Carbon Monoxide Safety For Your Home

 

cheap carbon monoxide detectorHow much do you value you and your famlies lives? Impossible to answer I would say. So, I have a question for you, do you have a carbon monoxide detector? If you havn’t then every day you are risking lives. At least you’re here which means you’re looking too buy a good value alarm or some information about why you should have one. Hopefully there will be enough information here for you to make the right decision.

Visiting us this site is the first step to protecting you and your family free from the dangers of this silent killer.

Here we will look more into the dangers of carbon monoxide, which kind of alarm is best to buy, what dangers there are for you and the placement.

As a former gas engineer I have visited thousands of homes and inspected numerous gas appliances and the number of people risking their lives without one fitted in their home is worrying.

Carbon Monoxide is known as the silent killer and is a highly poisonous byproduct ofcheap carbon monoxide detector the burning of gas and LPG. It is odorless, tasteless and cannot be seen. The concentrations of co gas required to kill a human is less than 2%. This sounds like a miniscule amount but if you think that is small, air polluted with CO gas with less than 0.5% of the air will kill in around 30 minutes. Think about that for a minute, 99.5% of the air can be fine with just a small percentage of the gas and in 30 minutes it will kill. An even lower rate will cause headaches, dizziness and nausea within quite a short time. There are many other dangers to inhaling low rates of this gas that can cause serious health problems later in life.

Unfortunately there are many deaths recorded each year due to co poisoning. In the U.K this figure is around 50 and in the U.S its is about 500 with a further 20 000 being patients at emergency rooms every year.

Carbon Monoxide produced by gas appliances is probably the biggest danger to us which is why a detecting it is essential. When a gas appliance burns it produces products of combustion. When it is burning correctly the appliance we have what is called complete combustion which produces carbon dioxide or Co2, oxygen and energy. When there is a problem with the appliance, we have incomplete combustion and this will produce this poisonous gas and oxygen and is something an alarm will recognise and sound to you.

An appliance will produce this incomplete combustion when its has either been fitted incorrectly, poorly repaired/ maintained or when vents, chimneys or flues are blocked or partially blocked which effects the air ratios or the path of the products of combustion. This is why it is vital to have your appliance serviced regularly by a qualified, registered engineer with a name you can trust. Have a quick look at your appliance to see if you can see a yellow/ orange flame instead of blue or sooty build ups on or around the appliance. These can be a tell tale sign of an appliance burning incorrectly.

 

An alarm is a device every home should have

 

An alarm will detect, obviously, harmful gas levels and should be installed in every home. The levels of co gas are measured over a period of time and will sound a warning when it detects dangerous levels of the gas in the air. This will give the user time to start ventilating the property, getting out and letting experts inspect the appliances and inform them when it is safe to reenter.

There are a few varieties available. Probably the cheapest, but perhaps the least effective is the patch or pad. This variety does not sound a warning but changes colour from a beige colour to black when it detects this gas. They have the advantage of being cheap but, as has been mentioned previously, it only takes a small build up of CO to be fatal so these types of detectors need to be constantly monitored which could easily be forgotten. They should also be replaced within 6 months and therefore end up costing more in the long run than paying for one that makes a sound from the start.

An electronic alarm will sound a warning when any poisonous gas is detected. There are a couple of varieties of electronic carbon monoxide alarm and they work in slightly different ways. There is a type which works in a similar way to the patch or pad, but a photocell will monitor the patch and notes any change in colour by way of light reflection and sounds a warning when there is a change. There is another type which reacts when any gas is around and through a chemical process which in turn will sound. Another type has electrodes inside and when this gas is present the electrodes will conduct electricity and therefore trigger alarms.

We are going to be bringing you all the advice you need to make a decision about purchasing one as well as all the best deals from the likes of Honeywell, Kidde and Fireangel. We cannot stress enough the importance of this product. It is one of those products that is easily forgotten or the purchase of one is pushed back to make way for other needs. However, this product may one day save you life. We hope that it never comes to that but taking the risk by not having one is taking too much of a risk. The cost of one of these detectors is so small that owning one should be without question. Do the right thing for you and your family, buy one today.

I hope you will choose to buy one for your home and keep you and your family free from the risks of carbon monoxide. This purchase will be one of the most important items you buy this year. It may not be the most exciting product to buy but it is an investment in your health and your lives and for the small cost involved in getting a CO2 alarm, it is something that should be in every home.

 

Battery Powered C02 Alarm

 

A battery powered device is probably the most practical to purchase. They are easy to install, will make a sound when the device recognises dangerous gas levels and relatively inexpensive. The other 2 potential purchases are the spot style variety, already mentioned here and mains powered devices.

Mains powered detectors will require hard wiring by a professional, which adds the cost of the purchase. It will do the same job as a battery powered one but as the battery one is much more convenient to install and move around, then this one is what we would recommend in most homes.

 

 

 

 

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