Oh yes Dicon had an alarm made as I said around 1976 to 1978. It looked similar to this only round. I am going to try to do a search again and if I do find pictures of it I will post it. The Dicon alarm also had a high pitched squealer horn to it. Very annoying and screechy is how I would put it. I was terrified of it as a child but when it went off you knew it. It made you literally jump 10 feet in the air. I wouldn’t be surprised if these two alarms had the same horn. I actually thought until today they were both Dicon alarms but just different shapes. I thought Oster was a brand that made kitchen appliances like toasters. We really do learn something new each day.
I am hoping this will work. I did a search and I found old newspaper ad from 1978 advertising the alarm. Sorry it is only a sketch but it is clear enough to see what the alarm looks like but I can see similarities between it and the Oster alarm.
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Get this newspaper
sorry I tried twice and I was not allowed to post the pic. I got a message saying it was a possible attack vector. But if you are interested in looking at it go to the google home page and type in dicon smoke alarm site: news:google.com/newpapers then click on the first article that says This Fire Alarm Could Save Your Life Home - Google News. It is only a sketch of the alarm but it is still a clear enough pic. Hope you are able to view it.
OK, believe it or not I never knew Oster made alarms, awesome find! Also to missj_73 I saw the image and I think this might be it:
Photo Storage
It looks similar to the one in the illustration. This was from “The Exorcism of Emily Rose” (2005) It was in the kitchen of, IIRC the lawyer. There was also a Westclox unit in the priest’s home:
Photo Storage
Note neither were going off, both thought they smelled smoke (at different times) so the scene switched to the alarms.
Yep that top alarm is the Dicon alarm my parents had in their old house. My parents also had the same Westclox one as well. I regret not taking both alarms. They also had an old Sears which got pitched as well. Im still on the lookout for all 3 though. I never saw that movie. That is interesting that they featured the alarms although you said they never went off in the movie. Although they appear to have the LED light on. Thanks for posting this Fire Alarm Fan
Sorry for all the posts on here but if anyone comes across that Dicon alarm please let me know on here. I don’t have an ebay account so the only way I can look for vintage alarms is rummage sales or thrift shops/antique shops. Which I am currently doing. I actually have 2 alarms that I have purchased with the last year and a half but have never got around to posting pics or videos of. Both at the same antique shop where I live. One is a Nortron smoke detector model TR88. Problem is it is the 120 VAC model and I don’t know how I can set it off. It does have a brass squealer and I can’t find the actual year the alarm was made but my guess is circa 1977 to 1980. The TR77 is the battery model which Im still looking for. Any help with the TR88 I would love. 
:). The other one is a Gardsman bell from the 1950’s or 1960’s. That one I can set off and I will do my best to post a video and picture of it as well as a pic of the Nortron alarm. But again if anyone locates the Dicon alarm please let me know. They were popular around the time they were made (1976-1978) but very hard to locate online.
For anyone who was interested in the Square-D alarms I posted about a while ago but was put off by the price they’re 40% off for the next 2 days (3/14)
http://www.ebay.com/itm/181639397971?_trksid=p2060778.m1438.l2648&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT
Check it out! A brand new still in the box GE Home Sentry 8201-401!
http://m.ebay.com/itm/181693218229?nav=SEARCH
Nice GE home sentry. I unfortunately don’t have a paypal account so rummage/garage sales and antique shops are my only way of getting vintage detectors/alarms. Or anyone is getting rid of them I will take them off their hands. Does that GE have a squealer or piezo horn? It looks like a later model since it is rectangular not square shaped.
All of the 401’s (rectangular shaped units) have piezo horns and make the “warble” tone that GE was known for. Most Black & Decker rebrands make a 5/6 pattern, but some later ones make the “warble” tone.
Okay thanks. That is interesting. What year were smoke alarms with piezos introduced? I heard it was around 1980. I don’t think before that. For some reason I thought it was more mid to late 1980’s.
What company was the first to manufacture them? Was it First Alert?
Smoke alarms used piezos as early as 1981. There’s a video on YouTube of a Sears alarm from 1981 that has a piezo. I think piezos were first used in battery-powered detectors, and that they started putting them in hardwired alarms in the mid-to-late '80s. Someone correct me if I’m wrong on that
The 1981 Sears with the square base was a Gateway rebrand
They had to have come put with piezo smoke alarms '80-'81
The FireX FX1020 was the last model to use the mechanical horns. It was made up until the late 80s.
Oh okay. My question is why did they stop using mechanical horns in the first place. They were much more serious sounding and some were down right scary sounding (Dicon and Sears models). Piezos do get your attention but I find no where near what mechanical horns did.
One word: money.
Also battery power conservation, and some other things.
No mechanical parts to get old and worn out, cheaper to manufacture, uses less power. The same exact reasons they are no longer used for commercial fire alarm notification appliances.
price, size, and current draw.
Oh okay. The parts wearing out I can understand but when it comes to saving someone’s life that’s alot more important than money. JUst my opinion. Even if there was a way to maintain the higher pitched squeal of the older mechanical alarms that would have been great. I still think they had a more frightening sound but again it worked for getting ones attention
The higher pitch actually doesn’t wake people up as well. Companies do all they can to maximize profits, so they usually put safety third.