The Siren Board

Ultra HyperSpike is a company not really mentioned here that much. Like LRAD they produce acoustic hailing devices, which are sound cannons that put out an ear piercing noise that drives the person or people it's used against into sensory overload. As it turns out the speakers they use are pretty good at putting out very intelligible voices. We've seen this with LRAD's 3 omnidirectional 360X variants; they also have directional speakers such as the DS-60 and SS400 (I believe this is what ADT's Clear Voice System spawned into after the company stopped selling them, since some of them have been spotted with LRAD controls on a couple bases). The MA series is Ultra HyperSpike's omnidirectional speakers.

They are very compact compared to other manufacturers, got some voodoo magic action for the amount of sound they put out. All of them measure up to have a diameter of about 12-13 inches and the largest model has a height of about 86 inches, at least in one instance. The largest model has been given a 3 mile range. By comparison here's a breakdown of other arrays on the market:

Diameter X Height in inches
Large Arrays
Whelen WPS-2910: 32.5 X 130.4
FS Modulator I 6024/32/48: 44.5 X 146.1
FS Modulator II 8032B: 35 X 124
ASC I-Force 3200: 52 X 88
LRAD 360X/XS-4: 34 X 63.2
LRAD 360X-8 (overseas): 34 X ~114

Small Arrays
LRAD 360Xm-2: 16 X 12
LRAD 360Xm-4 (overseas): 16 X ~28
LRAD 360XL-MID-2: 24 X 20

Before I go off there is some conflicting info on the specs of these speakers that I'll get into below. The aesthetic design of these also changed over time, however the core design hasn't changed. Each array has 5 sides to them that can have an active speaker, similar to the ASC I-Force except this one breaks down into a pentagon with 60° of coverage per zone instead of 90. All 5 speakers together turns it into an omnidirectional array.

MA-Micro


Link to site: http://www.ultra-hyperspike.com/MA-Micro
Link to cutsheet: http://www.ultra-hyperspike.com/Data/Pa ... -Micro.pdf

Here's one in action. Apparently this is an EST branded version of it, same speaker though. It's rated for a quarter mile of range using 700 watts total.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvG5XbmWTyI

MA-1


I wasn't able to find video of on of these online. I believe their products were only sold to the military until recently which might explain why the videos of this series are so sparse. It's rated at 1 mile of range and 1.5 miles when the array is 25 and 50 feet off of the ground respectively.
Link to site: http://www.ultra-hyperspike.com/MA-1
Link to cutsheet: http://www.ultra-hyperspike.com/Data/Pa ... _REV_A.PDF

MA-2


Link to site: http://www.ultra-hyperspike.com/MA-2
Link to cutsheet: http://www.ultra-hyperspike.com/Data/Pa ... _Sheet.pdf

Here's one in action. Keep in mind that this thing is only 40 inches tall and 12 inches wide. Much like the LRAD 360X demo from Wimberley, TX they pelt that anti-riot tone through this thing. The students must LOVE it! They rate it at 1.5 an 2 miles when the array is 25 and 50 feet off of the ground.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSLP_dmM_1o

MA-3 There isn't much about these things online. I managed to dig up a cutsheet with possible the only image of one online, which is what I used above. As you can see it is simply two MA-2s stacked on top of each other. They rate it at 3 miles of range.
Link to cutsheet: http://apacsecurity.com.au/wp-content/u ... I-MA-3.pdf

Here's one in action, albeit this one apparently has an older aesthetic design. The video isn't that great, but the audio is fairly clear. There's a slight issue here, the array they show in the beginning appears to be an MA-2. You can't really see it too well in the video, so it's beyond me if they stacked two on top of each other or there was a dedicated model for it at the time.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_Q3GHuWi8I

This is where the conflicting info comes up. Edwards Fire Safety sells these coupled to a controller of sorts under their brand falling under the HS series. The PDF on their site lists their version of the MA-3 (6400 watt class) as having a height of 81 inches, whereas the one above shows it as 86 inches tall; the MA1 and 2 are represented as the 1600 and 3200 watt classes respectively and have the same dimensions. There are also wattage discrepancies. The MA-1 is listed by Edwards as the 1600 watt class that uses 1600 watts. The cutsheet from the manufacturer shows the wattage of one panel, 450 watts, which would add up to 2250 watts total. acoustichailingdevices.com lists it as a 3000 watt array. This might be from Edwards running them on different controllers that don't drive the speakers quite as hard, but I haven't been able to track that down yet.

At the end of the day I find these speakers to be very interesting. The video of the MA-2 gets to me since it is so small but yet so loud. I want to hear what one of these things sounds like in person. They seem very capable, however, like the LRAD systems, these are focused more as PA systems rather than siren systems. They sound pretty good, but I would want to see how well they handle broadcasting a tone, maybe 500 or 600 Hz, at full force for an extended duration, since coming from an EMA perspective that's what you'd want as opposed to something that just talks. It seems like these companies are mainly focused on campuses and military bases where a voice PA system comes in handy during emergencies.

Do these sirens use the Planar style of speakers? How do they even work?

This is amazing. If these can be used with siren tones for long periods of times, I hope these blow up in popularity, because the sound to size ratio is AMAZING.

Very impressive! I'd much rather see these than the run of the mill Whelens or Modulators. Hopefully they start using traditional siren tones instead of those alien noises.

Valtonus wrote:This is amazing. If these can be used with siren tones for long periods of times, I hope these blow up in popularity, because the sound to size ratio is AMAZING.

If HyperSpike "sirenizes" these for lack of a better term, and markets these correctly, I could see them taking a sizeable chunk out of Whelen's outdoor warning siren market share.

I saw the first video and was amazed. Then I watched the campus broadcast and then my jaw just dropped.
What speakers do these use?

Wow, it's so clear! That's amazing.

Holy cow!! That is impressive. Let's see if other companies like Federal or Whelen can pull off something like this in new electronic sirens .

Wonder how an Ultravoice or ESC-2030 would sound on these? With their clear voice capabilities I could see these as campus warning sirens and work as functional electronic sirens

I'm bumping yet another post... I made a couple of discoveries today.

First up this: https://patch.com/georgia/eastcobb/emer ... tta-campus
Kennesaw State's siren system is composed of ASC I-Forces, four 1st Gen. STI-1600s and two 2nd Gen. I-Force 2400s. The Marietta campus has a 2904 and STH-10 couple and, according to their website, another Whelen siren in the area, presumably a 2810. Those Whelen sirens however are owned by the county. It appears that the college decided to string up a few HyperSpike speakers to serve as the mass notification system for campus emergencies. I'm not too sure on what models they have. According to the article they have at least two which makes me lean towards them being MA-Micros or MA1s. Looks like a field visit is in need here. What ever they are they would be the first to my knowledge in the state of Georgia and in the wild in general.

Ultra-HyperSpike updated the images on their site that show a clearer view of these arrays to where you can see the speakers. At first I was under the assumption that they were using planar arrays under the mesh guards, but it seems that they just ganged up a bunch of their speakers together to build this things. That's 150 watts per speaker, same as what you would get with an Alertus, SiRcomUSA, or ES5000DC siren. These would probably work wonders on a proper siren controller if they can dissipate the heat produced from the tone.







Now that we have a clearer view of the speakers they appear to be similar to the ones used in their handheld and fixed noise cannons. For a comparison here are images of the TCPA-10, HS-10, and HS-Micro II.