I'm not betraying a hard worker like that, they've shown up for work everyday for 7-10 years and you think I would replace them with some young'n?

A follow up is a absolutely regular thing and does not diminish neither study.

Because fire hot!

1. Comma splice in OOP's description

2. Concrete buildings, my dude.

I survived a house fire and my family was left with nearly nothing. We no longer live in places made from fire's favourite food.

I didn't say they were diminished. I said they weren't independent.

It's actually because my fume hood does nothing and is a piece of shit just slightly more than I am for not replacing it. At least I switched to avacado oil, higher smoke point.

They always wait until nighttime.

Most carbon monoxide detectors do too

*dooting

And if you live in a place with a lot of industry or traffic it should be replaced sooner than that.

Hehe.

You want to bet your life on that? You want to bet the life of your kids on that?

You're not fooling me!
Get out of here ya darn Velociraptor!

Alec in his own video mentions that the issue isn't that the Americium decays, but that the electronics themselves age and fail, which applies to both the ionization detectors and photoelectric detectors.

This is one of the things you just don't wanna mess with, as such a failure is completely unpredictable, and from what I know some manufacturers are even beginning to make detector units with non-replaceable batteries, intended to be replaced whole when the battery dies after years of runtime, to make it impossible to keep using a detector after its rated lifetime.

Those are the only battery ones legal to sell where I live.

Genuine question, how do you dispose of these properly?

We have limited electronic recycling options that I’ve found. When I brought my old detectors in, they sent me away.
I suppose I could break down the plastic vs the circuit components and recycle the plastic.

What do you all do?

Your city should have a solid / chemical waste collection point.

If you live in a state that observes time changes you should get in the habit of checking them on that day. It means you check them twice a year and you’ll be mindful of the expiration date.

They always wait until night.

Decades ago i survived a house only because I had left an empty aerosol can of mousse in a pile of clothes. That pile started burning and caused the can to explode and wake me. Otherwise the fire would have consumed me as well.

I was looking at one of those when I was buying new detectors.

They prevent death.

What's the reason behind that legislation?

Safety. What else?

You can see a news report from when it came into force here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-60203081

The guidance is here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/fire-and-smoke-alarms-in-scottish-homes/pages/where-and-what-to-buy/

Which includes this part on batteries:

Replaceable batteries cannot be used because the sensors in the alarm degrade over time and so will not be able to detect heat or smoke. This is why the alarm has a limited lifespan.  Sealed, tamper-proof battery units must be used because they are safer than those which allow the user to change the batteries.

There have been several tragedies over the years where alarms failed because their batteries expired, or people have removed them. Any alarm you buy will have information on how long it lasts, which can be up to 10 years.

Ours were just replaced in our rental house. They were last replaced in 2004 and our corpo landlord just doesn't give a fuck.

I don't think our dryer vent has been cleaned in a decade. This place is a fire trap.

I’ve had the same problem with them. I don’t recommend them either.

Even if they do have a warranty, they aren’t reliable enough to be worth doing the warranty claim on, imho.

I’ve gone back to the old battery style and gotten some rechargeable 9 volt.

I put things like this in a box labelled "I don't know how to recycle this", then I put that box in the corner of the least-used room in the house, where I won't see it often.

Exactly, that is a "next of kin" kinda problem

No vote. Doot!

Okay, let's start with Helium (named after the sun)

I know some manufacturers are even beginning to make detector units with non-replaceable batteries, intended to be replaced whole when the battery dies after years of runtime, to make it impossible to keep using a detector after its rated lifetime.

I'm sure that's the reason say they do it, but that smells like standard corporate planned obsolescence and profit seeking with a great PR team.

See if you have a local household hazardous waste recycling program. If not, check with the fire department if they'll take em

Found out my dryer vent duct was disconnected on both ends. I wouldn't be surprised 🤷

If you're not living in USA-land you're probably fine to simply change the battery every few years because you've got a photoelectric smoke detector.

Ionization based smoke detectors (that require changing because radioactive...) are more unsafe and usually only allowed in special cases in non third world countries like the EU.

Oh and you also can't just throw them into the trash because you know radioactivity... except in USA-land...

That's a celestial object, not a place. The sun is traveling at 230 km/s around the galaxy. It's not a "place."

You keep it until the next hazardous waste collection day, then put it in your car to bring there. Spend half an hour waiting in a big line of cars, get up to where they take it and get yelled at for wasting their time on such a small amount of hazardous waste

Don’t they all do that now? Tell you when they’ve expired?

I've warned them about this and our gutters rotting away the wood on our patio and they told me both were tenant's responsibility, despite a whole section on their website saying otherwise.

I couldn't give a fuck less about this house. I close on my first HOME next week!

That’s all they sell at Costco now and I’m worried they won’t last 10 years. They’re kinda pricey too $70 for two.

Maybe, if it is made past a certain date. Mine in the image, from 2005, did not.

The instructions in the box (who reads those right?) says to test monthly.

My hardwired detector was $73 for 1.

As I mentioned in another comment, I almost died in a house fire. I had an aerosol can in a pile of clothes that caught fire from a heater, that can exploded and woke me. Otherwise I would have slept through the fire.

Your comment hits me really hard (I am sure not as hard as being on scene where they did not have detectors). But reading some of the dismissive comments I was starting to think I was over reacting, you assured me I was not.

RIP. Please get at least one.

Okay do that.

People die every day in house fires, dumbass.

that's an interesting way to instantaneously combust. did they determine what the source was?

The sun is a place. The moon is a place. Earth is a place. A specific location on the earth is also a place.

Anything you insert into a sentence describing the origin point of something traveling is a place.

It was a space heater, I had it on a timer (we had no heating in that part of the house) and I thought I had turned it off. My laundry pile was too close to the heater, it ignited the laundry which caused the can to rupture.

The fire was isolated to my room, and my dad and I got it extinguished before the fire department arrived. We lived 20 miles outside town.

I forget what the exact cause was listed as in the report, but it was not the same as the actual cause.

It's tuned to a specific output and isn't exactly field adjustable. Certainly it will continue to be radioactive long after you're dead, but that doesn't mean it will still be working properly.

You're supposed to test them fairly regularly.

I get that monthly might be a pain, but once or twice a year is probably smart, for safety equipment.