Smoke/CO2 Detector that Won't Beep 3 Times at 3am!!!!!!!!

[LifeHappens]

Please help me sleep at night. Our home is required by code to have hard-wired smoke/CO2 alarms. Over the past 6 years we have been through many versions at great expense and annoyance. Like the time I literally grabbed one and smashed it with a hammer because It. Would. Not. F'ing. Stop.

All I want is alarms that will 1) detect actual fires so we don't die and 2) refrains from randomly going off at 3am, beeping 3 times and ruining my sleep.

I have read and followed the advice of all the articles suggesting vacuuming/dusting the alarms. We do have 2 cats, but surely there must be an alarm out there that isn't so damn sensitive.

HELP!

[dcheesi]

We had this problem with a particular brand of "10-year" battery-powered alarms. Seemed like it was their way of announcing (and it was literally at 3am both times!) that they were ready to be replaced. We replaced them with a different brand & model; no problems so far, but it hasn't been that long yet.

[HPstache]

This is going to be an unpopular opinion, but I feel smoke/CO2 detectors have been ruined by over regulation.  Give me a black market detector that is not painfully loud, does not go off at the slightest burning of grilled cheese, and gives and has as friendly visual warning prior to announcing to the whole house in the middle of the night that it's now time to change the detector/ batteries sometime in the next month.

[LifeHappens]

We had this problem with a particular brand of "10-year" battery-powered alarms. Seemed like it was their way of announcing (and it was literally at 3am both times!) that they were ready to be replaced. We replaced them with a different brand & model; no problems so far, but it hasn't been that long yet.

If the alarms were actually 10 years old I would not be so annoyed. We have had this happen literally a month within buying all new alarms.

[secondcor521]

The ones I'm familiar with have a battery in addition to being hardwired.  The chemical reaction that produces electricity inside the battery is temperature sensitive, and so when my house is at it's coldest and the battery is dying, it triggers the "low battery" circuitry and beeps.

Take down the detector, replace the 9V battery, put the detector back, and it's good for another several years.  I usually use Duracell brand batteries.

It's probable that new detectors come with cheap batteries that only last a few months.

I have a cat and don't dust my house very often and have never noticed any correlation between dust or cat particles and my smoke detectors.

[deborah]

Our government has advertisements that encourage people to change the battery each time they change all their clocks for daylight saving. And yes, permanently wired ones have batteries.

[HPstache]

Our government has advertisements that encourage people to change the battery each time they change all their clocks for daylight saving. And yes, permanently wired ones have batteries.

Edit: Nevermind, misread what you were saying.

[SmashYourSmartPhone]

All I want is alarms that will 1) detect actual fires so we don't die and 2) refrains from randomly going off at 3am, beeping 3 times and ruining my sleep.

Replace your ionization type detectors with photoelectric detectors, swap out the OEM rubbish bin batteries for a name brand battery (yes, there is a difference), and replace the batteries every few years, and use the spare 9V batteries for other projects/uses/etc.

This is going to be an unpopular opinion, but I feel smoke/CO2 detectors have been ruined by over regulation.  Give me a black market detector that is not painfully loud, does not go off at the slightest burning of grilled cheese, and gives and has as friendly visual warning prior to announcing to the whole house in the middle of the night that it's now time to change the detector/ batteries sometime in the next month.

Stop using crappy ionization detectors, change your batteries on a preemptive schedule, and the problems go away.  You don't need, nor want, a black market detector.  You need, and want, a photoelectric detector, because it won't go off when you burn something in the kitchen, but it will go off when you have a smoldering fire at night that is slowly filling the house with toxic smoke.  Ionization detectors are very poor at detecting smoke - they detect flaming combustion products.

Ionization type detectors should be illegal.  They kill in a variety of ways.  First, they are horrible at detecting the slow, smoldering, smoking starts of fires that actually kill people at night, and in some tests the delta between photoelectric and ionization in these tests is 30-40 minutes.  In other cases, the delta is infinite, because the ionization detector is destroyed by heat before it triggers.  For detecting fast flaming combustion, such as kitchen fires (usually with people present), ionization often triggers 15-30 seconds earlier.  But, those also go off with a slightly burned sandwich.

Photoelectric.  Replace the battery with a name brand every 2 years, or, if one starts chirping, replace ALL the batteries.  And then don't worry about it.

[lhamo]

You might also want to verify that the code requires hardwired now that wirelessly linked systems with the 10 year batteries are readily available.  I recently had my house rewired and the electricians suggested I put in the latter rather than adding a wired system.  Haven't installed them yet, but I got the X-Sense brand since the reviews were significantly better than Kidde:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BZR9GFKQ?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title

[roomtempmayo]

This might be facepunchable, but we bought Nest detectors about five years ago.  We've been nothing but pleased.

[LifeHappens]

All I want is alarms that will 1) detect actual fires so we don't die and 2) refrains from randomly going off at 3am, beeping 3 times and ruining my sleep.

Replace your ionization type detectors with photoelectric detectors

Thank you! This gives me info to work with.