Wow!!! Think your family is protected with your smoke detectors? THINK AGAIN!!

[Thebobo]

TBH I'm surprised sprinkler systems arn't code. They would save lives and save part of the structure. You would end up with a HUGE water damage mess but you still have a roof left and the majority of the structure would be sound. Better than replacing the whole house. Most sprinkler systems are filled with air and the water is only let in if the first stage is activated, which is smoke detection. In fact I think there's more to it than that, there may be two stages just to get the water to fill it. Then the heads still need to melt for water to actually come out.

Also it's not "zoned" like people think. There are zones, in the sense of managing the system but each head is not going to go off at the same time, it's only the ones that get hot enough and the wax rod melts.
.

Its the law in maryland now for all new home construction.

Pre action systems wich what you are discribing I doubt are used becuase of the complexity and they put a layer of uncertianty into the system (smoke detector/s have to go off) The systems you are discribing are mostly used in computer rooms and the like.
.

 

[rh71]

Decades ago I read somewhere to have photoelectric detectors everywhere but the kitchen. So double exclamation point panic....not found!!

Most people not knowing they have the inferior detectors is not cause for alert, just because you happened to read about it once?

 

[Gunbuster]

my apartment has sprinklers in every room. hope they never accidentally go off.

You have seen too many bad movies. You cant pull a lever and have a sprinkler system accidentally go off. Each head has a plug that melts when it gets too hot. You need a fire burning under it for the sprinkler to activate.

 

[rh71]

You have seen too many bad movies. You cant pull a lever and have a sprinkler system accidentally go off. Each head has a plug that melts when it gets too hot. You need a fire burning under it for the sprinkler to activate.

Aren't they unsightly in a residential room? I mean you have to have quite a few heads to cover a room.

 

[gorcorps]

Aren't they unsightly in a residential room? I mean you have to have quite a few heads to cover a room.

they dump a shitload of water

if it's fairly central to the room you only need one

 

[Thebobo]

They can be recessed

 

[JackBurton]

Good to know.

 

[imagoon]

You have seen too many bad movies. You cant pull a lever and have a sprinkler system accidentally go off. Each head has a plug that melts when it gets too hot. You need a fire burning under it for the sprinkler to activate.

Depends on the system. One melting can drop a zone if they use positive pressure retention. Not that I expect a lot of those types in homes except maybe a kitchen that needs more than one head.

 

[Rubycon]

Wow! Can you buy these residential?

Well technically, nothing will stop you from procuring them and installing them in your house. May be on the expensive side, however.

Another thing to test for is heat rise rate. If temp goes from 20C to 25C in a minute there's probably something very wrong. There are probably actual calculations you can use for that, I'm guessing. I should probably implement that into my home monitoring system, I already have sensors around the house. Though I do want to add more eventually.

That's precisely what we do in living quarters. If someone takes a very hot shower and opens the door soon after, the system will be triggered. Not sure of the actual slope that's used, as with the detectors, they have adjustable thresholds. Now that smoking is forbidden in cabins, the thresholds have been lowered on smoke detectors in living quarters.

 

[JimKiler]

It appears you want both ionization and photo electric detectors in your house. one is better at smoldering fires and the other is better at fires with lots of flames.

http://www.nfpa.org/safety-informat...ment/smoke-alarms/ionization-vs-photoelectric

 

[rh71]

It appears you want both ionization and photo electric detectors in your house. one is better at smoldering fires and the other is better at fires with lots of flames.

http://www.nfpa.org/safety-informat...ment/smoke-alarms/ionization-vs-photoelectric

So we need dual detection + carbon monoxide in one now, hardwired. At least 5 of them. All kinds of awesome. Natural gas would be good too actually. Someone do it.

 

[Thebobo]

Years ago when working the in the field myself and another tech where working on a open head sprinkler system, meaning no head at the end of the pipe just wide open. The fire alarm would trigger a solenoid releasing the water and dump it. Usually there are double zones and all sorts of protections to prevent just one device or zone going off causing water to flow but this was an old pyro hi-voltage one zone system and my friend did not read the out of service instructions. He accidently tripped the panel which was outside the room the heads were in. Inside were a bunch of navy folks dressed in white. I was at the main fire alarm and ran up there to see a lieutenant all covered with foul dank sprinkler water, had to call my boss down to calm them. My co-worker was banned for life there.

 

[JimKiler]

Years ago when working the in the field myself and another tech where working on a open head sprinkler system, meaning no head at the end of the pipe just wide open. The fire alarm would trigger a solenoid releasing the water and dump it. Usually there are double zones and all sorts of protections to prevent just one device or zone going off causing water to flow but this was an old pyro hi-voltage one zone system and my friend did not read the out of service instructions. He accidently tripped the panel which was outside the room the heads were in. Inside were a bunch of navy folks dressed in white. I was at the main fire alarm and ran up there to see a lieutenant all covered with foul dank sprinkler water, had to call my boss down to calm them. My co-worker was banned for life there.

Good story and i know MN wants to mandate fire sprinklers in houses but your story makes me worry about false alarms in them.

 

[Rakehellion]

Nest (smart-enabled smoke & carbon monoxide detectors) has a good blog post on this:

https://nest.com/blog/2014/06/16/nest-protect-in-the-real-world/

Their white paper has some scary data:

https://nest.com/downloads/press/documents/co-white-paper.pdf

Someone selling carbon monoxide detectors is telling us the dangers of carbon monoxide? Get outta here!

 

[Jeff7]

is this a hit piece secretly backed by google/nest?

The firefighter talking about the photoelectric type did remind me of an MST3K episode.

The main plot of the movie is best summarized as: "Thank god for RADAR!!!!"
(Which, incidentally, is capable of creating moving-POV camera-quality imagery over great distances.)