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A Necessary Inconvenience Worth Understanding
Smoke alarms are sometimes regarded as a necessary inconvenience – just one more thing to interrupt your average day. Here is the kind of thing we’re looking at: for no apparent reason the smoke alarm goes off or starts making intermittent noises when you know there’s no fire.
Smoke alarms are essential though so in this guide we’ll give you tips to make them work for you without the small annoyances. Smoke alarms should be respected, as they could save lives in the event of a real fire.
How to Test a Smoke Alarm
Alarms of all kinds sit there doing nothing until they are needed, so it is easy to forget about them. But what if they don’t actually work when the call comes? They need to be tested regularly, and here is how to do that yourself – and it is very easy. They come with a test button, so you just press that and the piercing sound should happen.
As a bonus, this will alert everyone else in the building to the presence of smoke alarms and make them think about what they would do if this was a real emergency. Anyone who has ever been forced to get up in the middle of the night in a hotel because the fire alarm went off knows that it feels highly inconvenient, but better that than be caught up in a real blaze. Maybe you should organise a fire drill. While you’re running through home safety basics, it’s also worth knowing how to know if a fuse is blown, since both checks form part of good household maintenance.
How do you turn off a smoke alarm? Press the button again and the sound stops. How to change a battery in a smoke alarm? Battery-operated alarms can be fixed by simply inserting a new one (just open the unit, take the old one out and put a new one in its place. For mains-operated varieties you should contact the supplier or a good electrician. Smoke alarm testing is a sensible part of simple home maintenance.
My Smoke Alarm is Making too Much Noise
Smoke alarm chirping could be the result of a battery that needs changing, so try that. It could be that dust or dirt is interfering with the unit, in which case try cleaning it with a brush. It might be something like steam or vapour from cooking that is troubling the automatic mechanism. If none of these things fixes the issue, call a professional – our guide on warning signs it’s time to call an emergency electrician can help you judge how urgent the issue is.
It could be that your smoke alarm – and maybe your whole fire prevention, detection and extinguishing system is out of date. The best advice is to get it looked at by a professional, and a qualified electrician such as you will find with us at One Point Sydney Electricians can take care of the electrical side of it for you. Our electrical fault finding service can also help track down what’s causing an outdated or misbehaving system.
One thing you cannot afford to do is ignore your smoke alarms, so check them over yourself and if in doubt, call a professional.
