With a battery-operated alarm located in a central hallway on 2nd floor of a townhouse. Alarm goes off with no apparent reason (no fire, no smoke source, no heat source). Alarm stayed on steady for few minutes but then shut off. Any suggestions as to what may cause this apparent false alarm?
defective, low battery, steam from shower, spiders?
accumulation of dust. Try replacing the unit
That you can see.
You don't know it is a false alarm.
How do you tell if there is smoke? With a smoke alarm. Get a new second smoke alarm of the same sort (ionic or photoelectric) and put it up close to the first one. Then compare the results.
A neighbor of mine thought their alarm, also on the ceiling of the second floor hall, was going off for no good reason, so they removed it. A few weeks or months later a fire burned out their whole kitchen, with smoke damage to the rest of the house and water damage in the basement from the fire department.
How old is the fire alarm?
tom @
on 7/14/2007 10:22 AM Jacque Asse said the following:
We rented a motor home one time and the smoke alarm went off every time one of the women used a hair spray.
Good point, but I'd buy a new one even if it's not old. False alarms aren't useful. Next thing, the batteries come out.
Exactly!
Too often I hear, the alarm kept going off, so I killed it. :(
tom @
I've had this problem periodically... maybe once every five years or so. Each time it was corrected with the vacuum cleaner. Alternately, you could try blowing it out with a can of compressed air.
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