1848 ; despite the arguing in the thread, you can go to Google Street View and see the ATI sticker on the boxes).

Given that ATI claims to have been around since 1981 (starting as a consulting firm), I'm curious if we know of any pre-2003 DSA installations besides the two mentioned above. As much of an interest as I have with electronic sirens, I'm trying to learn a bit more about the history of ATI (of course, I'd also love to know where they sourced those DSA style speakers and the Federal style boxes from). Any and all tips appreciated.

Thanks guys and gals!

Personally, I prefer to call those post-2003 installation head styles just CJ46 Arrays, being that Atlas seems to have had connection with just about any siren company that has/had offered electronic sirens and they're really just cheap generic arrays at that.

Aside from that I know there are some of those CJ46 arrays installations in Dumas, TX and that's pretty much it.

As far as those cabinets are a concern, ATI could have possibly started that "1st version" back in '95 (with the intro to the MCP) to have their products as a "cheaper alternative-and looks the same-but with unexpected results" offering (cough...knockoffs...). Just thinking outside of the box there.

Oh yeah! Forgot about Dumas. Weren't they the ones who literally pulled the broken one(s) off the poles and threw them in the landfill?*

*I say this not trying to start an ATI bashing thread, but to try to recall something I read on here.

The Dumas ones are still there. Or at least they were about 6 months ago. They had replaced one with a 2001 but the other 2 were still up. The EMS director hates them. They never work. We went to get a recording and they failed. Of course with all the others that are there, these ATI's are not needed. Have 2 vids of the Dumas system.

Baytown, Texas used to have several of these DSA style ATIs. I originally thought they were Whelen 2000 arrays, but after talking with the emergency manager, he insisted that they were ATIs. I have no idea when they were installed though.

This is the only picture I could find of one of them since Google updated their streetview.


Baytown replaced all of them about four or five years ago with Modulators once they all quit working.


This is where it gets interesting. The reason I thought they were Whelen 2000s was because of this video which shows the sirens sounding a very Whelen like whoop tone.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQi8D_Ey4cQ

The only other possibility is that the Bayer refinery itself had Whelens, but that's very skeptical given that the closest siren location to the person who filmed the video is Holloway Park, which is on the other side of town from Bayer. So if this is the case Frisco, Texas was not the first instance of ATI using Whelen's tones.

You know, that's very interesting. That Sattelite View sure looks like a DSA style ATI with those white MCP style boxes.

I've seen that video before and just assumed Bayer had Whelens. So if that whoop came out of a similar ATI and not some extant Whelen (and if that video wasn't doctored in some way), that makes me wonder how early ATI's generated their tones. Certainly there's videoes of the ATIs using the Federal dual toned wind up (exemplar: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnLCRO-8PRk) to lead into a single tone pulsed alert, but this just reeks of "interesting."

The discussion here makes me wonder--and again NOT to start an ATI bashing thread--if we've already lost a great many early ATI sirens because they've broken down.

Well, I'm not sure if there is much discussion left to generate, but thanks for those who have helped me out (or may continue to as new information is generated).

They are Federal DSA's. There was a video which described how they had ATI controls and how they completely failed. I have no idea why they didn't just go with Federal controls.

echo1030 wrote:They are Federal DSA's. There was a video which described how they had ATI controls and how they completely failed. I have no idea why they didn't just go with Federal controls.

They are ATIs. Even if you are referring to Dumas.

kdksiren on YouTube wrote:But the Dumas EMS Director says he bought all 4 that are there from ATI. When they break, whick seems to be often, he calls or gets parts from ATI.

To support such a statement here are two examples of look-alikes:
1.

2. *Video Proof: http://youtu.be/PMi0EGr5TN8?t=14s

Notice how the driver compartments there lacks a warning label verus what every other DSA I've seen has.


Also take a look at this image and compare to the next one. The ATI's actual top enclosure for the main controls is a bit more tall than a MCP and the battery enclosure seems to be the same width compared to an MCP, also lacking signs of warning labels:

1.
2.
*I take none credit in these pictures.

Also relating to the picture of the one in Ventura, DSA arrays cannot exceed 6 horns per unit unless they are wired semi-together. Notice how there are 8.

What I'm curious to know is if those older ATIs used the singular Class D Amplifier or if they really tried to mimic Federal with there 2x 200W = one whole 400W amp idea.

echo, who knows what's up with the arrays. I've always figured Federal doesn't make the DSAs but buys them off someone else (Atlas?) and resells them. The DSA is such a simple design it would make sense. I figure ATI did the same thing and purchased from the same manufacturer. I don't figure Federal would happily sell its equipment to a competitor to reuse!

You know...darn good question you raised with the Class D amps, Mysterious. Time for some total speculation on my part (can ya handle it? ). I'm going to pull all sorts of information from this thread I posted, so catch up if you need to: https://airraidsirens.com/forums/viewto ... =2&t=15184

ATI filed both its patents for using a Class D amp in early warning siren systems in 2002. My guess is that they had tried it out before then, given they were making sirens before 2002 (but my hunch is probably not long before 2002, given the relative scarcity of the pre-Kingstar ATIs). Mind you, the Nashville ATIs had the same MCP-style boxes as are seen on the Atlas ATIs, so my guess is same electronics, different speakers.

Now, that being said, if you note in my thread I post a picture of an ATI amp from an eBay auction, then later show modern ATI boxes. The modern ATI boxes use amp boards directly inside the cabinet seemingly a part of the control board whereas the 1600 watt HPSS amp seen from the auction is modular in nature and totally self-contained. Both, however, seem to share the same layout corresponding to a Class D amp.

My hunch (and its only a hunch) is that the amp seen on eBay is from an early MCP style ATI cabinet (be it from a Kingstar or Atlas system) and that the MCP-style cabinets used some kind of modular design similar to what Federal was doing at the time (notice the connector to a mother board on the back of the eBay amp). I would figure you can hook less than 1600 watts into a 1600 watt amp, even though our Atlas ATI exemplars feature either 4x 400 watts or 2 x 800 watts (both getting us to 1600 watts; its also hard to see what's going on with the Baytown example). Furthermore, I think this means that ATI indeed used a 1600 watt Class D amp from day 1, but changed it from a modular model to a board sometime along the way (likely when they began using their own cabinet design...perhaps as a reason for their current design). I also believe that ATI has used the fact they use a Class D amp as a differentiator from day 1. Whether or not the D amp for outdoor warning is what switched them from a consulting firm to a manufacturer is a matter of deeper speculation that I won't get into, but there is some convincing evidence in that direction.

*end speculation*

I wonder if this helps you along, Mysterious.

I also have an update from earlier.

TboltTX1 wrote:
The only other possibility is that the Bayer refinery itself had Whelens, but that's very skeptical given that the closest siren location to the person who filmed the video is Holloway Park, which is on the other side of town from Bayer. So if this is the case Frisco, Texas was not the first instance of ATI using Whelen's tones.

I also did a little more digging I should have done earlier. The poster of the above video seems to later confirm there's Whelens at Bayer in the form of 2700s (though the OP seems confused about what they are; given there's a high pitched analog 864 whoop, I figure its probably a 2700).

Source:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2SnhS-btq8

To support my statement above, Not all DSA's have a warning label. Where I live, on O'ahu, there are about 50+ DSA's and some of the new one don't have any warning labels possibly because they got painted over. Look at the mounting bracket on the one with the ATI controller, they are identical to the pictures of the DSA's in Kailua and Kahuku below which is a dead giveaway that they are Federals. Those boxes on the picture do look darn close to the federal MCP but the top box is much taller, like an older MC. It almost seems like ATI is trying to "copy" the federal MC design, at least when it comes to the boxes and the "batteries in a separate box" design since most ATI's have the batteries, amps, and motherboard in the same box. Could they have fit the ATI guts in a Federal MC box (if it is a MC box) if the MC died?