The winner was the Warrior MT588H-LB, photoelectric with 10 year battery. Highest rated with 10year battery

Thanks all

mentalinc:

 

The winner was the Warrior MT588H-LB, photoelectric with 10 year battery. Highest rated with 10year battery

 

Thanks all

 

https://www.consumer.org.nz/products/smoke-alarms-and-batteries/warrior-mt588h-lb

Based on member reviews and comments at the bottom, I think I'll stick with my 4 x $20 warehouse detectors supplemented with NEST Protect 

chimera:

 

mentalinc:

 

The winner was the Warrior MT588H-LB, photoelectric with 10 year battery. Highest rated with 10year battery

 

Thanks all

 

 

https://www.consumer.org.nz/products/smoke-alarms-and-batteries/warrior-mt588h-lb

 

Based on member reviews and comments at the bottom, I think I'll stick with my 4 x $20 warehouse detectors supplemented with NEST Protect 

 

 

Will see how they go and will report back if I take them back

Speaking Alarms are all the rage now. I recall we were in Hawaii, staying at the Trump, the night after the Earthquake and Tsunami hit Japan and we had already had sirens going on Maui the night before etc. It was 2:40am and there was no real "siren", rather a flashing light, illuminated floor lights and a womans recorded voice;

"There has been an emergency and you must evacuate immediately, do not use the elevators, please exit via the stairs".

Was quite frightening going down 17 flights of stairs with my Son on my back, Asthma kicking in, helping an old lady with a disabled grandson and about 900 people pushing from behind, not knowing what the emergency was. Got to the bottom expecting buses to take us to higher ground. 

Turned out some muppet had burned his toast!

The staff were awesome, handing out water, checking people and making sure everyone was ok.

Got a nice gift basket from the manager who said he was impressed that I would help the two down the stairs and I'd done a great job keeping people calm. 

I must admit, the voice thing was MUCH less alarming than a siren.

networkn:

 

Speaking Alarms are all the rage now. I recall we were in Hawaii, staying at the Trump, the night after the Earthquake and Tsunami hit Japan and we had already had sirens going on Maui the night before etc. It was 2:40am and there was no real "siren", rather a flashing light, illuminated floor lights and a womans recorded voice;

 

"There has been an emergency and you must evacuate immediately, do not use the elevators, please exit via the stairs".

 

Was quite frightening going down 17 flights of stairs with my Son on my back, Asthma kicking in, helping an old lady with a disabled grandson and about 900 people pushing from behind, not knowing what the emergency was. Got to the bottom expecting buses to take us to higher ground. 

 

Turned out some muppet had burned his toast!

 

The staff were awesome, handing out water, checking people and making sure everyone was ok.

 

Got a nice gift basket from the manager who said he was impressed that I would help the two down the stairs and I'd done a great job keeping people calm. 

 

I must admit, the voice thing was MUCH less alarming than a siren.

 

 

 

The Quell range of smoke alarms (available at Bunnings) has some gimmicks <cough> features to make particular models "best suited" for each room. The bedroom model has a talking alarm. I didn't see the point and spent some time scoffing with the Bunnings man about the pointlessness of it. However when I got home Mrs MDF referred me to a study that showed a surprisingly large number of people can sleep through a siren alarm - desensitised by the snooze button? - but that almost no one sleeps through a talking voice announcing an emergency. So maybe there is a point to it.

We ended up with the Family Shield photoelectric 10 year lithium battery for about $25 each while I look into centrally wired/smart/sprinkler options. 10 years should be _plenty_ of time to reach a fully informed decision...

Linking to the cleverloop smokey app incase people want to add "smarts" to their normal smoke detector...

http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=73&topicid=198527

I have 4 cavius photoelectric and 1 heat detector in my house. Hasn't burnt down yet so don't know if they work but look good, easy to install and long life battery is nice for peace of mind.

mdf:

 

We ended up with the Family Shield photoelectric 10 year lithium battery for about $25 each while I look into centrally wired/smart/sprinkler options. 10 years should be _plenty_ of time to reach a fully informed decision...

 

I bought four of these a couple of years back from The Warehouse. Two of them have had significant problems with going off at random times (some of this potentially related to the issue raised above regarding falling voltage in the cold?). It's really not fun having to race to the (external) garage in the middle of the night to get out the ladder so as to silence the alarm (high stud so no reaching it from a stool!). Also, with one of them the alarm now often goes just upon inserting the battery so seems faulty. In the end I returned two last weekend for a refund; ended up buying similarly priced alarms ($30 each) at Mitre 10, so hopefully we don't have the same problem!

I was tempted by the aesthetics of the Cavius alarms, but the price is on the steep side. I see that Mitre 10 sells them for $49.99, and Bunnings for $53 - so wouldn't that mean with a price match guarantee Bunnings would need to sell them at $42.50? That doesn't seem quite so bad.

mentalinc:

 

chimera:

 

mentalinc:

 

The winner was the Warrior MT588H-LB, photoelectric with 10 year battery. Highest rated with 10year battery

 

Thanks all

 

 

https://www.consumer.org.nz/products/smoke-alarms-and-batteries/warrior-mt588h-lb

 

Based on member reviews and comments at the bottom, I think I'll stick with my 4 x $20 warehouse detectors supplemented with NEST Protect 

 

 

 

 

 

Will see how they go and will report back if I take them back

 

Hmmm, the Consumer member reviews of the Warrior alarms are a bit of a worry - I know that one of the largest property management companies in Christchurch is installing these in every property they manage and billing the landlords for it. Great if they work as intended, but a complete waste of money if the tenants have the issues stated in the member reviews. The landlords are being charged $70 a pop (including installation), so for that price I'd expect them to be functional with no false alarms in the middle of the night.

As one of those landlords I will follow the next round of property manager inspections with interest to see how many have been tampered with or removed by the tenants. Interestingly I have the same model at home (albeit with standard 9 volt battery) and have never had any such false alarms.

Can anyone with the Cavius alarms fitted in their house report on how common (if at all) false alarms are with these units?

And is it worth spending more to get the thermal alarm to replace the one in the dining/kitchen? Generally, apart from the likelihood of false alarms due to cooking etc, are the problems with installing standard photoelectric and/or ionising alarms in such spaces real enough to not make it worth having such an alarm in these spaces?

The Warrior units I've replaced my two "go off in the middle of the cold night" Family Shield alarms with clearly suffer from the same problem, as highlighted above in references to the Consumer members' comments. Excellent - paid a few more dollars to get units that are probably no better. I'm thinking of taking them back for a refund and spending a few more $$$ to get the Cavius. Of course this'll leave a hole exposed on the ceiling, given the units are so much smaller!

I got some of the "Fire Angel" alarms from Mitre 10 when we moved house about a year ago.

They look good, the "toast proof" model nearest the kitchen has had no false alarms (I think it went off once, but we had actually burnt something), they make one which includes a light to find your way, and they flash an LED to indicate the battery is low (as well as chirping) so when you go to find which one is complaining you can find it.  Nice big test/mute buttons too.

I'd have gone with the 10-year battery option but money was a bit tight, it's nbd changing the battery every 6 months anyway

jonathan18:

 

 

 

And is it worth spending more to get the thermal alarm to replace the one in the dining/kitchen? Generally, apart from the likelihood of false alarms due to cooking etc, are the problems with installing standard photoelectric and/or ionising alarms in such spaces real enough to not make it worth having such an alarm in these spaces?

 

The Warrior units I've replaced my two "go off in the middle of the cold night" Family Shield alarms with clearly suffer from the same problem, as highlighted above in references to the Consumer members' comments. Excellent - paid a few more dollars to get units that are probably no better. I'm thinking of taking them back for a refund and spending a few more $$$ to get the Cavius. Of course this'll leave a hole exposed on the ceiling, given the units are so much smaller!

 

Maybe it is something to do with the environment in your house, and where they are located? Sounds like an odd problem. I am thinking of buying some  Cavius alarms, but only because they are better value over their life, and don't have to go though the effort of changing the battery.