Strobes, Bells, and Sirens -- Which and Where?

"David" a écrit dans le message de groupe de discussion : snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

It all depends..

and like someone said to me once.. its all about location, location, location and the type of alarm system..

we dont even know if its for burglar or for fire ;-)

Details, details, details:

Commercial/residential .... fire/burglar ...... 1/2/? story .... single/multiple dwelling, sleeping locations, big/small dwelling etc, etc, etc...............

Great responses Pete and Jim! :)

That was a good example of how one can miss the forest while busy focusing on the trees wasn't it? I think it's called myopia. :)

O.K, I'm talking about a burglar alarm for a single family residential dwelling. All of the rooms for a standard residence will be located on the ground floor, plus two bedrooms and an office room. The second floor will have only the master bedroom plus bath.

The location will be in a rural wooded area, with the closest neighbor about 100 meters distant. The property is surrounded with walls and fences which, according to the neighbors, are normally respected. The rate of violent crime, at least so far, has been nil; however, there is some petty thievery and occasional breakins in the surrounding areas.

I would seldom, if ever, plan to leave the house unattended over night; and I plan to have the system auto-dial the neighbors if/when alarmed.

Residential alarm systems are very uncommon around here, (I'm in NE Thailand); and the perps, at least so far, are pretty unsophisticated, so I would expect that most would be quite surprised by any kind of alarm sounder or strobe.

Hope this provides enough background information -- but if not, please ask.

Thank you again, David

Inside, near the bedrooms.

I hardly ever put exterior sirens in, but you might consider one with a strobe where a neighbor "may" hear it and see the strobe, then run over to investigate and get shot by the burglar.

Personally, I tend to favor the Binford 9800 PRS (Perp Removal System). You'll need a relay and contactor to handle the 98 gigajoule laser but you really can't beat charcoaled perp for your rose bushes.

Or ..... not knowing enough about a subject to even know what questions to ask. But ya gotta start somewhere .........

I presume you are going to put contacts on all doors and windows.

Bells have pretty much fallen out of favor. They are electro- mechanical and have a finite life expectancy, especially in humid and damp areas. The term "annunciator" can mean a lot of things and encompasses bells and sirens but it can include smaller sounders too .... such as found in keypads etc. Now days sirens are used to announce an intrusion. Not like a fire engine siren but a "whooping" sound. Here, in the US, outdoor sounding devices are not used as much as in the past. Mainly because no one pays any attention to them anymore and also because central station monitoring is depended upon to notifiy someone that an intrusion is occuring. You'll find more often commercial installations will have out door sounders. Residential will usually not have them. Again, due mostly to central station monitoring. Indoor sounders are used to warn the intruder that they have been detected and the occupant that the system has been breached if they are at home.

In your case, alerting the neighbors seems to be more appropriate than calling the authorities. obviously, the problem with doing that is that you may be setting the neighbor up to get hurt, should he interrupt a crime in progress. You will have to decide what you want to do about that.

At 100 meters you'll have to use quite a powerfull siren driver. Also consider that siren speakers are very directional. Putting a speaker on only one side of the house leaves the sound on the other side of the house at a fairly low volume. Pick your directions and use at least two speakers. Self contained sirens are not typically powerfull devices. Look to get a seperate siren driver board and seperate speakers. I think Moose makes the most powerfull siren driver but I don't have need of such heavy duty units so someone else will have to give you the part numbers. Run at least 18 gauge wire to the speakers and if it's over 50 feet make it 16 gauge.

How you want to mount to speakers is another thing you have to consider. Do you just want speakers hanging on the outside of your home? Do you want to mount them so someone cannot just knock them off the building before breaking in? There are siren speaker boxes that the speakers can be housed in that contain tamper switches. Should someone try to open the box, or remove it from the wall, it will trip the alarm. If you have attic vents, you might be able to conceal the speakers in the attic but directly up against the attic vents so they can be heard out side.

Depending upon the size of the home, one or two smaller speakers should be mounted inside.

How multiple speakers are wired is something that you will have to pay attention to also. So that you apply a proper load to the siren driver with an equal dispersion of sound. You can only put so much of a load on a siren driver. ie, with lots of speakers, you may have to use more than one siren driver.

You lead a sheltered life! ;-)

As mentioned above, consider this carefully. I don't know if there is anything like a central station in your area but if you are going to alert your neighbors via a dialer device, you realize, of course, that you are depending upon a lot of favorable events being in place in order for your message to be received by someone. And you have to determine what you want them to do, when if they even DO receive it.

Stobes, here in the US are used outside the building and primarily to help the authorites locate which building or home has the alarm condition. I've never put a strobe inside, but obviously it has to be put in a prominent spot to be effective .... It would be up to you to decide if you wanted this device hanging on your wall or ceiling in plain sight.

You did not mention whether you are installing a fire alarm system too. This would add a number of other considerations.

If I were to guess ..... it might be something based on water buffalo power.

Now don't start steering him wrong.

Stop horning in. You're lible to wind up taking the bull by the tail.

**Crash: The electrical power is 220v/50hz. The two installers that I have found here offer Texecom and Bosch systems that are power-compatible. My primary concerns right now are 1) which of these two products/installers I should select, (any thoughts?); and 2) if/when I later want to import and DIY some of the products that I have learned about in this NG, (e.g., Optex sensors), whether they will adapt to that panel I have already had installed. The complications increase exponentially when you're trying to do something uncommon in an uncommon location, don't they? (BTW, the main reason that I am not DIY'ing the entire system is that I want someone local to "own" the basic installation; for the very compatibility/adaptability reasons that you have just cautioned.) **Jim: Actually, from a "horsepower" standpoint you aren't too far off! . They still use them around here, although they are more common in the poorer areas, and on the east side of the (Mekong) river in Laos, Cambodia and Viet Nam. I'm on the west bank. Well, I'm getting off-topic here. But more on-topic, one of my related concerns is whether my neighbor's cows and water buffalo will set off my long range PIRs, , if I sometime in the future should end up installing them. My more immediate concern is that they keep eating my banana plants...

tallers that I

Product, I couldn't make a suggestion but as far as installers ..... I'd guess you'd have to use somewhat the same criteria as you would in the States .....or anywhere, for that matter. The one who's been around a long time is a good place to start. Who else (neighbors, etc) has used them that you can get good referrals from. In your area, do alarm companys have signs on buildings that they are protecting? If so, don't be shy about asking the home or business owners if they are satisfied with their performance.

I'm not positive about this, but I would think that the fact that something is being powered by 220v 50Hz would not make a difference to the 12VDC devices attached to it. You would only have to be concerned about devices that were directly powered from your household voltage.

Good thinking but be wary about them locking you out of the system. This can be a touchy situation but it depends upon if you are going to have them provide you with alarm monitoring services ..... if it's available or even useful in your area. If they are providing you with services that are dependent upon the operation of the panel, they would be wise to lock you out of the programing so that you didn't inadvertently muck something up in the monitoring portion of the programing, while doing some of your DIY tinkering. Likewise if you are going to have a service agreement for repair or maintenence. They won't want to be being called out on a service call just to fix a problem that you caused by messing up the programing. So, if they (rightly) lock you out of the sytem, there goes your DIY tinkering.

If they aren't providing you with any follow up services, then there would be no reason for them to have any obligation to you after the install .... anyway. So "owning" the system should probably be considered more like ... them "having familiarity" with the system.

ff-topic here.

I hope you mean outdoor motion detectors, other wise you'd better get some pretty sizable litter boxes in the house.

If its out door motion detectors you're talking about, I'm afraid your out of luck. There are pet immune motion detectors up to 100 pounds but nothing in the range of 1or 2000 pounds ... on up.

Here's an idea. It isn't a great expense or hard to insall either. If you don't have any domestic pets or small children around, you might try an electified fence around the perimiter or at least around the bannana plants. Ummm But then again, I guess it depends upon how you feel about domestic pets and small children.

Personally, I love them. They taste just like chicken.

You make a very good point here, (rightly), from an installer's POV. If I were an installer, say in America, (where I'm from), I am sure that I would feel exactly the same way. Fortunately, things are much more loose and free-wheeling over here. The favorite saying is, "mai pen rai" -- "don't worry, no problem". Unlike America, it isn't a regulation and lawyer-driven society here, where you have to worry about a liability litigation suit everytime you sneeze. Well, again, I'm getting OT.

Where I'm heading with this is that I would honestly be surprised if they would lock me out if I told them that I wanted to tinker with some DIY sensors. In fact, the response I would expect would be, "if you get into a problem by doing so, don't worry, we will work it out somehow". A rather innocent and startling attitude isn't it? I'm sure things will become more "modern" here when the lawyers arrive.

I guess I should say that part of my confidence with DIY tinkering comes from the fact that I have written a lot of software in the past so I kinda think that way, and also I have installed a couple of alarm systems from scratch. I sure wouldn't claim to be any expert, but with a good manual I think I should I hope be able to at least avoid doing something really stupid.

True, and if it should come to this, that's O.K. I'll import the ASA-recommended sensors from America and let them install them.

Good idea. Actually, I have thought about this. I grew up on a farm and have been shocked by an electric fence more than once myself, as a small child, and am still here, using USENET...

>

Thank you all so much for the very helpful information and education you all have given me on several topics over the last few months! It will be put to good use!

Have Happy Holidays and a Prosperous New Year, Be Well, David

One thing you want to plan for is make them independently redundant. It really freaks out burglars when they think they have silenced a siren only to find another one, or two, going in another location.

Bob

David wrote: