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Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Its time Horn/Strobe Boosters have built in Trouble sounders


Its bad enough when you have to service a Fire System you are not familiar with but to then have a Bell 1 or 2 trouble on the loop which supply s power to the Bell Horns and Strobes this can be a real night mare.
It all started when the American with Disabilities Act required Fire alarms to include clear flashing Strobe Lights . Fire Alarms could no longer support pushing out power to horns and bells plus now strobe lights so independant supervised Power Boosters where developed to solve the problem. They do the job well when properly installed but one big problem is after they are in for several years the back up batteries need replaced . When this condition occurs a trouble signal is generated to the main fire panel and if the booster is right beside it no problem pop in new batteries and away you go but what if it is located else where and not clearly visiable like installed above a cieling now what do you do? Thats right get out the ladders and flashlights and start looking and spend sometimes 4 or more hours looking for it because the people who installed the booster violated NFPA72 by not marking in the main panel where the booster is located.Given the fact not all booster boxes are red they can be any color can lead to an even more exhaustive search.
Now why could manufacturers not put a simple little .50 cent piezeo sounder in the panel you can silence with a push button like the 2 line fire dialer s currently have ?
Stupidity as usual never ever take into account some one needs to service this unit let alone the least common denominator installers company's use who could care less if they even install fire systems properly and you can see this can be a real problem.

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