Louisville, Kentucky very low pitched sick Thunderbolt

[ver tum]

This is the recording that my grandpa made on Tuesday, September 8, of the Thunderbolt 1000T at PRP VFD #1. As you'll hear, this Thunderbolt is literally a half octave lower than it should be, and the chopper motor sounds very underpowered. This is the only recording I have this time, because I was out of town, and I had both of the other recorders with me.
http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/2/3/1 ... -08-09.mp3

For comparison, here's a recording of the same Thunderbolt from April 2008, when it sounded like it's supposed to.
http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/2/3/1 ... FD%201.mp3

[dilloncarpenter]

Wow, that is too low, maybe a collector ring/brush problem. Have you reported it?

[EL1998P71]

Nurse!!! Nurse!!!!, we need a doctor over here stat!!!

That's crazy low.

[md5]

Reminds me of a video posted a year or two back from a thunderbolt sounding just like this I think in Iowa. Spine chilling sound if you ask me.

[coppercarl]

That does not sound good at all. But the wind up did sound really cool though.

[ver tum]

I've reported it directly to the Electrical Maintanence Department, and I'm sending my contact there a link to this thread, so that he can hear how it sounds now, and how it's supposed to sound. I'm guessing that it's either the brushes, or it's a transformer problem. The odd thing is that the pitch doesn't fluctuate much, so that almost makes me want to rule out the brushes. The blower and rotator sound fine.

It sounds almost exactly like this Thunderbolt recorded by Trucky6119.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vcAKnSmX08&fmt=18

[ver tum]

I now have some bad news and some good news about this siren. The bad news is that I've just received an email from my contact with the city, letting me know that the siren was taken down and replaced on Monday, September 14. The good news is that it was replaced with another Thunderbolt, which was rebuilt a year ago, and there are plans to restore the old one. I was also informed that the old siren was set on chopper level 5, which means that it's been sick since March of 1990, when I first heard it sound low pitched. Before 1990, there was a level 5 sounding Thunderbolt there, which I now believe was likely the same siren. I was told that the rebuilt siren is set on level 6, which means that it could be higher pitched than the old one even was before 1990. We'll have to see what it sounds like on test day next month. I plan on taking at least one recorder to my grandparents' house for that test.