EICR , smoke alarms and rented flats

[tabbypurr]

Yes. Your point?

[tabbypurr]

whoosh

[tabbypurr]

whoosh again. But to be expected from an electrician that doesn't understand the upsides of ring circuits.

[Tim Watts]

Who are you? Theresa May's Special Adviser on BREXIT deals?

:-)

[tabbypurr]

some bloke who tried moving ionisation alarms further away from the source of trouble until they worked correctly. It's hardly a challenge. Adam OTOH, who has never tried it, thinks he knows the facts. You couldn't make it up.

maybe that's not the only thing that doesn't work.

[ARW]

The reason I have not tried is threefold.

1. Moving an ionisation repeatedly is not the correct way to do the job
2. The ceiling would have lots of holes on it.
3. I do the job properly first time and don't waste my time and fit a heat detector as per regs and per everything I have been taught (inducing the AICO professional installer courses).

[ARW]

It's the bit between my legs.

[Tim Watts]

People don't usually sleep in the kitchen (bedshits noted as exception).

What's safer? A heat detector in the kitchen and a smoke detector in the hall (and better the bedroom too) - OR - a smoke detector in the kitchen that pisses people off and gets disconnected?

[tabbypurr]

I think we can agree on that :)

that isn't the choice of course, there is a 3rd as I explained.

Fires take hold & get out of hand very fast. The fumes spread & are what kill. The quicker you can get out the better. Heat detectors are false alarm proof but only detect late in the process. Ionisations can either false alarm terribly or be just the thing for the kitchen, depending exactly where they're installed. But I explained all that.

NT

[Robin]

No, you have not yet explained how to determine the place in a kitchen to place a mains, interlinked ionisation alarm so as to (a) avoid nuisance alarms but (b) detect real fires.

[tabbypurr]

Each time it false alarms just move it a bit further away from the source of the false alarms. At some point it no longer false alarms, but picks up real incipient fires reliably.

NT

[Robin]

1. If faced with only 2 choices remaining do I move it into (a) the hall or (b) the garden?
2. How long on average do you spend installing a smoke alarm in kitchen for for a customer? And how many holes in the ceiling need to be made good afterwards?

[tabbypurr]

can be an issue in a small place

and that's why manufacturers recommend a simple quick heat alarm approach, though it's poor at detecting fire.

NT

[tabbypurr]

obviously there is.

alarms should be like that anyway, regardless of type/position.

NT

[John Rumm]

You are misrepresenting the guidance given, since this is not just "one size fits all" easy way out for the manufacturers, it is also the advice given (and mandated) in the building regulations, and as supported by all the main fire brigades.

The building regs specifically proscribe fitting alarms in kitchens. From approved document B:

"1.16 Smoke alarms should not be fixed next to or directly above heaters or air-c "1.12 Where the kitchen area is not separated from the stairway or circulation space by a door, there should be a compatible Interlinked heat detector or heat alarm in the kitchen, in addition to whatever smoke alarms are needed in the circulation space(s);"

From BS5839 "Fire detection and Fire alarm systems for buildings":

"10.2 Recommendations The following recommendations are applicable. a) Smoke detectors may be used in any room or area of a dwelling, other than kitchens, bathrooms and shower rooms. However, other than in the case of circulation areas (i.e. hallways, staircase landings and corridors), their use should be avoided in any room or area in which smoke detectors would have a high potential for false alarms (see Clause

12), unless the risk from fire warrants the provision of automatic fire detection and the use of other forms of fire detection is precluded on the basis of their speed of response to fires of the type that might be anticipated.

b) Smoke detectors installed within circulation areas, such as hallways, staircase landings and corridors, should be of the optical type, unless the use of optical detectors would significantly increase the rate of false alarms above that anticipated in the case of ionization chamber smoke detectors (see also Clause 12), or unless (unusually) there is evidence that there is a significant risk of a fast, clean burning fire in these areas.

NOTE 1 Custom and practice has been to use ionization chamber smoke alarms in the above circulation areas. This practice is now deprecated in view of the greater potential for ionization chamber smoke detectors to generate false alarms when exposed to fumes from kitchens, and in view of their poorer response to smouldering fires and smoke that has drifted some distance from its source."

Poorly implemented systems that give rise to a high false alarm rate, are simply less likely to save lives, because they either get disabled or ignored.

[tabbypurr]

1. With respect I have not misrepresented the guidance given. You seem to be confusing one thing with another.
2. I don't believe heat detectors are forbidden in kitchens.
3. Besides, what regs have to say about what alarms they want where has little to do with whether ionisation alarms can be effective in kitchens.

NT

[Robin]

So are you saying your method only works in a large kitchen? If so, what is "large" for your purpose?

and that's not an answer.

Let's try another approach. In how many kitchens have you fitted interlinked ionisation alarms? And how many are still in use?

[whisky-dave]

I thought that was why wired detectors were meant to be put in rented accomadation so they couldn't be disconnected. Well not without it being obvious.

[whisky-dave]

Why can't these things be placed where they won't false trigger, and just how far do you move them each time a cm a foot ? and then how do you know it hasn't been moved too far, so should move it back.

[tabbypurr]

I can measure later.

It was the point I wanted to make, not the one you wanted. I don't fit them for customers. If I did I'd be obliged to do what Adam does.

I've put ionisation alarms in 2 kitchens. They've both stayed in service for many years (I don't remember how many, certainly over a decade). They have good discrimination between false alarms and times when attention really is necessary.

If I'd fitted 1000 I could tell you if the method ever fails to work. At this point I can only tell you that out of 2 it works very well indeed. If heat alarms had been fitted instead the risk of fire would have been significantly greater, as ionisation alarms do go off if the room begins to fill with smoke from something about to catch fire, so they effectively act as fire prevention as well as fire detection.

NT