Nighthawk CO detector/alaram

[George E. Cawthon]

If only 160 die per year, it is unlikely that thousands get sick each year. On the same point 100's die each year for lack of buckling seat belts that are already there. Houses burn down and people die because they're too stupid or too cheap to replace batteries in smoke alarms. What I'm saying is that CO in the home is a tiny problem in the scheme of things that will not be appreciably solved by people buying CO detectors. If you want a more pressing problem try addressing the thousands of child deaths because their parents store bad stuff within the childs reach. Now if you can get them to turn their brains on you would save 2-3000 each year instead of 160 people. The name of the game is Priorities.

[George E. Cawthon]

You're probably right, but many ordinary get "burned" because they don't call a professional at the first hint of problems. It's unlikely that the bad chimney happened all of a sudden.

I looked for possible causes, but with no reason to connect the

No, everybody doesn't. And they especially don't have all off those things start happening, especially the uncharacteristic headaches. Any time someone start getting bad headaches and/or flu like symptoms and their is combustion close (house or car) one should suspect CO poisoning. That's just a rule, not taught very well though. You had bad luck (or maybe good luck) with changeable weather, but you did suspect something was wrong.

Unfortunately, some professionals don't know much. The first furnace repairman was a dunce, he should have left you with a CO meter, but he apparently was too incompetent do even that.

Your first clue which you ignored was that there wasn't any leaking water but you had high humidity which had to come from some place. The next largest source to a leak would be furnace combustion. CO problems are not common in maintained house appliances. Natural gas is pretty safe, especially with newer appliances. I'm don't mean to jump on you because you missed the correct analysis, since most people probably would. I just objected to the characterization that this was common or a commonly missed problem. Most people that die of CO poisoning do so because they did something stupid or somebody in thier group did something stupid.

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[Silence Seeker]

You are absolutely right. After you recommended the SEARS unit, I rushed to the local store and bought one. It costs only $45.

The unit is impressive - it can be installed 3 ways: directly to the

110V outlet, through a detachable power adapter or standing on any surface. It has a battery backup and - most importantly - a PPM counter.

However, the most impressive item in the package was not the detector, but the owner's manual. It has a lot of important and useful information. Enough to make George E. Cawthon's postings look silly.

But I believe he is just pulling everybody's legs here. And some people buy it - to the extent of getting mad and calling names. No need for that. Really.

Thank you everyone for your advice! Sam

[mark Ransley]

Its unfortunate but guys like George Cawthorn exist. They are right , and that is it . no discussion...

[George E. Cawthon]

Well, I'm fairly serious. After a quick google search on CO, I didn't turn up much more than I had a year ago; there is a lot of conflicting information, so it is best to rely only on government sites. Still, the number of deaths attributable to CO apparently varies widely by reporter and from year to year. Then, there is the problem of how many deaths are attributable to autos, how many to home appliances, how many are industrial, how many are due to camping equipment, and how many are inflicted intentionally. The statistics, at least on the net, are rather fuzzy, so it is really just a guess how many lives could be saved if everyone had an operating CO detector in their house.

More important for most people is chronic poisoning for which the statistics are even more variable, and current CO detectors may not be so good in preventing chronic poisoning for a number of reason.

I too was impressed with my NightHawk, but it hasn't done a thing since I bought it. Maybe that's because my furnace and water heater are only 2 years old and still operating at near their peak efficiency.

My post however was intended to inject a bit of reality into the excessive euphoria of what a CO detector can do. Sorry if I stepped on some persons crank, but not real sorry based on the potty mouth remarks.

[Ron Hardin]

Get the one with the snooze alarm.

[Tom Miller]

It failed and it was a random event. I've had it inspected regularly.

And I did call a professional when the furnace failed. I called the repair service from the gas/electric utility company, PSE&G of New Jersey. But there was no issue about CO -- they were there to fix the furnace.

That's the whole deal with CO poisoning and why a detector is such a good idea. There's an article in the Science section of this morning's NY Times about a doctor who treated two patients with CO poisoning from similar causes. Almost identical to mine, in fact.

This is just silly. First you say that CO poisoning is so rare that it isn't worth getting a detector. Then you say that everyone should know the symptoms of this rare malady and suspect it. Your argument is circular.

Then you argue that I should have figured out what was wrong and the repairman should have figured out what was wrong. Well, duh. I guess if that had happened there wouldn't have been a problem, now would there?

Then you say that most people would not have figured it out, but they should have.

I think you don't know what you think, except you need to justify your original statement. Really, you are just being pigheaded. and trollish. Thank goodness your wife is smarter than you.