Most of the current emergency vehicles have some style of smart light and/or siren controller. This means that it does more than just tell what lights to turn on depending what switch is turned on. These smart systems can use vehicle signals to turn on or off certain lights. This means less controller manipulation your officers have to worry about. Some examples of this is disabling flashing white lights (including traffic pre-emption), changing the pattern so it calms the scene, and automatically disabling the siren when the vehicle is placed in park. Depending on the system you have an how it is set up, the options are limitless for what you are able to do. 

We can assist you and your department with making the most of the system you have. We will evaluate the current set-up and even be able to demonstrate some of the features. We will always suggest the best practice as advised by the lighting manufactures, NFPA, and studies. 

Short answer is no. Since the late 1920's when the first warning light was produced, every company strived to improve and make a better light. The act of making a light flash involves some sort of mechanism. Old school halogen used relays to make them flash or a motor. Strobes used a power pack. Both could be customized for different flash rates. Majority of LED lights have a flasher built into the lights with many flash options.

The controllers, on the other hand, only really started to improve in the early 1990's. This started with companies introducing "remote mount" siren/light controllers. This allowed for the brains and bulky side to be hidden away in the trunk leaving a compact control head for the officer to interact with. From there companies added siren park kill modes to disable the siren, hands free siren control using the horn pad, and even incorporating timers into the auxiliary switches for gun locks. As technology advanced, that allowed the manufactures to do so much more.