New Fine Woodworking magazin almost made me ill

[Joe Wilding]

I just got the new Tools and Shop edition of Fine Woodworking. After browsing through quickly, it looks like there is some good stuff once again.

However, the picture of the burned down shop in the middle of the magazine almost made me physically ill. I had to sit down and put the magazine aside for a few minutes.

I guess the article succeeded at making me think more about shop safety. I have made this request before, but never found a good answer, so maybe I will ask again: I have a detached shop about 100 feet from my house. I have been looking for some sort of a remote transmitting smoke alarm for the shop that would sound int he house if I ever did have a shop fire. I am sure this is something that a lot of woodworkers could use. Does any know of anything like this that is affordable?

Thanks for any advice,

Joe in Denver my woodworkin website:

[Doug Miller]

It shook me up too. Not quite that badly, but that photo was pretty grim. And scary. My shop is in the basement. Under my 13YO son's bedroom. I really, really, REALLY don't want a fire in the shop. We have a heat detector there already, wired into the monitored alarm system, but that article has me thinking about sprinklers. I'd *much* rather deal with water damage to the tools, than fire damage to the tools *and* the house, and the danger to my family.

No doubt it's affordable, but is it practical? I mean, how much damage is going to happen before you can even get there?

Speaking of affordable... did you see that the article described fitting a

900 square foot shop with a sprinkler system for about $100 and a day's work? Sounds like a winner to me. Like I said, I'll take water damage over fire, any day.

-- Regards, Doug Miller (alphageek-at-milmac-dot-com)

Get a copy of my NEW AND IMPROVED TrollFilter for NewsProxy/Nfilter by sending email to autoresponder at filterinfo-at-milmac-dot-com You must use your REAL email address to get a response.

[Clint]

You say you'll take water damage over fire damage any day, but I remember the hassles a relative of mine went through when trying to build a house just outside a municipality. They wanted him to get a sprinkler system installed because he was too far away from the fire stations. His insurance company was giving him flack about having a sprinkler system installed, because of the rate of false alarms, and water damage caused when that happened. Actually, they weren't so much giving him flack as soaking him (tee-hee) on the premiums. I think in the end he signed a waiver with the city to cover their butts, and life went on. But it dragged on for over a year, got in the paper, etc.

So I guess the idea of a sprinkler system is a good one, but it may be financially more expensive to deal with. I doubt in particular if your insurance company would cover ANY of your costs if you DIY. And if you consider how often your smoke detector goes off in your house when there's not actually a fire, and imagine repairing/refurbishing your tools on that frequency, you may want to reconsider. Then again, maybe your wife doesn't cook like mine...

Clint

[Lee Michaels]

"Clint" wrote

Who is the redneck comedian who says that his wife is a terrible cook? But she has improved since whe figured out that the smoke alarm is not a timer.

[Lee Michaels]

I remember now. It is Ron "tater salad" White.

[Joe C.]

Jeff Foxworthy?

[Mark Jerde]

Some other comedian said "My wife treats me like a god. She serves me burnt offerings three times a day."

-- Mark

[Charlie Self]

I'm pretty sure I heard Rodney Dangerfield come up with that one, years ago.

Charlie Self "Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing." Redd Foxx

[Eddie Munster]

I have smoke detector in the basement away from the shop and a heat detector over my DC. Also monitored. There isn't much else to catch fire in there. Heat detector in garage and smoke detector upstairs too.

John

Doug Miller wrote:

[Charles Spitzer]

both my insurance company and the fire service i subscribe to gives me a discount for having sprinklers installed. they don't use electronics to trigger, and it actually takes a lot of heat for them to go off. iirc, 175F at the ceiling. it cost me about $3k for about 3.5k sqft of protection when i was building my new house.

[mare]

False alarm with a sprinkler? AFAIK the (often) red sprinkler caps break after becoming too hot. If there is no fire I'd be surprised if they become too hot. There is no detector like in a alarm system, and it's all mechanical.

[igor]

I'm not sure at that distance, but an X-10 type system might work. Maybe w/ a booster. You might call these guys:

connection with them, etc.. I have not called them in a couple of years but back when I did they were very knowledgeable and helpful with free advice. They have some expensive stuff but press them for "affordable". Call them and just tell them the problem and see what they say. HTH. -- Igor

[Chris Richmond - MD6-FDC ~]

Avoid the whole water damage thing and install 'one uh them thar' fancy halon systems. Probably not a DIY, nor ~$100, but if this is a big risk... Seems plausable for a basement shop, esp. with volatile finishing stuff.

Chris

[patrick conroy]

No idea of what you consider affordable - but for "things like this" (I was going to say "toys" but didn't want to sound demeaning) I usually browse

See: you're always going to be considering tradeoffs. Is the reliabilty of this system enough to suit my needs? Is the price right? Will the smoke detector get set off by dust (as mine does)?

[Rob Walters]

I don't think you can buy halon systems anymore...not to mention I wouldn't want to be around when it went off.

Rob

[Lobby Dosser]

Was in a computer room many years ago when the halon system went off. We all knew what it could do and the result was blood and hair on the door jamb!

[Dave Balderstone]

We had a sprinkler head let go at the printer I worked for a decade ago. After the fact, I wished I'd had the foresight to run into the room and drop off the POS color printer we were using that the boss wouldn't let me replace.

I haven't received the FWW issue yet, but I don't have a smoke detector in the basement shop, though there is one in the basement. Will pick one up when I go out in a couple of hours.

Hope the sawdust doesn't keep setting it off...

[Dave Hinz]

They don't buy new toys for you until you break the ones you have. Modern sprinkler systems have a flow alarm which notifies (someone) when water is flowing in the sprinkler supply line. Apparently the risk of sprinklers going of is still well lower than the risk of an un-controlled fire, because most if not all insurance companies give discounts if you have sprinklers.

Get an ionizing one, rather than an optical one. Look for "contains Amerecium 241" and the NRC exemption stickers on the box. Optical smoke detectors will "see" the dust and think it's smoke; ionizing ones are much less likely to trigger falsely for that reason.

Dave Hinz

[Waldo]

Clint, in my opinion there is a lot of mis-information or urban myth in what you have said above. There are many types of sprinkler systems and one that is properly designed and installed will seldom if ever go off by itself. Most cases of accidental discharge are caused by human failings such as bumping a discharge head or damaging components such as the piping, or failing to properly maintain the system. The last stats regarding true accidental discharges I can recall was something to the effect of only 1 head failure per 17 million installed.

NFPA 13 and it's accompanying sub-standards outline the requirements for sprinkler systems installations. Worth a look if you can get your hands on a copy - maybe the local library.

Waldo

[Phil]