Smoke alarm problem

[GB]

I found a smoke alarm that was lying around the house, and I cheerfully nailed it up on the first floor landing. Unfortunately, it goes off if we use the shower and forget to close the bathroom door. Is that usual, or is it defective?

As far as I can see, it was a cheapy, probably bought from Tesco and only a couple of months old. I think my nephew probably bought it and left it here.

Any thoughts? We have one downstairs, anyway, so I could throw the new one away. It's sited pretty close to the bathroom, but so is everywhere else on that landing.

[bert]

In article , GB writes

I'd say usual - it's when it doesn't go off it's defective. First one we ever had about 1980 I put it up in the hall. Next time I did a bit of toast in the kitchen it went off and couldn't switch the thing off. Promptly went in the bin and I never had another one til last year.

[Graham.]

It will be an optical one then. Simply swap it for a Ionisation type.

[GB]

Do the optical ones have radioactive material in, too? (This one does.)

[Brian Reay]

It isn't unusual with some alarms at least.

At least one of the halls of residence one of my daughters lived in had a real problem with this. Students were under strict instructions to check the bathroom door was shut while showering but, of course, some didn't and the whole building was emptied as the alarm went off.

[alan_m]

My ionisation type fitted in the room next to my kitchen sometimes goes off as a result of steam from the kitchen.

Big Clive tear down of an optical sensor

[Bob Eager]

One of the issues is the distance between the top of the door and the ceiling, at least in the case of smoke.

[tabbypurr]

optical detectors trigger on steam. Ionisation may be better - they are a l ot more touchy & trigger readily on kitchen smoke, but that's easily solved by moving them a bit further away each time until they no longer false ala rm. Once you get the position correct I find them generally better.

NT

[Robin]

RTFM :)

Probably includes something like:

"Optical (Toast Proof) smoke alarms are less prone to false alarms from cooking fumes, are therefore suitable for locations near kitchens. However optical smoke alarms are more susceptible to nuisance alarms from steam and should not be located too close to bathrooms and showers."

[Brian Gaff]

Well you need to look at where air flows and where heat goes from potential fire locations. I put mine in the hall halfway up the stairs so any fire downstairs, heat rises and smoke too, but of course burn toast with a vent open upstairs, and off it goes. The trick I think is to do a temporary fix and test it for a while of gotchas. Brian

[Dave Liquorice]

Move it away from the bathroom as much as possible, keeping it central from walls.

Given a choice between ground floor hall way ceiling and 1st floor landing ceiling the upper floor is better. Smoke rises, it could concievably by pass the hall detector, enroute to the stairwell and up to the upper floor ceiling where it collects and triggers the detector up there. It's also likely to be nearer the bedrooms thus louder and more likely to wake you up. A downside is that a upper floor one might not trigger quite as quickly as a hall way one, if the smoke doesn't bypass it...

A smoke alarm is better than no smoke alarm. It doesn't take long (couple of minutes) for a fire to get a hold and become serious problem to escape from.

[alan_m]

Fit two or more - they are not expensive.

[John Rumm]

I fitted a control switch to my interlinked alarms so that I can mute them all from the switch also cause the one that triggered the alarm to sound alone so you can identify the source. *Much* easier way to do it if you have high ceilings.

[alan_m]

The stand-alone battery alarm in the room adjacent to the kitchen has a

2 minute(??) mute facility. I have high ceilings and in order to mute it I have to use the broom handle to press the casing on the corner which operataes the inbuilt mute switch.

[Graham.]

Perhaps it's a dual sensor type like this Kidde PI9010