Fire alarms

When our house was built it was done so with fire alarms that were hard wired to te electricity and networked together. The networking means if one fire alarm goes off they all alarm.

The contractor did a good job distributing the alarms around the house. The BRK system that was used had a limit on how many alarms an be networked together and the contractor maximized that number.

The problem? Many rooms don't have alarms. If a fire started in one of those rooms? The smoke would have to drop one or two feet from the ceiling before it would spill into the next room and trigger an alarm. By that time I estimate it would be very dangerous to get out of the house.

I wanted to add more alarms to the house. The difficulty is the new alarms have to be hardwired into the betwork and the network is maxed out. iI discovered BRK alarms allow for a wireless expansion. By simply installing a bridge onto the wired network you can add additional smoke alarms to the network and the additional ones don't have to e hard wired into the network. However, the additional alarms do new to be hard wired into the electricity! An that presents a problem on the first floor in areas that have a second floor over the top. Essentially, I have to install a light fixture outlet into the ceiling with no above ceiling access.

This was more work than I was prepared to get into. Yet I felt compelled to take some action for the safety of the family. My solution was to purchase a number of cheap battery operated non-networked alarms (the kind you can buy anywhere). In areas like bathrooms and kitchens, I installed photocentric alarms to reduce the number of false alarms. In other areas of the house I added standard alarms.

At some point I will revisit this and install all networked alarms. But for now? I have made an improvement.

The BRK alarms tend to fail and need to be replaced. So I always keep a case of alarms on hand. In addition, the detectors within fire alarms wear out after ten years (I bet you didn't know that!) so all fire alarms have to be replaced 10 years after installation. These two facts keep me busy with fire alarm replacements and means keeping a case of BRK fire alarms on hand is essential. 

There is a general rule: when you turn your clocks back in the fall time, change all your alarm batteries. I have over a two dozen alarms around the house (even the hard wired alarms have a battery backup). I recently realized the 9 volt batteries are running around $2 each (although if you shop around you might find Everready for $1). It gets really expensive to change all the fire alarm batteries every year!

As a word of caution (since we are talking about fire alarms): 9 volt batteries are a fire hazard, so, be careful how you store and discard them. If anything metal crosses the heads you'll make a circuit that will produce heat and possibly fire. If you replace a bunch of batteries and throw the old ones in the garbage you'll risk the leads coming into contact leading to a fire in your garbage. So, a simple rule is to place a piece of tape over the top of all your 9 volt batteries when storing or discarding them.

What are my tips for fire alarms? It is better to have more. Use the right kind of alarm for the location. Change the batteries yearly. And replace the alarms every ten years.