Most Maintenance-Friendly Siren

[jkvernon]

So I've been wondering for quite some time about the cost of maintaining a siren system. Here's a quote from Clayt Werden from a while back in the Hamilton County Siren Thread...

"The old sirens are costly to maintain" WOW wait till the new ones go in.

Now each community pays for their repairs and EMA only pays for the malfunction diagnosis at $50.00 per call. I think last year there were 50 or 60 work orders and most were due to not changing gel-cells after 3 or 4 years. A lot of sirens are placed where they use electricity from fire stations, schools,etc.

New sirens: 200 battery sirens, which means 800 batteries at $100 a piece plus 90% of the sirens will be supplied by Duke for a flat fee for electric. So take $80,000.00 divide that number by 3 years or $27,000.00 per year plus 180 sirens at 15 to 20 dollars a month or $3,500 per month times 12 is $42,000.00. Therefore $42,000 + $27,000 = about $70,000 with no malfunctions or repairs so we will say $100,000.00 per year maintenance compared to $2,500.00."

I've been told that Franklin County dishes out about $1,200 per year per siren for their system of 181 Whelens totaling about $217,200 average for the system each year.

My question is, how much does it cost to operate an AC only siren system vs. a system of DC only or AC/DC sirens? Also, does it really cost that much more to maintain a system of electronic sirens vs. a system of mechanical sirens? It's just a thought, but would it be better to use a system of both AC and DC powered sirens?

[Travis]

I believe KDKsiren asked this same question to the City of Amarillo, and they seemed to indicate that the cheapest sirens for them to operate as far as maintenance and upkeep were the Cyclones.

Omni-directional AC mechanical sirens are always going to be the cheapest to deal with, especially if they are 3-phase. Sirens like the Cyclone are virtually maintenance free. You don't have any kind of follow up maintenance really, you just fix it when it breaks. I haven't ever heard of one suffering some kind of catastrophic failure though, other than lightning.

As you get more complicated, you start adding costs of maintenance. Sirens like the 2001 and T-128 have more motors to break down. Electronics have the issue of blowing drivers, and lets not even get started on the Thunderbolt.

The fact is that batteries are the best way to alternately power sirens. Unfortunately they don't last forever, and you just have to bite the bullet and replace them when it comes time. As far as which system works better, I don't know. I like the idea that our Whelens are run off of DC only, with some not even having service entrances and being 100% solar reliant. In this way you always know if the batteries are good: if they aren't, the siren isn't going to sound ever, something you would take note of if you had regular testing practices in place. But whether that is the best option for larger mechanical sirens like the 2001, 16V1T, and T-135DC, I don't know. Will the batteries last longer if they are just on a trickle charger and never used? Or is it better for them to get drained every month during the test?

[holler]

IMO the most maintenance free siren is pretty much any three phase omnidirectional.

Next up would be a single phase omnidirectional with a rep or series wound motor (brushes). The ones with capacitors are not that great.