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Fearguy1234
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Mountings

Fri Aug 26, 2016 8:32 pm

Hello! Recently, I have been thinking about some sirens, and their places in an old siren system. For example, some sirens were ''freely mounted'' meaning they were usually put up around a place that needed advanced warning (Such as a school, neighborhood, or a Downtown area) on their OWN pole, instead of on a building, using their own power source, and using their own equipment. These sirens had to be activated by a telephone line, or by Siratrol. However, some sirens are infamous for being building mounted, and being controlled by equipment inside of the building. For example, if you google a Federal Signal Model 5 etc, you usually only see them on a building, or on a mount outside of a fire station or other building, instead of being freely mounted on a pole.

Do you have any pictures where a: 3t22, 2t22, Model 5, Model 5T, Any sterling siren, or any siren, is freely mounted, instead of on a building, etc? ( It can't be pole mounted beside a building, where the equipment is inside of the building)

(By the way, the only time I've ever seen a Model 5 ''freely mounted'' was when they were used in the old Los Angeles system, with maintenance cages beside them.)

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All of these sirens are either building mounted, or mounted onto a pole that is right outside of the building that controls them.
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Minnesota2T22
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Re: Mountings

Fri Aug 26, 2016 9:35 pm

Free mounted sirens are alot more common than roof-mounted sirens where I live. Most of the time, sirens with the equipment/controller inside a building are in small towns at fire departments. In larger cities, sirens are controlled by the city/county and can all be activated at once.
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r4tbolts
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Re: Mountings

Fri Aug 26, 2016 10:35 pm

Interesting thought got me to thinking. In my County (Jackson Co. MI) the old system was almost exclusive roof top mounts with the exception of a water tower mount that replaced a building mount when the fire house closed the siren was mounted on. Mostly school buildings and fire stations were where sirens were rooftop mounted as well as the Court House which had a Chrysler (now has a T-Bolt). When the big upgrade to 2001's in he late 90's early 2000's happened all the sirens were pole mounted. The only rooftop siren we have now is a T-bolt on the Court House and I think there is still a Model 5 active on a school building.

None of the rooftop sirens here were ever on private buildings. Not sure who paid the utilities for the electric City, School or Township but I do know OEM paid Michigan Bell Telephone monthly for the dedicated loop that activated the sirens which wasn't cheap BTW.

Another interesting thing about the phone loop sirens was the little brown box ringers, that had the 1,2,3,4 lights and rang like a phone for test, alert, attack,( can't remember what #4 was). The ringer and light would activate when the siren on the building did.

Finally one more thing about the old system here, many school buildings and government buildings that did not have sirens had the Old Federal Ten-Ten radio receivers that were used to alert the schools.

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Fearguy1234
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Re: Mountings

Sat Aug 27, 2016 4:31 am

Yes, today, sirens are more commonly found on their own dedicated pole with their own equipment. It's very rare that I see an old siren enclosed into a system, because they are usually rooftop mounted and controlled from within the building.

Also, what were the little brown box ringers called? I believe these were similar to the ''Boneheads'' used in the Ladybug Ladybug Movie.

Used here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXOZzBwXGS0

Also, this was part of the Civil Defense Bells and Lights Attack Warning System.
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3t22
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Re: Mountings

Sat Aug 27, 2016 10:03 am

The Vernon CT 3T22B taken a week after it's removal from service back in 2007.
3t22.jpg
Proud owner of a 2T, 5, M-5, 1000 Head, 7T, 3T22, and a single toned 2

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r4tbolts
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Re: Mountings

Sat Aug 27, 2016 2:21 pm

@Fearguy1234....Yes, the box in the movie is pretty much the same just a tad different in appearance. The ringers we had were numbered 1,2,3,4 and not with letters. Not all but some of the ringers had a 4 hole dialer 1,2,3,&4. that would activate all the Civil Defense sirens on the phone line loop. Jackson City/County OEM replaced the phone loop and switched to radio controlled sirens in the early 1980's.

There is a clip on you-tube about a tornado outbreak in Cincinnati back in the 70's that shows Civil Defense activating the sirens with the ringer/dialer box I described. I'll have to look and see if I can find the clip. It has been posted here on ARS a couple of years ago on a thread about siren activations.

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