sparkling husband primitive has wire nuts

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=287x6596

Oh my.  The real-estate magnate the sparkling husband primitive.

One wonders if he fixes up homes for the homeless, given that it's a hot topic among the primitives.

If he doesn't, then the sparkling husband primitive's a base hypocrite, not practicing what the primitives (including himself) preach.

Husb2Sparkly  Donating Member  (1000+ posts) Mon Jun-23-08 08:37 PM
Original message

Wire nuts
   
I had to get a new smoke detector installed in a house I own. It was built in 1941. When I went to hard wire the detector, I found the job more than I wished to undertake, so I called in my trusty electrician.

In the course of doing the work, he handed me a wire nut he'd removed.

It was ceramic! I'd never seen one. Never knew they existed, to be honest.

A ceramic wire nut. I'll be damned!

here a photograph of a common sort of ceramic nut, commonly found in the real world

(In looking on "The Google" for an image, it seems they still make them ...... for high temperature applications.)

I'm curious.  How does one "hard-wire" a smoke detector?

Aren't they just battery operated, and one just screws them onto something?

Warpy  Donating Member  (1000+ posts) Mon Jun-23-08 09:19 PM
Response to Original message

1. Plastic wirenuts would get cooked and possibly fail in a situation where you'd really need that smoke alarm.

You bet they make them. I've seen them at the big box stores.

Wash. state Desk Jet  Donating Member  (912 posts) Tue Jun-24-08 02:24 AM
Response to Reply #1

2. Ya, those are kind of cool!
   
All the old stoves had those too! Before those tape was used ,connections were soldered. My grand dad was electrican ,so was my dad, grand dad was a cigar roller before he became a electrican at the turn of the twentieth century 1902. The inspectors liked to view his connections ,because those connections were unique! Cool stuff hua!

I dunno.

Smoke-detectors disturb the cats here, and so I removed them right after I moved out here.

What happens is that the batteries wear down, and at the point of expiration, the smoke-detector goes off, apparently creating some sort of sound (remember, I can't hear), considerably discombobulating the cats, and it takes time for me to figure out what's agitating them.

[Uhhuh35]

I'm curious.  How does one "hard-wire" a smoke detector?
Aren't they just battery operated, and one just screws them onto something?

http://www.ehow.com/how_14118_choose-smoke-detector.html
"Decide if you want a battery-operated smoke detector or a detector that runs on electricity. AC-powered smoke detectors with battery backup are the most desirable smoke detectors to have".

I thought batteries had "electricity" in them too but I could be mistaken. 

My Uncle and I wired a senior car facility almost ten years ago. Hard wired smoke detectors are required by code.

[Flame]

Frank, I gotta say it, even if you disreagard the advice, but you really should have smoke detectors.  Can you find some that have a strobe effect rather than a sound?  That's way the cats don't get bothered, and yet you are still warned about a fire?

Wouldn't want anything to happen to you!

[Lord Undies]

Believe it or not, ceramic wire nuts are still available and are not an oddity.

My smoke detectors are "hard wired" as per county code.  Battery operated detectors are worthless in many hands. 

[franksolich]

Well, Uhhuh35, what I don't understand is this: during a fire, isn't the electrical power usually one of the first things to go?  So how can a smoke-alarm go off, if the power's out?

And Flame, there's such a thing as smoke-alarms that emit light, but what good are those if one is sound asleep in bed, or out of view of the smoke-alarm?

franksolich takes his chances, and God has always been good.

[Uhhuh35]

Well, Uhhuh35, what I don't understand is this: during a fire, isn't the electrical power usually one of the first things to go?  So how can a smoke-alarm go off, if the power's out?
And Flame, there's such a thing as smoke-alarms that emit light, but what good are those if one is sound asleep in bed, or out of view of the smoke-alarm?
franksolich takes his chances, and God has always been good.

Frank, I talked with one of the firefighters where I work the other day. I asked him about the relative merits of A/C versus battery powered detectors. He said that both systems have the same reliability but he was dismissive about the idea that electric power is the first thing to go in a fire.
But he did state that A/C powered systems are needed if you should choose some sort of alarm monitoring to go with your setup. You know, they call you if an alarm goes off and call the fire/paramedics if need be.

[MrsSmith]

Well, Uhhuh35, what I don't understand is this: during a fire, isn't the electrical power usually one of the first things to go?  So how can a smoke-alarm go off, if the power's out?

And Flame, there's such a thing as smoke-alarms that emit light, but what good are those if one is sound asleep in bed, or out of view of the smoke-alarm?

franksolich takes his chances, and God has always been good.

If the alarm is in your bedroom, the light will wake you.  Though there isn't a great danger, with that many cats, the cats will probably wake you before the alarm would even go off. 

However, the danger is very real.  My family has had 3 fires on the homestead...one when my grandmother was small, total loss of the house.  One about 15 years ago, wiring in the bathroom got hot enough to burn several square feet of wall before it was discovered (by luck, if my brother had been asleep, it would have been different).  And the third about 5 years ago, caused by a lightning strike, they lost one kennel building and several dogs.  If there had been hard-wired alarms in the houses and kennels by the third time, they might have saved the kennel and the dogs.  As it was, one theory for my mom's lung cancer was that it was actually started by the toxic smoke from the kennel, when she ran right in and tried to get to her dogs.  My brother was about a minute behind her, got her out before she was badly burned, both had to be treated for smoke inhalation.  He was sick for 2 or 3 days, Mom was sick much longer.   

With earlier warning, many things could be so different. 

I know you have no family, but do your cats have a way out of the house if they can't wake you?

[Chris_]

Well, Uhhuh35, what I don't understand is this: during a fire, isn't the electrical power usually one of the first things to go?  So how can a smoke-alarm go off, if the power's out?

And Flame, there's such a thing as smoke-alarms that emit light, but what good are those if one is sound asleep in bed, or out of view of the smoke-alarm?

franksolich takes his chances, and God has always been good.

Smoke detectors are supposed to go off well in advance of conflagration.  99% of the time the fire (from whatever source) will give off smoke and trip the alarm LONG before you lose AC power.  And, of course, with AC it doesn't matter as much if you forget to change the batteries.

Frank, get Smoke detectors for the deaf -- I did a Google search on "smoke" "detectors" "deaf" and got a bunch of hits.  I am willing to bet they are even subsidized (like TTYs).

A lot of us have really come to care about you.