Fire Station Alert & Two Tone Detect

[andrewhags]

Looking to upgrade (fix) our current station alerting setup, specifically with the use of a relay to power lights and a potential a game-well bell. I have two main options I can think of
Option 1 - Utilize the accessory port on the rear of a pager amplifier to power the lights and bell. The issue with this is we are combination fire and EMS department, and we would lose the ability to have multiple options (ie: trigger a red light for fire, blue light for EMS ect) as the pager tripping just opens the relay.
Option 2 - We have a Rasberry PI running two tone detect that currently is used for IAR audio alerts as well as programmed to run a script to open an audio file which alerts which is tied into the audio alerting system throughout the building. Would it be possible to write a script and utilize a USB relay to trigger the lights and bell? If so does anyone have any input on how to do so?

 

[mmckenna]

Option 3 - Use a traditional 2 way radio that has the 2 tone and trigger outputs to do what you want. We ran Motorola CDM-1250's at our station for years.

 

[krokus]

The Two-Tone Detect is great, but the author specifically says to not use it for critical systems.

Option 4: Two pagers, with cradles, each hooked to their respective alerting circuits.

Using a mobile as a base, that can trigger multiple outputs might be the better option. (Such as mmckenna listed in option 3.)

 

[cpg178]

You can do option 2, I have a setup with USB relays that triggers lights and bells, or just lights depending on the tone received. And for some tones just sends me an email with the audio file. However there are times where the lights don't go off, requiring me to unplug and plug the light relay USB back in. So I agree with the others above I would not trust it in a real environment, but it is fun to play with in a test setup. I will say that it seems it is my USB relay that has the issue, I have very rarely had TTD fail to alert to a page, it is usually other factors such as the USB relay or a gmail issue preventing the email/text from being sent if and when there is an issue.

 

[littona]

The Two-Tone Detect is great, but the author specifically says to not use it for critical systems.

Option 4: Two pagers, with cradles, each hooked to their respective alerting circuits.

Using a mobile as a base, that can trigger multiple outputs might be the better option. (Such as mmckenna listed in option 3.)

One of our bases uses two-tone paging to open their hangar doors. Sometimes it doesn't work. Blame the radio guys.

 

[kf8yk]

Look at the Federal Signal Informer tone alert receiver: I-HIOW, I-UIOW, I-HIO and I-UIO Informer Tone-Alert Radio It's designed for your application.

It has two programmable relays, you could set up one relay for fire & the other for EMS. Relays can be programmed for timed release or latching.

 

[mmckenna]

I'd echo the others here. Using some hobby grade applications/raspberry Pi setup sounds like a disaster waiting to happen. Might work fine, but if it fails once and a call gets missed/delayed, they are likely to come looking for someone to throw under the bus.

This is not a new application. This has been done for a very long time. I'd caution you against trying to reinvent the wheel on a critical application like this without having years of proven reliability to back it up.

The Federal Signal unit that kf8yk linked to above is an excellent off the shelf solution. If you have known good mobile radios on hand, you can easily build your own.

 

[a417]

another +1 for the Fed Sig informer. Officially supported functionality, new unit will have warranty, quite flexible in terms of what you need. I always liked the wall mount variety.

 

[jeepsandradios]

Add me to the list of the Federal Signal Informer. Installed hundreds over the years for FS alerting tied to PLC for lights, doors, valves and the mix.

 

[a417]

Add me to the list of the Federal Signal Informer. Installed hundreds over the years for FS alerting tied to PLC for lights, doors, valves and the mix.

Programming software design by Play-Skool.