User Guide

rior of your alarm (sensing chamber) by using compressed air or
a vacuum cleaner hose and blowing or vacuuming through the
openings around the perimeter of the alarm. The outside of the
alarm can be wiped with a damp cloth. After cleaning, reinstall
your alarm and test your alarm by using the test button. If clean-
ing does not restore the alarm to normal operation the alarm
should be replaced.
7. LIMITATIONS OF SMOKE ALARMS
WARNING: PLEASE READ CAREFULLY AND THOROUGHLY
• NFPA 72 states: Life safety from fire in residential occupancies
is based primarily on early notification to occupants of the need
to escape, followed by the appropriate egress actions by those
occupants. Fire warning systems for dwelling units are capable
of protecting about half of the occupants in potentially fatal
fires. Victims are often intimate with the fire, too old or young,
or physically or mentally impaired such that they cannot escape
even when warned early enough that escape should be possible.
For these people, other strategies such as protection-in-place or
assisted escape or rescue are necessary.
• Leading authorities recommend that both ionization and photo-
electric smoke alarms be installed to help insure maximum detec-
tion of the various types of fires that can occur within the home.
Ionization sensing alarms may detect invisible fire particles (asso-
ciated with fast flaming fires) sooner than photoelectric alarms.
Photoelectric sensing alarms may detect visible fire particles (asso-
ciated with slow smoldering fires) sooner than ionization alarms.
• A battery powered alarm must have a battery of the specified type,
in good condition and installed properly.
• AC powered alarms (without battery backup) will not operate if
the AC power has been cut off, such as by an electrical fire or
an open fuse.
• Smoke alarms must be tested regularly to make sure the batter-
ies and the alarm circuits are in good operating condition.
• Smoke alarms cannot provide an alarm if smoke does not reach
the alarm. Therefore, smoke alarms may not sense fires starting
in chimneys, walls, on roofs, on the other side of a closed door
or on a different floor.
• If the alarm is located outside the bedroom or on a different
floor, it may not wake up a sound sleeper.