INDEX:

DO YOU LIVE IN A FIRE TRAP?
COMMON FACTORS IN FIRE SAFETY
SAFETY MEASURES 
TYPES OF FIRE ALARM SYSTEMS
COMMERCIAL FIRE ALARM SYSTEMS
RESIDENTIAL FIRE ALARM SYSTEMS
PHOTOELECTRIC VERSUS IONIZATION SMOKE DETECTORS
WHAT AMERIGARD CAN DO FOR YOU

DO YOU LIVE IN A FIRE TRAP?

If you live in a highrise apartment building, the answer is most likely yes.  But what if you live in a single family house?  Surprisingly the answer is still most likely yes.

Every year in the United States thousands of people die in residential fires and many times that number are terribly injured. Billions of dollars in property are lost and much of it is uninsured. Perhaps the most tragic aspect of these losses is the fact that so many of them could have been prevented had certain simple measures been taken.

COMMON FACTORS IN FIRE SAFETY

The most important single factor to reduce the risk from fire is early detection. It only takes a matter of seconds for an automatic fire alarm system to report a fire and only a few minutes for the Fire Department to respond. Try to answer this question accurately: if a fire broke out in your home, when you were asleep, how long would it take for it to be detected? Your life could depend on this. Once flames break out a fire doubles in size every few seconds. Often it is to late to escape. Deadly smoke and poisonous gases have already taken their toll on human life.

SAFETY MEASURES 

In order to provide the most rapid detection of typical residential fires, it is necessary to:

(1) install a sufficient number of photoelectric smoke detectors in each dwelling unit,

(2) interface those detectors into a fire alarm system that continually checks each detector and reports its status, and

(3) monitor the system via a central station to insure the fire department would be dispatched without delay in the event of fire.

TYPES OF FIRE ALARM SYSTEMS

• For existing buildings that wish to avoid the expense and disruption of installing a hard wired system AMERIGARD offers an excellent wireless fire alarm system that:
  • provides all of the advantages of hardwired systems at a fraction of their cost,
  • causes no damage to tenant's apartments,
  • is NFPA, UL, BOCA and MEA approved.
    
    
• For new buildings a hardwired fire alarm is often the most practical to install, and also the most responsive.

COMMERCIAL FIRE ALARM SYSTEMS

The same excellent wireless fire alarm system used for residential buildings is ideally suited to protect commercial space.

• It will detect fire long before building sprinklers are activated thus saving valuable computers, data and files from water damage.
• It will not damage client's finished space.
• It is usually much less expensive than hardwired systems.
• It can be installed without disrupting business operations.
• It is NFPA, UL, BOCA and MEA approved.

RESIDENTIAL FIRE ALARM SYSTEMS

Almost everyone could rattle off a list of fire hazards that exist in virtually every home: overloaded circuits, stoves, microwave ovens, frayed wires, halogen lamps, cigarettes, matches, candles and so on. How well are you protected from these hazards?

The answer is probably not well enough unless your home has a sufficient number of photoelectric smoke detectors, you and your family are needlessly in jeopardy. Photoelectric detectors should be installed inside each bedroom, along escape routes, and on every level of your home. The purpose is to insure everyone would be awakened if sleeping when a fire broke out and would still have a safe escape path.

PHOTOELECTRIC VERSUS IONIZATION SMOKE DETECTORS

There are two basic types of detectors available for home use. One is a photoelectric detector, which is a true smoke detector. The other is an ionization detector, which is more accurately a flame detector. Although both types are marketed as "smoke" detectors, in truth ionization detectors do not detect smoke adequately.

The problems with ionization detectors for residential use are legion.

• They can be very slow to react to smoldering fires, reacting far too late to protect people's lives.
    
• They also are prone to frequent false alarms, because they react to many things such as normal cooking gases.
  • Many people remove the batteries from detectors which constantly false alarm, rendering the detectors useless.
  • Many people become so used to their detectors causing false alarms, that they often ignore the alarms in actual fires, causing them to lose the precious available time left to escape.
       
• Over time ionization detectors also become less and less sensitive.
  • (The National Fire Prevention Association recommends that they be discarded and replaced at least once every ten years, because they may be completely unreliable after that point. But the public is unaware of this, so practically no one replaces their smoke detectors ever. )

There are many advantages of professional quality photoelectric smoke detectors.

• They provide the earliest possible detection of smoke, which accompanies most common household fires and normally precedes flames by a significant amount of time.
    
• If installed correctly they hardly ever false alarm.
    
• They perform self-diagnostics and signal when they need to be cleaned.
    
• They have built-in drift compensation which automatically adjusts their sensitivity.
     
• Some models also include built-in fixed temperature and rate-of-rise heat detectors, and provide both local and remote reporting capabilities.

One of the most positive steps anyone could do to improve their fire protection significantly would be to replace cheap ionization detectors with an adequate number of photoelectric smoke detectors - but not just any photoelectric detectors, modern photoelectric detectors that are obtainable from professional security companies such as Amerigard.

WHAT AMERIGARD CAN DO FOR YOU

Amerigard is an Underwriters Laboratories listed company offering a broad spectrum of security services and products, including burglar alarms, fire alarms, access control, camera systems, central station monitoring, guard response, etc.

Because Amerigard is an independent company and not a manufacturer it is free to offer the most suitable products for each situation from very modestly priced items for personal protection to elaborate systems for high security commercial applications and high rise buildings.

Amerigard is particularly outstanding at custom designing systems and installing them in aesthetically critical environments to be completely inconspicuous.