Strange Smoke alarm problem ??

Drdogface · Drdogface's Garage

Hopefully someone can shed some light on this and help us resolve.

We have a fairly larger home..at least for us...and maybe 8 smoke detectors installed in various rooms. They are connected to house wiring and have back up batteries. Our problem started with just one in a hall way which seems to beep all the time...as if the battery is out. We changed the battery...no help. I called the mfg. Cust. Scvs and they said to a different kind/works a different way and sent me one. This is no help either. Now a few of them beep but mostly when the house cold...like at night when we turn the thermostat down. They beep in the early AM until we heat up the house. It's driving us nuts. All the batt's are OK...

Dueller · 11:50 AM

Had similar problem with hardwired alarms...did the same thing with new batteries. Electrician told us to use compressed air can to blow any dust out, change batteries and hold test/reset button down for 20 seconds, release and test again. Something about clearing fault code. Seemed to have worked for ours. Also...do you have CO detectors? Did the same thing with those as well. All quiet on the southeastern front now.

Drdogface · Drdogface's Garage

Thanks Jim...I'll try it

968rz · 968rz's Garage

+1 on the blow out,
Dust and stuff build up in units and cause the beeping, January is a good time to replace the batteries and clean them.

lowyder993s · lowyder993s's Garage

Ours go off in the summer when the humidity rises(not beep...I mean GO OFF). Usually 4-5 a.m. I'll try Jim's fix...hopefully it works out

williecoyote · 01-16-2010, 04:07 PM

+1 to blowing dust out of the sensors.
A good time to change batteries is spring and fall, when you change your clocks for daylight savings time.

jeffgrant · 01-16-2010, 04:28 PM

We had the same problem in a past office.

Turned out that high-humidity, when it got cold, clogged the sensors and raised a fault.

Blowing them out reduced the ability for condensation to form on the sensor. Raising the low-temp setpoint solved the problem, but we just opted to occasionally blow-out/reset the sensors when they would go off.

PITA, but what can you do?

911Rob · 911Rob's Garage