HALP!!! My WS-295 is dying!

[Rofocowboy84]

Bought a WS-295 from someone on the board, installed it on one of my SAR team's vehicles. Lately it's been acting up. At first we thought it was the on/off switch, as sometimes the unit wouldn't turn on, but we're certain it's not that. What's happening is it'll turn on, and the manual button will light up. As soon as we key up the mic or hit the button, it will die out, and you might get like a half second of weak horn sound. Now we're thinking it might be the wiring for the mic, because it looks pretty haggard from the circuit board to the cord, so I'm guessing it's like that inside the cord too. I can't seem to replicate the problem though. It happened a few times when the mic cord was stretched, but then I spend the next five minutes stretching the cord in all directions and it worked fine. A few minutes later I wasn't even touching the mic and it started acting up again. Any ideas?

 

[WhiteLite03]

Sounds like a bad ground or power connection from the siren to the vehicle. Check your wiring from the unit to wherever it connects in the vehicle. My local PD had a similar problem, where the siren would power on and light up, but when they tried to use it, it would go dark and occasionally make very quiet sick sounds out of the speaker. Found a ground wire that wasn't even attached :shock: under the passenger side floor mat, just laying on the metal floor. Once I actually attached it to a ground with a screw, they haven't had a problem.

 

[Rofocowboy84]

That could be it.....unfortunately I wasn't present for the install, and we've been going back through and basically redoing everything that the guy did. One of our comm. guys, who just happens to be a Ham and has worked on tons of radios is currently replacing the mic cord with a donor one from a 295HFSA1 that I'm just using for parts now. Even if that's not the problem, at least we'll have a new mic cord and not have to worry about that, lol....

 

[WhiteLite03]

Well in that case I would definitely try to trace the power and ground cables and make sure they're connected securely and not grounding out anywhere. I hate trying to troubleshoot other people's wiring installs. lol

 

[Rofocowboy84]

Well in that case I would definitely try to trace the power and ground cables and make sure they're connected securely and not grounding out anywhere. I hate trying to troubleshoot other people's wiring installs. lol

Ugh, tell me about it. This whole truck has pissed me off, as I was originally put in charge of the EV equipment for it, but pretty much every idea I've had has been shot down by people who know absolutely nothing about vehicle lighting. The one guy (the Ham fixing the mic cord) actually admitted he doesn't know about the stuff, he just knows how to wire it, lol. He hasn't really given me too much of a problem though. So I pretty much just washed my hands of the whole thing. Like today, the place they had mounted the siren was under the dash (it's an '86 Chevy truck, ex-military), and it would have been a safety hazard to try to operate it while driving. So I was going to move it up the dash, just underneath the jerry-rigged switch panel on the trim piece (which looks horrible btw, apparently most people are only concerned about function, not aesthetics), so it would be right underneath the switches and easy to reach. Well, just before I was about to grab the drill, they decided to mount the new 3-spot DC plug thing in the ash tray, which I was planning on covering with the siren. I'm sure as hell not going to let it stay where it is, so now I have to probably just put it on top of the dash. It will look like shit, but oh well....


Like I said, it's the typical too many chiefs and no indians, except these chiefs know nothing about what they're doing....except the wiring part, lol....

 

[WhiteLite03]

We have the chiefs and indians problem too. I think that's pretty common at most departments, especially volunteer ones. lol

 

[Rofocowboy84]

Good news everyone! The mic cord was replaced, and the wiring was completely re-done, and it appears to be working! Of course time will tell, since this is about the third time I've "fixed" it, only to have it start acting up again a few days later, lol....

 

[sirentech]

Hi, are you still in need of some info on your problem with the WS-295?

 

[philyumpshus]

Hi, are you still in need of some info on your problem with the WS-295?

Come on, guy; you resurrect a month-old thread where the problem was actually solved? If you're that worried about it, PM the OP!