Actually it was a Simplex 4903 remote horn set to continuous, not a TruAlert
Oh, okay: I had to go by the sound as I don’t think I could see the device itself, & given what kind of alarm usually makes that sound I went with “TrueAlert”. It’s one of those rare 4903s that has a TrueAlert horn in it huh?
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Yep, we also have one in one of the school’s portables and ones with strobes in the school’s annex
Ah, neat. Not sure I’ve ever seen a remote horn model 4903 with a TrueAlert horn in it: all I’ve seen are horn/strobe models.
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Those horn only 4903 TrueAlerts are quite rare compared to the horn/strobe one
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The first fire alarm I heard was a system sensor SpectrAlert on Code 3 during a drill at my 4k School. In my elementary school, they had a Simplex 4037-1, but mostly SpectreAlerts, and I think I also saw one 4040?
At my current school, They have TrueAlerts in the hallways and Ceiling Mounted 4903’s in the rooms.
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Moved this comment to “What alarm do you have at work/school”
In this post, I want to talk about my school district’s old high school. I know that I have talked about it a lot (probably too much lol), but I want to review it because I now know most of the history. I also just wanted to have this in writing to look at, but I thought others might also be interested as it is a very interesting building with an interesting system and an interesting history.
A map of the high school:
First, I will divide the building into sections to make this easier to understand. I will be referring to the map above. Keep in mind that it is facing with the cardinal directions (the top is north and the bottom is south).
Darker Orange (Original Part of the Main Building): This is the original building that was opened in 1957. It has three floors in the eastern wing, and one floor in the southern/western wing.
Light Gray (on the north-east side of the main building): This is the gymnasium addition that was done in 1959. It consists of a gymnasium with a single basketball court that is ringed by a hallway with classrooms, locker rooms, and an entrance/ticket area.
Blue: This is another academic wing that was added in 1965. It only has two floors.
Green: This is a vo-tech addition that was added in 1975. It has one floor that matches up with the rest of the wing it attaches to.
Light Yellow: This is an addition that made the cafeteria about twice as big that was added in 1986.
Light Gray (on the south side of the main building): This is an auditorium addition that added a 400 seat auditorium with an extremely large stage to the school. It was finished in 1986. It is only one floor that matches up with the original wing it is attached to.
Dark Gray (on the south-east side of the main building): This is an addition that added a new library to the school. It was finished in 1986. Unlike the rest of the building, this part has no fire protection for some reason.
Brown: This is another academic wing addition that was added in 1996. This is the newest part of the building. It is two floors.
Lighter Orange (Separate building north of the main building- “Braves Center”): This building was built in 1983. It houses an alternative high school, an aquatic center, more vo-tech classes and shops, additional classrooms for the main high school, an additional gymnasium (although quite a bit smaller), and the district offices. The building has been renovated a few times, but the most recent was in 2010 that renovated the gymnasium and vo-tech parts.
Dark Gray (Separate building to the north-east of the main building- “All Seasons Arena”): This building was built at some point in the early 90’s. It originally housed a hockey arena, an athletic training room, and wrestling rooms. Now, it has the same things except the hockey arena was remodeled into three basketball courts.
The only parts that have sprinkler systems are the auditorium, the 2010 remodeled part of the Braves Center building, and the entire All Seasons Arena building. Now, let’s get into the fire alarm systems:
Main building:
Original System (Only applies to the 1957, 1959, 1965, and 1975 parts. Was in service from 1957-1986.):
Panel: Unknown (likely a coded system)
Notification Appliances: Seemingly some dual projector AC horns and Simplex 4050 or similar AC horns
Pull Stations: Unknown flush-mounted coded pull stations
Detectors: Unknown- probably some sort of heat detectors
Annunciator: Almost certainly none
Second(?) System (Installed in all parts of the main building. Was in service from 1986-2007. This system was installed when the three additions were done in 1986.):
Panel: Cerberus Pyrotronics XL3 (extremely early addressable panel)
Notification Appliances: Pyrotronics rebranded Wheelock 7002T horn/strobes in most of the building. The gym and the auditorium restrooms have Cerberus Pyrotronics rebranded Wheelock MT horn/strobes with LSM strobes. The front entrance has a ceiling-mount Edwards Integrity horn/strobe that was presumably installed at some point in the late 90’s when Edwards worked with the district for a few years (the first and only time that ever happened). There are also some Cerberus Pyrotronics MTL-s17F (or similar) horn/strobes in the 1996 addition and at least one as a 7002T replacement in an older part of the building. In the 1957 and 1959 parts of the main building, the devices are mounted on surface mounted back boxes over where the old devices would have been. In the later parts, the devices are mounted on Wheelock 7002T trim plates over where the original horns would have been.
Pull Stations: Likely Pyrotronics MSX-1 addressable pull stations- most mounted on red painted oversized metal plates over where the flush mounted coded pull stations were.
Detectors: Mostly unknown, but I know for sure they had Pyrotronics DC-1 dual sensor smoke detectors by the elevators (probably would have been monitored by TRX-2D addressable monitor modules). The rest of the school could have had anything. They could have used those, DI-AX3 addressable ionization detectors, PEX-3000 addressable photoelectric detectors, DT-X3 addressable heat detectors, or something completely different.
Annunciator: Unknown
Final System (Installed in all parts of the main building. In service from 2007-current.):
Panel: Simplex 4100U
Notification Appliances: Most are the same as before, but around half of the 7002T rebrands have died over the past 5-10 years and have been replaced with Simplex TrueAlert horn/strobes (probably free-run)
Pull Stations: Simplex 4099-9001 addressable pull stations (most mounted in the same spots as the previous system over the existing coded pull stations).
Detectors: Simplex TrueAlarm addressable smoke detectors and heat detectors
Annunciator: Some sort of Simplex lcd Annunciator that is surface mounted at the front entrance (near that Integrity horn/strobe I talked about earlier)
Braves Center:
Original System (In service from 1983-late 90’s.):
This system is completely unknown to me. I have no idea. I just know that the building was built in 1983 and the oldest current devices are late 90’s devices that are surface mounted with conduit.
Second System (In service from the late 90’s-2014 or 2015.):
Panel: Probably a simplex 4004
Notification Appliances: Simplex electronic 4903 horn/strobes and 4904 remote strobes (all horizontally oriented units with vertical strobes)
Pull Stations: Probably Simplex 2099-9754 conventional pull stations
Detectors: Unknown
Annunciator: Unknown, but probably none
Third System (In service from 2014 or 2015-current.):
Panel: Simplex 4007ES
Notification Appliances: Most remain the same as before, but some dead 4903 and 4904 devices have been replaced by TrueAlerts (at least one mounted oddly on a 4903 backbox), and the areas that were remodeled in 2010 now have SmartSync TrueAlert horn/strobes
Pull Stations: Simplex 4099-9001 addressable pull stations
Detectors: Simplex TrueAlarm addressable smoke detectors and heat detectors
Annunciator: None (Panel is located at the front door)
All Seasons Arena
Original System (In service from the early-mid 90’s-current (the building’s only ever system)):
Panel: Most Likely a Cerberus Pyrotronics SXL
Notification Appliances: All of the original notification appliances were Cerberus Pyrotronics rebranded Faraday 6226-W mechanical horn/strobes. The system was expanded not long after it was originally installed with Siemens U-HN-MCS horn/strobes and U-MCS remote strobes for better coverage in the locker rooms, restrooms, and athletic training room (not 100% sure on the candela ratings). At one point around the same time, a 6226-W in the athletic training room got replaced with an Edwards Integrity horn/strobe (during that same short time period when the school district worked with Edwards). Recently (within the past 1-2 years), a few older devices have been replaced with Siemens ZH-MC-R horn/strobes.
What does the future hold for these buildings (and their fire alarm systems)?:
Main Building:
The main building is already mostly vacant due to a new high school (that I have already talked about way too much lol) being built in my district to replace this old one. The only thing being used in the main building is the Auditorium (and that is not even once a month). This is because the new school’s auditorium is not done yet and is not set to be done for 3-6 months. Once they get fully done with the new building and no longer need the old building, they are planning to demolish it and turn the area into mixed use buildings/a park/a town center/a new housing development. Sadly, the main building will probably be gone within the next few years. Despite this, they are continuing to maintain the building (including the fire alarm system). They will continue to do this until the building is no longer needed for anything. This past summer, they were testing the system while I was in summer school there and I saw one of the technicians as well as one of the custodians going around with their Solo poles. Unfortunately, they didn’t set off the NAC’s while I was there. The only time I ever heard this system go off was in fourth grade. We were in the auditorium practicing because our elementary school was having a performance there. We were on the stage when the alarm went off. That area has all rebranded 7002T’s. Unfortunately, they are all sick so they were very quiet. We didn’t even realize it was a fire alarm until someone noticed the extremely dim strobes flashing.
In 2019, the district had a study done on the old building. They found out that, based on the crazy amount of structural and code issues the old building has, it would cost just as much money to repair it as it would to build a new building. That didn’t even count adding onto the new building. They came up with two options that the public voted on:
- Update the old building to fix structural issues and make it meet code. Also, add on much needed space.
- Build a brand new building that is twice the size as well as a brand new elementary school for slightly less money than the first option.
- Do nothing
Obviously, despite wanting to save old buildings, they weren’t going to choose the first one. Eventually, almost 90% of the people voted towards option two.
If anyone is interested in seeing the results of that study, here it is:
I would highly recommend taking a look at the above study. It does mention the FA systems, but it also goes over a ton of other aspects of the buildings. Mainly, it highlights the reasons why they decided to build a new building. It shows just how much was wrong with the old one and what it would have taken to fix it.
Braves Center:
This building will continue to serve as the district offices for the foreseeable future. They will turn the classroom, gymnasium, and vo-tech areas into a storage facility for the district. The pool equipment will be reaching the end of its useful life within the next decade, and there are no plans to make upgrades. If deemed necessary, they will add a pool onto the new building. Who knows what will happen with that part of the building. There are no plans to make any changes to the fire alarm system anytime soon.
All Seasons Arena:
This building will continue to be used for sports both by the school district and by the community. The upper level with the wrestling and weight rooms will likely be turned into something for the local parks & rec department (they actually have joint ownership of this building with the district) because the new building has replacements for those. I wouldn’t be surprised if the fire alarm system got an upgrade in the near future because it is out of support and is over 30 years old. Also, it is serviced by my local Siemens dealer who is pretty good at getting customers to keep their older systems up to date.
Pictures and additional information:
Below is a photo from the principals office I took from an old video from 1988. You can see the xl3 as well as a mystery console in the background. The xl3 system would have been only two years old at that point. The 4100U is currently in that exact spot.
Below is a map of what would have happened if they would have gone with the option of expanding the old building.
Below is a map of the property of the new building that was built.
Here are pictures of the main building and its system as it stands today:
Picture of how the outside of the main building originally looked:
Unfortunately, it doesn’t look this good anymore. Around 35-40 years ago, they removed most of the windows and decorations from the front for whatever reason.
Final Thoughts:
Thanks to everyone that helped me figure out the history of this system. This system is one of the systems that originally sparked my interest for fire alarms. It has always interested me. Now, my area has moved on to bigger and better things that were much needed. Although I’ll miss this place when it’s gone in a couple of years, the new place more than makes up for it. They would have just updated this place instead of building a new building, but the structural issues (the gym wing is starting to collapse and fall into the ground) and the lack of the building being sprinklered made it insanely expensive.
I hope someone finds this post at least mildly interesting as I spent a few hours working on it. Thanks again, and I hope to have more interesting posts eventually. I will also update on this building’s progress.
My elementary school had only SpectrAlert Classics, my middle school also had a single SpectrAlert horn near the front door but it didn’t work
There’s been a few instances where I’ve heard an alarm in public. One time in 2018 I was in one of the hallways at my local mall to use the bathroom and I heard an Edwards integrity on code 3 in the distance. (Eventually a fire fighter showed up). Then another time I was in Seattle for vacation and heard the “Slow-Whoop” sound in the distance. I wasn’t able to find the source unfortunately so I couldn’t figure out what model it was. Then there was the time where I was at a hotel which had SpectrAlert advances, which went off while I was asleep, so that startled me awake.