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Smoke Detectors |
Smoke detectors are one of the most important safety devices you can have in your home. They should be installed in the hallways and in the bedrooms. Smoke detectors provide early warning in the event of a fire, and enable emergency action in the event of a fire. They are inexpensive, easy to install, unobtrusive, and require very little maintenance, and no home should be without them.
Smoke Alarm Types
Detectors come in two common types--the ionization and the photoelectric variety. Ionization smoke detectors feature a harmless radioactive source within a dual detection chamber. Ionization detectors respond to invisible by-products of combustion. They operate by sensing for a change in the electrical conductivity across the detection chamber. The advantage of the ionization detector is that the smoke can be invisible to the human eye, while remaining very much visible to the ionization detector.
Photoelectric smoke detectors work on an entirely different principle. Photoelectric detectors look for the presence of visible by-products of combustion in the detection chamber. When a sufficient density of visible combustibles fill the detection chamber, the detector sounds an alarm condition.
Interconnecting Smoke Detectors
Home smoke detectors should be
interconnected. This means that an alarm in one smoke detector will cause
all others in the home to go into alarm. Typically the detectors are connected
by a pair of wires to transfer an alarm signal from one detector to all the
others in the chain.
Things to Look for in Smoke Detectors
Any smoke detector you install should have a test button. When the button is depressed, the audible alarm sounds the warning signal. If you have a hearing impaired person in your house, consider the installation of a hearing impaired smoke detector. These are special units that feature a powerful strobe light to alert the hearing impaired in the event of a fire.
Smoke detectors should be wired directly to the 120VAC electrical circuits. Units that depend on batteries as their sole source of power should be avoided if possible. The ideal detector would be direct wired and also have a battery backup.
How Good Are Smoke Detectors?
They are very good indeed. The common home smoke detector cost around $10 and will detect smoke in very small concentrations in the home. Smoke emission occurs during the early stages of a fire, so smoke detectors in the ceilings of the home will provide plenty of early warning in the event of a fire.