Smoke detectors for the elderly

No argument here.

When people design "phones" that work by putting the video screen to your ear, I just don't know.

Josh

Reply to
zzznot
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I guess they need a smoke detector that shakes the bed.

Reply to
Van Chocstraw

Used to have 'em in some motels. Only cost a quarter.

Reply to
HeyBub

Heck, I think this would work better:

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TDD

Reply to
The Daring Dufas

A followup to this thread about low frequency sounders in smoke alarms and this unit:

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One problem I've noticed with the unit I've put in the basement is that it occasionally interprets the turning on of the fluorescent lights as an IR pulse that you would send to self-test the unit remotely. Not a big problem, and one rectified by placing it so that the worklights don't shine on it directly, but I'd thought I'd mention it. On the plus side, the unit is loud enough that we can hear it at night in the bedroom upstairs from the floor below.

-- Bobby G.

Reply to
Robert Green

I'm sure something must be available -- the fire alarms (which are triggered, inter alia, by smoke detectors) where I work are so loud the deaf people I work with can _feel_ them when they sound.

Reply to
cjt

Just wanted to say I appreciate the follow-ups (so many times I follow an interesting thread that just dies off and I wonder what happened). My parents are gone, but I've told several people about this concern and potential solutions. Strange, but I know that as people age they don't hear higher frequencies as well, and I knew (when I thought about it) that the smoke alarms are pretty high pitched, but I never put together that older people might not hear the smoke alarm.

(Me, I think I have all modes covered - I have two herding type dogs that bark at whatever they think is important which includes things like telephones and doorbells, and of course falling leaves. And when they bark they woof and they jump on and off the bed. So I figure I have high pitched, low pitched and excessive vibrations... not to mention a cold nose in my face if something goes off when I'm sleeping! Of course, I do get false alarms during thunder storms).

Reply to
Lee B

I haven't followed the entire thread, so don't know the solution. With an elderly person with such severe hearing loss, he might be eligible for special alarms...either as handicapped or elderly person. I suppose you have checked with the fire department?

Reply to
norminn

To summarize:

  • The industry has recently recognized the problem
  • First Alert offers some speaking alarms, with warbling three-beep tones, that work well starting around .
  • There are also (much) more expensive and specialized versions.

J.

Reply to
zzznot

"zzznot" wrote

Thanks for the summary. I'd add that my friend's hearing loss is bad, but he's nowhere near deaf. What happens as many people get older is that their ability to hear very high frequencies decays rapidly. "Aging ear" is so prevalent that it allows kids to create ring tones only other kids (mostly) can hear:

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and by to drive them away from certain areas with high frequency sounders:

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I was always dubious about those ultrasonic pest devices, but we now have proof that it works with at least one pest. the common spotted teenager.

-- Bobby G.

Reply to
Robert Green

I have a squealing, high-pitched alarm (still working!) made in 1980 so the problem has taken 30 years to solve. I suspect changing anything involving detailed standards like smoke detectors is a slow process. The insides of new alarms look like they were designed 20 years ago with very few IC's and lots of discrete components. I suspect once a design gets "blessed" by all the various regulatory agencies there's very little motivation to change it and restart the approval process. Just a guess, though.

My dog can always be found cowering the bathtub during a thunderstorm. I don't know why she does it: you would think that the sound would reverberate in the tub, but for whatever reason, at the first clap of thunder, she's in the tub. On the positive side, she's beep attuned. We have a sensor on the screen door that sounds a chime whenever anyone opens it. She knows beeps = company = new smells = maybe even some food! If we didn't hear an alarm, I suspect she'd "help" us hear it.

-- Bobby G.

Reply to
Robert Green

FYI: I just learned (by reading the plastic package these thincs com in) that there are TWO types of, well, FIRE alarms:

1: SMOKE alarms, that work via PHOTOCELL -- and this kind has a "P" on the package.

2: the kind that works via some wee radioactive thing, that senses, I think, the FIRE. It has some OTHER single-letter printed on the package.

The instructions advised have BOTH types. Unfortunately, Costco (where I shop) seems to have only the P-marked kind.

David

Reply to
David Combs

On Sun, 1 Nov 2009 20:02:40 +0000 (UTC), snipped-for-privacy@panix.com (David Combs) wrote Re Re: Smoke detectors for the elderly:

Most of the above type of alarm uses Americium-241 (an Alfa particle emitter) in it's detector chamber to ionize air and detect combustion products.

Reply to
Caesar Romano

The 2 types are "photoelectric" and "ionization".

Most smokes in use are photoelectric, the ionization ones are very sensitive and tend to false alarm more often.

Reply to
G. Morgan

Walmart (on the Web) sells a First Alert Detector that uses both methods and can be remote controlled via a TV remote control to cancel unwanted alarms or to test the systems. Costs 19.96 Best Buy rating in Consumer Reports

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Reply to
Walter R.

...

Great! Congratulations! May your old one live longer than any of the rest of us!

NOW -- how about telling THE REST OF US what BRAND it is, WHERE you GOT it, how much you PAID for it, etc.

If only one of those, how about the BRAND, the NAME of the thing?

Please.

David

Reply to
David Combs

Somewhere towards the beginning of this thread I saw (but cannot find it now) a post with the suggestion to:

Dig into the thing, disconnect the alarm, and wire on instead something really LOUD, LOW PITCHED, etc.

To me, that's a pretty good way to go.

Measure the voltage when it's beeping (er, trying to beep), then go buy a relay that works at that voltage, hook up some HIGHER voltage or power source to the other end of the relay that goes to eg some electric version of a truck horn, or fire-engine siren (hell, maybe an ordinary siren (a la Odysseus on his way back from Troy, having himself tied to the ship's mast -- which if that doesn't get him "up", I don't know what will!), something like that.

Or maybe hooked to an install-it-yourself burglar-alarm, with horns distributed througout the house.

------

What *I*'d like to do is somehow get into my APC UPS -- you know, that big HEAVY battery-plus-electonics box you plug into the wall, and then your computer into it.

There's NO WAY that I'm going to hear the beep-beep-beep-beeping sound if I'm up or downstairs from it, and the circuit blows, OR if I'm listening to music or whatever via earphones, OR if I'm asleep or napping (with the bedroom door closed).

Thinking along as I write this thing, maybe that burglar-alarm idea isn't so bad.

ESPECIALLY if it has TWO kinds of beeps, eg one for burglar, and another for one of those around-the-neck "HELP -- I'm in trouble (fell down the stairs, ...)", and use that 2nd one for the UPS.

(I sure don't want to go rushing around the house finding out which computer UPS it is when there's actually an armed burglar loose in the house!)

Anyone have any ideas on HOW to do this, to get into the UPS to wire something (eg a relay) in parallel to its beeper?

Thanks!

David

Reply to
David Combs

...

What's an "A-coil"?

Thanks,

David

Reply to
David Combs

And please tell us what brand, etc, it is.

Thanks

David

Reply to
David Combs

So what'd they give him, life without parole?

(Suppose his name was eg Mustafa?)

Just tonight on BOOKTV (cspan-2) is an hour on a book (talk by author) on something like "how the feds persecute (prosecute?) innocent people". Go to booktv.org/schedule. Or, if you miss it, and it isn't on again next weekend, follow the link for video (I think it is named), it'll take you to youtube, and you can see it there.

Wait til maybe wednesday for them to get it up over there.

:-(

David

Reply to
David Combs

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