Thunderbolt Siren Restoration-Chopper Housing Page

Thunderbolt Siren Restoration Chopper Housing Thunderbolt Siren Restoration Main Siren Chopper Chopper Housing Rotator Blower Siren Controls Sirens Main Page Civil Defense Museum Main		The chopper housing is the steel can that the chopper mounts down inside of and the horn support attaches too. I decided to make a seperate page for it to show the detail of the brush/ring mechanism and inside of the housing. This is the brush collector ring assy. This ring bolts onto the rotator section tube that sticks through the bottom of the chopper housing. The brushes at the bottom of the chopper motor ride against these rings as the horn rotates. I had to replace the old rotten original wiring that connects to the rings. The wiring terminals were originally riveted to the rings with copper rivets. I replaced the rivets with screws and smoothed the tops so the brushes would ride smoothly over them. Later when I found out this siren would be going back into service I made some copper rivets and replaced the screws with the rivets. This is looking down into the chopper housing. This is how the brush collector ring looks in the housing. I had always wondered how this was done. When I finally saw a Thunderbolt apart I just thought "oh, yeah?" You can see the cable passing down through the rotator support tube. There is no danger of damaging the wiring if installed correctly because the tube and rings stay stationary while the housing rotates around it. Also, the blower air comes up through this opening as the siren operates. Here is the whole thing assembled for the photo without the rotator sheetmetal housing.

The chopper housing is the steel can that the chopper mounts down inside of and the horn support attaches too. I decided to make a seperate page for it to show the detail of the brush/ring mechanism and inside of the housing.