Need Outdoor Siren/Strobe and Indoor Siren Recommendations

[nemesis]

I am just begining an HAI OMNIPRO II installation for my home and detached garage. I have most of the components in hand, but am still looking for some of the hardwired components. I am looking for recommendations on the following items:

1. Outdoor Siren/Strobe Combination - Require 4

2. Indoor Siren - Require 5

3. Wired Motion Sensors - Require Several

4. Wired Door Sensors - Require Several

5. Wired Glass Break Sensors - Require Several

6. Wired Smoke Detectors - Require 10

I am not in love with any one brand. Simply looking for suggestions and experiences on which ones are the most reliable while looking good (need to keep the wife happy). Thank you for your assistance.

 

[nemesis]

I appologize for this being such a broad, open-ended question, but I am suffering from information overload. I promise that I did not just post this before doing research. I have been researching for months with no clear winners. Wireless was easy, I stuck with HAI items. Wired however appears to be all over the board. I am just looking for suggestions from people who have actually used the above items with their OmniPro II set-ups and what your feedback is for your experience. For example, ATW siren/strobe combinations: Thumbs up/down? System Sensor Smoke Detectors: Thumbs up/down?

Thank you for any advice that you can provide.

 

[gatchel]

I use some of the following:

Bosch DS-835i motion detectors
Sentrol /GE Contacts
System Sensor 4WTA-B Smokes

Elk Sirens and speakers

 

[nemesis]

Thank you!

 

[nemesis]

Gatchel,
Thank you for your response. I have been reading a lot of information regarding 4 wire smoke detectors and have seen some pretty creative wiring schematics. Did you do anything special with the wiring of these sensors or did you keep it pretty straight forward?

 

[Del91574]

Honestly, running multiple 4 wire fire zones starts opening up a bunch of issues that can't easily be addressed, especially when installing a system to meet code requirements. Unless you have a very large house and install, the cons column outweighs the pro column IMHO....do you really need to know which smoke out of the 7 or 8 installed in a typical 4 bedroom house that meets code caused the event? Are you prepared to address all the functionality issues that are going to come into play for fire reset, troubles and tandem ring (if being installed)? Those are just the first issues I can think of when considering multiple zones of smoke detectors.

I would recommend using contacts that have terminals, not pigtails, usually almost any "brand name" unit is equivalent across all the manufacturers. I do use Bosch dual tecs (835I's and their newer replacement) and have had exceptional luck with Visonic Gtechs for glassbreaks. I commonly use System Sensor's I3 series detectors for fire alarm.

Siren, speakers and strobes depends on how visible the units are, but I prefer to use stainless enclosures and units outside, the other units that have integral enclosures are sleeker, but tend to have more issues with bird nests and insects in my experience. Plastic units don't hold up over time, like the cheapie ATW "dog" series units.

 

[gatchel]

Gatchel,
Thank you for your response. I have been reading a lot of information regarding 4 wire smoke detectors and have seen some pretty creative wiring schematics. Did you do anything special with the wiring of these sensors or did you keep it pretty straight forward?

I have one fire zone with several sensors on it. This way where is one reversing relay and one power supervision/ termination point. They are all wire in a daisy chained fashion.

There are others that prefer to know where the smoke/fire is and wire several zones. It's really up to you. In most average homes (2000-3000sqft) I see no benefit to having multiple zones for fire. I want everybody out. That's what really matters.