(Updated: Friday morning. I was able to reach a customer service rep at BRK Electronics, the maker of the alarm. She walked me through the process of unplugging the alarm (it didn’t appear to unplug last night and I certainly didn’t want to run the risk of shocking myself) and make sure it was in fact, free from dust. While it looked clean last night and I run a vacuum over it, when I took the unit down I was able to see a bit of dust in the sensor slots. I used pressurized air to clean it, and the rest – just in case and am hoping for the best. The good news is, she told me how to disengage the alarm from being interconnected and setting off the whole house – unplug it. Thank you for your comments and emails, I appreciate it!)
I am not going to sleep tonight.
My smoke alarms started going off at 9:45 p.m. tonight, just prior to E going to sleep. He gets VERY upset when he hears them, is very scared and breaks down into a crying jag that is almost equal in intensity to the LOUD and incessant alarms.
I raced around trying to figure out WHICH alarm was causing problems since they are all interconnected (awesome idea, by the way, let’s make ALL the alarms go off so you can’t tell which one has a problem) and when one goes off, almost all of them do. And of course, I didn’t get an owner’s manual with the alarms when I bought the house four years ago, so I have no idea how to silence the damned things. There is one button, to test, which only makes the alarm go off again … and even longer. Great idea to NOT have a silence feature, alarm manufacturers!
So I grabbed a chair and opened one alarm, making sure the battery is in there, etc… everything looked okay. Alarm stopped. For two minutes, then went off again. Repeat, same process x4. Finally, I went in my office, and discovered that when I changed batteries in all the alarms several months ago, I somehow missed the one in my office. I installed a new battery, snapped it in and went to bed after E calmed down.
12:20 a.m. ALARMS ARE GOING OFF AGAIN!! - I woke in a panic, racing from room to room, dizzy and tired and stumbling. Couldn’t find the problem, I’m racing against time before they wake E. Either the one in his room is NOT going off and not interconnected with the others or he is sleeping through it. If the former, then its only a matter of time till he hears all the rest, so I was racing. Found nothing wrong, but eventually, they stopped after I messed with the one in the hallway, which is also near an air conditioning intake vent. I went back to bed.
2:00 a.m. THE ALARM CHIRPS! Which usually occurs one more time prior to all the alarms going off. I raced into the hall, opened and closed the battery latch on the alarm next to the air conditioning intake vent. I looked online and saw that some alarms can go off from dust. While there’s some dust on the intake vent, it’s been much worse. Hell, I’ve allowed dust bunnies to graze at times, simply because I never to think to look up at the vent. At any rate, I vacuumed it. I opened the battery latch and checked the battery (again) and then closed it. I began to suspect this is the only way to prevent the alarms from going off, sort of a silence button.
2:20 a.m CHIRP! I raced into the hall, clicked open, and closed the battery chamber.
I feel like the guy in LOST who has to press reset every 108 minutes to prevent doomsday.
Only, I am trying to prevent my son from waking up frightened. And the clock is now resetting at random intervals.
2:40 a.m. climbed back into bed, hoping to get some sleep before dawn.
2:45 a.m. CHIRP! WTF?! I raced back into the hall, opened the latch, closed it. Waited. Nothing. I begin to suspect that my wife has secretly enrolled me on some hidden camera reality show in which the audience waits to see how long before I lose my mind. (Spoiler alert: Pretty damned quickly.)
3:05 a.m. climbed back into bed. My heart is pounding, I’m anxious as hell, my eyes are heavy. I’m waiting for the chirp to rob me of my sleep once again. I didn’t have to wait long this time.
3:07 a.m. CHIRP!
3:08 a.m. – Said “F it!” Looks like I’m going to stay up all night and play guardian of the smoke alarm. I will likely have to call someone, like an electrician, to come out here tomorrow and take all my money to help end this madness.
3:31 a.m. - nothing yet. knock on wood.
3:42 a.m. - CHIRP! Repeat process. Is that a tear in my eye?
So, if anyone has any advice, I would greatly appreciate it. The alarm is a BRK smoke alarm, four years old, though I can’t see the model number at the moment. I would try and take it apart again, but I don’t want to risk the alarm blasting. I’ll have to wait until my son wakes up and goes to daycare.
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Oh, WOW. The only time we’ve had a problem with our fire alarm was when the battery was low. But you’ve already done that. I can’t imagine what the heck is going on with your system! Is something shorting it??
.-= Hayden Tompkins´s last blog ..The Awesome Post of Awesome =-.
Oh! Way to make you hate a house immediately! And always be scared it’s going to do that again! (I had similar issues of dread with recurrent water seepage. Ugh.)
Can they all be disconnected? If so, I’d even consider a short term disconnect with a couple of temporary ones in strategic places until you figure out what the deal is. You need your sleep, man.
.-= Betsy Wuebker´s last blog ..THROUGH A GLASS GRIMLY, PART 3 =-.
Take all the batteries out and go to sleep. Work on it when you’re rested.
The risk of anything happening when they are disabled is very slight. The risk of something else happening when you are tired and frustrated is much more significant.
Just before we left on our September trip, I discovered that the smoke detector and the carbon monoxide detector in our motor-home both had their batteries in stalled backwards. The RV dealer service department was apparently supposed to put them in right before delivery to the customer. Ooops. Didn’t happen and that was in July 2008.
.-= Mike´s last blog ..Long’s Peak and Big Run from Black Cañon =-.
I am too late to help but wanted to share that we were awakened last night by our security system. As he always does, my husband ran downstairs in his drawers. One day there is going to be a burglar down there and he’ll be sorry he didn’t grab a light saber on the way down.
(teehee, note to self install motion activated nightvision camera for to make the youtube millions off half asleep Irishman fights off burglar with light saber)
Not trying to alarm you, but I think the machines are about to take over.
.-= Tracy´s last blog ..Dear Stephanie =-.
I’m very sorry about this, but I cannot stop laughing!!
.-= chrissy´s last blog ..Baby Shower Gift Idea: The Rockabye Baby! Download Card Gift Package =-.
Hayden – I updated the post – it seems to have been dust. At least, I hope that’s all it was.
Betsy and Mike – Thanks. I didn’t think they could be disconnected at first without as the plug doesn’t come out easily and I didn’t want to be too forceful with electrical wires. However, turns out, they can unplug. From there, if it happens again, I will remove the batteries also to the one which is going nuts.
Tracy – That would be a funny video post! And yes, the machines have enslaved us all. Oh, overlords, please don’t take this as a criticism.
chrissy – Like I said before, my misery = reader enjoyment. At least some good is coming out of it.
We have ear protection for our daughter–the kind that you see airline workers wearing on the runway. It comes in handy for situations like this. She also wears them for fireworks, and for car races, which was the original intent. They are designed for kids–so they fit. My husband sometimes wears them when he cuts the grass, which is comical because he has to wear them upside down to fit. Anyway, they’ve been quite handy and I highly recommend them.
.-= Alisa Bowman´s last blog ..How to Find Yourself, Part 1 =-.
Reading this AFTER the fact is funny. AFTER.