atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Wiring - Telecom Carriers - Trunks & Services Security, Alarms and Paging Emergency rerouting of calls

I'll start with the question and then explain why. Is there a relay or device available that will place an analog line off hook, while passing audio, and remain off hook until it is manually reset?

Viking Electronics has an autodialer device (K-202-DVA). It has two inputs for contact closure devices. We intend to connect it to our fire alarm and have a manual button for weather and other emergencies. Once triggered, this device places a call. We will program it to dial the intercom/PA system and play a recorded message within the device.

Our phone system will route all incoming calls to the same analog extension used by the device. The extension will have an immediate call forwarding path. If the extension is on hook, the calls will be forwarded as normal. If the extension is off hook, all calls will be forwarded to a message explaining that no one is available to take the call.

The problem is that when the device is done playing the recording, it hangs up. Once the extension is on hook, the call routing resumes as normal. We could suffer through listening to the message up to 99 times (which at best would be 16 and a half minutes), or find a way to keep the phone off hook until we reset it.

Yes, I know that Intelligent Router would be able to handle this problem, We don't have IR and our management is unwilling to pay $4K to support an event we hope will never happen.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Did I scare everyone off with this one? Is there a way to imitate a second phone going off hook? Perhaps a relay paralleled with the device?

You didn't scare me, I don't understand what you want. I got lost in the paging and 16 1/2 minutes.

There are digital announcement machines, telephone patch units, and station level paging adapters, all three of them are well under 4K.

Loop detection is trivial and it can be made to operate a relay, or add or remove power from a circuit.

Perhaps you can start again, leaving out any reference to what you think you want to use and/or a moderator can move it to the paging topic and someone can make sense of it.

Carl

use a 600 ohm resistor with a reset switch. Put it in series with the closure relay tied it the the line. The resistor will keep the line off hook utill you push the reset switch

No need to get nasty Carl. Intelligent Router has the $4K price tag, not the device doing the paging. IR can be programmed to perform a task when an extension goes off hook. Since we do not have IR, and we're not going to pay $4K to do this one task, I need to find an alternative way to keep the extension off hook after the paging device has finished its message. The paging device places the extension on hook after it has played its message. As long as the extension is off hook, the PBX will reroute the calls as we need.

TNT thanks for the idea, but that may not work. The contact closure activates the device that places the call. I need something to keep the line off hook until I reset it manually. I thought of running a relay in parallel with the line to the extension or the original contact closure. That would keep the line off hook, but would it keep the device from connecting to the page port? As with a home phone, if you have two phones off hook, you cannot place a call.

Wow, I didn't think it was nasty, I really had to read the original about 6 times to understand what you were trying to do.

Rube Goldberg lives, but think about this. Viking makes a gate controller that interfaces with the dialer. If you record control tones at the end of your announcement, it could activate a relay that would short out the line and keep it shorted until you reset it. This way, the message would have to play before the line got shorted out and it would redial if your paging circuit happened to be busy.

I suggested moving this post only because it would reach a wider audience if it is in Paging as opposed to a specific system group.

Carl

Carl, sorry for the misunderstanding. It sounds like a great suggestion. Thanks.

I'm moving this to Security & Alarms for more input on ready made devices. Doug is a regular here in the Inter-Tel forum, but perhaps you guys can assist him further. :toast:

Thanks Trace

Easy one, I've done stuff like this many times before, since back in the days when we did everything with relays.

I'd setup a simple relay with lock down circuit, activated by a relay contact for alarm/announciator, that would place a 600ohm 1W resistor across each incoming phone line. A single 4 pole relay would allow you to busy out 3 phone lines. Another push to open button or switch would drop power to the relay for reset.

Parts list:
12v power supply & plug in transformer
12v relay & socket 2 pole or 4 pole(qty as needed)
(Altronix comes to mind for items above)
Push to open button
600 ohm 1w resistor
Box to mount this in
Terminal strip or punch on block
Jumper wire

Tough to draw a schematic diagram here, but we can get you what you need.

I've considered exactly what you've described (without the advantage of knowing the parts list, thanks!), but will it work? Two contact relays on the Viking device activate a number to dial and a message to play. If this added relay set the extension in a busy state, will it be able to dial and play the message? Won't I need the added relay to activate after the Viking device has dialed?

dfeschute- If all you need is to imitate a phone off hook, take one of your spare analog trunks on the phone system, connect it to your autodialer's port that you need to keep busy. Take the trunk off hook and put it on hold. That will keep the line open and busy. Then, go in and take the call off hold and hang up when you're ready to resume normal operation.

Seems simple to me! I know I've done stuff like this with a Bogen PCM2000 and a Norstar Digital system.

Unfortunately, it's not that easy. The extension needs to be used to send a message over the intercom/PA and then remain off hook so calls will be routed to a separate routing scenario. All of this has to be done automatically. Our Security department will not allow anything that must be done manually during an alarm.