horn/strobes should stay out of restrooms.

I see certain restrooms in my area that have horn/strobes installed inside them, sometimes even very small restrooms the size of a walk-in closet. No need for a horn in the restrooms. Remote strobes will do.

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I had an architect require speakers with 1W taps in all bathrooms that had showers because the ambient volume of the shower was in his words “too high” to be supported by the speakers in the hallways. Needless to say post project the customer had us lower the taps to 1/4W.

Yeah but he was talking about horns and not speakers. Obviously there definitely would need to be speakers in bathrooms because there is no way people in the bathrooms would not be able to hear the speakers. Horns however might be a little too much overkill unless it is a locker room.

One of the Dunkin Donuts I went to though had a Gentex GX-90 up above the sink in the bathroom.

Aren’t NAs in bathrooms required to be weatherproof? Does anyone manufacture weatherproof speaker/strobes?

Yes! Among others:
Wheelock ET70WP
SpectrAlert Advance (the weatherproof speaker/strobes are distinguished from the indoor version by the screws on the side.)

There are also weatherproof EST Integrities.

That being said, my freshman and sophomore dorms only had strobes in the restrooms. Speakers in the halls were just fine. My junior/senior apartment complex on the other hand…the horns in the 2 BR units were in the bathrooms.

At a few places in Canada, I have seen bells in restrooms.

When my high school did a partial upgrade and replaced the 2DCDs+AV32s (a total of TWO of them) with Siemens U-MMTs, they also but TrueAlerts in the bathrooms. The classrooms that had bathrooms got strobes (even if it had a direct exit outside with no horn/strobe in the room) but the ones in the HALLWAYS got horn/strobes.

That’s the first I’ve heard about NAs in bathrooms having to be weatherproof. I’ve certainly been in plenty of bathrooms that clearly had non-weatherproof NAs.

Unless it’s a particularly large bathroom, I agree that there’s no need for horns. And putting them in small one-toilet bathrooms really seems like overkill, yet it seems to happen quite a bit, sometimes even when there’s a horn right outside the bathroom.

For voice systems, I would say that average-sized bathrooms should have speakers in them. I was rather surprised that the bathrooms in my freshman dorm didn’t have them, especially considering there are showers in there. The remote strobe didn’t seem like it would be that easily visible from the shower area either. What’s even odder is that some other dorms that had the same design, but with fewer levels, had HORNS in their bathrooms.

Multiple person bathrooms typically have speaker/strobes when buildings have voice evac so the voice can be clearly heard inside the bathroom.

Speakers can be pretty loud too, I know of a couple speaker systems around here that are pretty deafening when activated. & I have seen bells installed in restrooms too, I saw one a few days ago when I was eating at a local restaurant, needless to say I wouldn’t want to be in there when that bell goes off.

Bells are the worst. Ouch!

Welp, 65 Square in Bellows Falls, Vermont, which is where Subway is, has Wheelock ASes and there’s a Wheelock AS in the restroom!
Also a smoke detector in the restroom, too! Looks like a Mircom system, I thought in the next room over, I saw a Mircom FX2000…
The pulls are Mircom dual-action T-bars.

At the Springfield, Vermont Shaw’s, there’s a Wheelock AS in the restroom out back, too!

In my middle school, they had Gentex GX-90 horn strobes. Considering their loud, high pitched chirp I don’t think anyone wants to be in there when it goes off. However, in my high school, one of the larger bathrooms has a ceiling mounted Siemens ZH horn/strobe. I’ll assume it’s the same for the Girls’ bathroom. All the other bathrooms in the school have remote strobes.

I mentioned that in my Kindergarten drill post that they put TrueAlert horn/strobes in the classroom’s bathrooms! Explanation please, thats just loud

In a Walgreens near my house, there’s a Gentex Commander 1 located above the sink! There’s also a pull station besides the door inside the bathroom! Again with the high pitched horns…

At my Dad’s work, there are all System Sensor MASSes in all the bathrooms, including single toilet bathrooms! A couple bathrooms have older SpectrAlert Classic horn/strobes too. Any bathroom with a newer Classic or Advance is a remote strobe thank GOD no one has to listen to those.

So yeah. It’s pretty uncommon to see horn/strobes in restrooms, but when they are used, it can be pretty bad.

There’s a pull station in the Walgreens bathroom? That’s interesting. I’ve never seen a pull station in a bathroom before.

[quote] In a Walgreens near my house, there's a Gentex Commander 1 located above the sink! There's also a pull station besides the door inside the bathroom! Again with the high pitched horns...

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Pulls in bathrooms may be uncommon, but I one came across a pull in an unfinished attic only accessible by using an extension ladder to reach a small door 10+’ off the ground.

Here’s the 65 Square restroom:

holy… wow.

Well if you had problems going to the bathroom and you were in there when that went off, it would probably help you with having to go. :lol:

Hey, I want to get my hands on a Wheelock ET70WP.

Why should horn strobes not be in restrooms? (bathrooms)