Fire Suppression Blankets there all the hype in putting out fires.Just one problem many can be deadly and spread a fire because how they are made

 Did an inspection of a fire scene in a family's home after the Chicken they where frying caught kitchen on fire when grease ignited while making an evening snack.

The home Owner had an older Fire Extinguisher which he tried to use to put it out ,but because it had not been inspected or maintained it lost its pressure to propel the powder 

 

But he had back up he had purchased a fire safety blanket which he put over the stove as he had seen in the instructions but the blanket which he can not remember who made it  caught fire and home was destroyed

                                                         Example not actual blanket

 The problem is many of these blankets are not certified by any 3rd party certification outfit to their worthiness so there is no guarantee they are suitable to be used in a fire .

Plus many blanket manufacturers are very deceptive how they sell these blankets for what they can do.

Yes they use them in industrial settings but those blankets are highly regulated .and personnel trained to use them.

If your going to buy a blanket make sure it has UL or ETL certified seal and learn how to use properly.

But a Fire Extinguisher is always my first go to. 

 

 

 

 

Limited Area Sprinkler Systems in closets and crawl spaces are a good ideal but is anyone testing to make sure they work ?

 Limited area Sprinklers are a great idea I recently came across one in an apartment building  tenant storage room 

Its just 3 sprinkler heads run off the buildings main water line  NFPA 13 limits these systems to 6 heads and they make sense where you don't need a full sprinkler system but want extra protection. Like storage rooms and Trash chutes etc 

 

But the question is who or when are these to be tested if there ever tested ? 

I can find nothing in codes require them to be tested other than NFPA25. to make matters worse   valves serving them are not locked or electrically monitored  like regular sprinklers . Seems to be a AHJ call and the bigger problem is really old limited systems generally have no inspectors test valve or flow switch with bell which limits there inspection. 

So the next question is after they have been installed 20 to 30 years will they even still work? 

I have seen steel pipe sprinklers where rust was so bad heads did not activate  should not happened with a copper or plastic piping but still who is keeping an eye on them? 

Lots of questions no answers . 

 

 

 

Another Honeywell Honey-fail 5495 Silent Knight Horn Booster Failures

 Yes Once again Honeywell has failed when it comes to a quality product and how the hell did these 5495 Horn Boosters ever get on the market .

 

 

It seems every 5495 Horn Booster myself and other fire Alarm techs have installed have failed with in 12-113 years . Worst part no trouble signal from booster its not working .

This bad one was found during bi annual test  .

Well needless to say I will never buy or put in or replace another SK Booster it will be Potter Electric boosters from here out. 

because Honeywell will not address or fix the problem because as usual they just dont give a F#%k if you get hurt  

Verizon FIOS technicians putting public at danger as they upgrade Fiber interfaces for Phone Lines

 It is a case of shear laziness and Verizon not giving a Fu>k about pubic safety .

Technicians are taking the original Fios fiber interface boxes which had a Back up battery and would hold phone lines up and ripping out the original parts and installing a new interface has no battery back up

 You can see in picture above where battery sat.

I recently had a case where a Dollar General  fire Alarm went into trouble and would not communicate every time the store in Ross twp  P on 3 degree road lost power which is frequent and this is the mess I found.

 You now have to request battery back up and they give you this flimsy enclosure  holds 12 D batteries or you can use a UPS

Isn't that nice of Verizon putting peoples lives on the line and this is not the first one I have found. 

 

 

Addressable Fire Alarm systems once seen as great advancment over Convntional Systems . But now proving to be a legacy problem as systems age and parts are no longer available

 Addressable systems are fantastic when it comes to there flexibility especially in large buildings and multiple properties .they let you know exactly know which device is in alarm or trouble. 

Because with old conventional systems in some cases you could have as many as 20 or more devices on a run and trying to find the bad one can be a real pain finding it.

 

But as Analog Addressable systems are now going into their 2nd and 3rd generation of design

The legacy systems in the field  are becoming a Night Mare for Building owners .

Because of mergers and changes in protocols how panels communicate  in the industry many parts are now no longer available.

Take the case of   Silent Knight and Fire Lite

Silent Knight offered 2 protocols SK and Hochiki  Silent Knight now has dropped the Hochiki Protocol

and Fire lite has dropped Clip Protocol for Hyper Speed.

So now you as a building owner who has a 25 year old system who needs parts can not get them.

So you have choices.  Try and find old stock expensive or replace the whole system.

Which is thousands of dollars.  But what many are doing is eliminating devices and bypassing them  and  going without protection in certain areas.

Not a good situation at all. But they are doing it.

So you say well the building owner should have been told and prepared for the systems to be upgraded

But when you put the wrong protocol in even 5 years ago spent $20K for a  new system and now its going to cost you another $20K or more  how do you call that fair.

So  because no one has been keeping their eyes on the situation we now have unsafe buildings because of it.

 

Fire Investigation and AI it could open up a world of new tools for Investigators , But it can also do the same for Arsonists. So who is keeping an eye on it

 As a Fire Investigator new tools and procedures are always welcomed to help prevent and catch those who will do harm to others.

However AI Artificial Intelligence opens up a new world of totally unbelievable possibilities one can not even imagine. So lets look at some of the Good and Bad aspects of it .

For the Investigator AI could help solve previously unsolvable Arson and even Accidental Fires and how they started. AI could be put to task in solving old cold cases as it finds clues missed by investigators .

Imagine you go to a scene do a full 360 video of scene  put it into your AI assistant and it spits out all the possible scenarios as to what happened and when saving painstaking hours of research. Identifies the source of accelerate and spits out possible suspects and where the accelerate was recently purchased

But of course there is always a give and take its the law of nature.

So what could AI  for the Criminal Arsonist 

It could teach them better ways to set fires and not get caught . How to better fool investigators and cover their tracks.

It could develop even more highly flammable substances which do extreme damage before firefighters even arrive on scene  

  So yes there are all kind of possibilities and who is keeping there eyes on it to prevent it from getting out of Hand ?

Simple $30.00 Weather Alert Radios could have saved many lives in Texas flood why where they not mandated.

 It is absolutely the worst case of incompetency I have seen when over 100 people are now dead after the Guadalupe River in Texas took them downstream during extreme weather conditions.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/07/10/texas-flooding-death-toll-missing-search-updates/84529818007/

They know this is an area with tragic level floods frequently yet no warning sirens  and a delayed Red Alert by the 911 center  and a Austin  Fire Chef denying aide. who has been asked to resign over his DEI hiring 

https://www.theblaze.com/news/dereliction-of-duty-dei-obsessed-fire-chief-on-hot-seat-following-deadly-texas-flooding

 But much of the deaths could have been avoided had simple $30.00 Weather Alert Radios been mandated at those campsites to warn campers 

 They come on  and are activated by National Weather Service and have battery back up if there is a power failure . they work and alert 24/7  They even make small personnel weather alert radios with flashlight and AM/FM Radio built in 

Why where they not mandated as part of the Texas Approved Emergency plans ?

Simple effective and very cost efficient . Placed where people are sleeping or who are on duty 

the tones come on and messages are delivered. you can even listen to local weather forecasts .

Of Course if there not maintained with battery's when needed  or warnings are ignored. tragedy will still happen but a lot more people would have survived.  

I have had a weather radio in my home since 1981 when a tornado came into Pittsburgh area  

I keep my eyes and ears on weather all the time due to Radio towers I maintain and other critical property's and weather radios alert me when bad storms are coming thru area so i can take precautions necessary.

 Maybe now officials will get a clue i doubt it we have talked about tornado sirens in Pittsburgh area for over 30 years and its still nothing but talk.  

  

 

Alarmax Distributors just screwed every Small Alarm Dealer in Pittsburgh

 I have been a loyal Alarmax distributors customer from day they opened after Rodger Graff started it after Triangle Electronics  which he worked at went out of business in late 80s.

There location on Liberty ave  in Pittsburgh not always the easiest to get into but they always where able to get me the parts I needed for alarm and camera systems.

 Since I am a smaller company I always paid cash and what ever the price was like all the little company's who buy there. averaging 50 to 100 K+ in Purchases every year .

It was the little guys like us who helped keep Alarmax flush with cash   when they ventured into providing the Big Regional company's   with hundreds of alarm systems etc. and adding more branch locations .

The Big Company's dictating what they would pay and when they paid it.

Rodger knew this and always took care of us little guys. 

Unfortunately Rodger passed away and things started changing and it was getting harder to get Parts we needed especially special order items .

Now going to the supply house was always a good networking thing you got to see other dealers  and talk shop over what was going on in the industry over a cup of coffee and manufacturers reps would come in and show latest new products , and some times offered a nice simple lunch . and training classes .

BUT NOW THAT'S ALL GONE 

Alarmax now has changed the branch to the Big Dealers only and they expect us to order everything from their Cleveland Branch which has had a bad reputation  for years  and now  have our product orders  dropped shipped to our home office. 

No more just walk in and get what you need when you need it. no more seeing other dealers who I will probably never see again unless I bump across them in the field 

The Corporate Suits who decided to go with the big money and screw the little guys have taken over and

Rodger has got to be turning in his grave.

Needless to say I will no longer purchase from Alarmax  . There are plenty of alternatives available.

Why they would take such a risky chance and deal with large alarm company's that are highly leveraged and a house of cards financially and have little to no real assets other than locked in contracts which people will break if economy goes south  I will never understand . But I can see the coming down fall of Alarmax. Every Electrical Distributor who played this game failed in 5 to10 years in this area. 

 SHAME ON YOU ALARMAX SHAME ON YOU