SMOKE DETECTION, FIRE ALARMS and CO DETECTION
Fires can ruin properties and cause loss of life.
Make sure this is never the case in your property, contact us to carry out full design and installation of fire alarm systems. This ensures that not only are our clients compliant with health and safety and insurance regulations, but keeps themselves safe.
We work with our clients from the initial fire alarm design right through to installation and hand over to ensure every fire alarm installation meets the clients’ needs.
After installation, let us take another of life's hassles away from business businesses and trust us to service and maintain your fire alarm system on an annual basis to ensure consistent compliance of the fire alarm system.
Scottish legislation has changed. Introduced in February 2019, the change applies to all households in Scotland and must be met by February 2022. Applies to ALL Homeowners and Landlords.
The new Scottish legislation states that an interlinked Fire and Smoke alarm system must be fitted in a property and that there should be adequate Carbon Monoxide protection. All smoke alarms and heat alarms must interlink with each other e.g. when one alarm sounds then all smoke and heat alarms in your property must also sound at the same time. This interlink can either be done by hard wire cable between each alarm or by radio wireless communication or by a combination of both. This means that installing simple standalone smoke and heat alarms with replaceable 9 volt batteries is NOT allowed.
Summary
· A heat alarm is required in your kitchen
· A smoke alarm is required in your main daytime room which will likely be the living room or lounge, you may have more than one room you class as a daytime room so a smoke alarm would also be required in this room
· A smoke alarm is required on each level of your house, for most homes that will be for ground and 1st floor hallways/landings. Homes with more than 2 storeys and attic conversions would also require smoke alarms on those additional levels
· More smoke alarms may be required depending on the size and layout of your home e.g. you may require smoke alarms in any rooms that are adjoining to your kitchen or daytime room if you have to go through those rooms from your kitchen or daytime room to reach your escape route hallway. Smoke alarms will be required in those adjoining rooms if the kitchen and daytime rooms have no doors leading directly to outside your home
· You may require more smoke alarms in hallways that are large and smoke alarms may be required in small rooms that you need to go through to get from the hallway escape route to outside your home. Additional heat and smoke alarms may be required in rooms, hallways, areas that have obstructions on the ceiling e.g. dropped beams
· You can install hard wire cable smoke and heat alarms that connect to your electricity but the smoke and heat alarm must have a battery backup. As long as this alarm is mains powered then for private individual households then the backup battery in the alarm can be 9 volt replaceable back up (although we recommend that replaceable 9 volt battery backup types are not used, instead use long-life non-replaceable lithium battery backup type. For all rented accommodation e.g. Private Rented or Social Housing Rented then the battery back up in the mains powered smoke and heat alarms must be of the long-life non replaceable lithium type
· Battery only smoke and heat alarms are allowed but this type of alarm must be powered by a long-life non-replaceable lithium battery that will last for the life span of the actual alarm detector itself. This long-life battery only type of smoke and heat alarm must also be capable of interlinking either by hard wire or wirelessly by radio communication to all other smoke and heat alarms in your home
· You can install a mixture of mains powered and long-life battery powered smoke and heat alarms as long as they all interlink, communicate and sound together when one smoke or heat alarm is activated
· If you already have existing smoke or heat alarms e.g. in your hallways, those detectors will have an expiry date (usually 10 years) so those alarms may need replaced.
· If you already have existing smoke or heat alarms e.g in your hallways then one or more of those alarms may need to be replaced in order that it can be replaced with a type of alarm that can interlink and communicate with any new smoke and heat alarms
· Depending on your type of house any new smoke and heat alarms can be wired with cable but this will be determined on your type of home and how easy it is to get new cables to the required new alarm locations e.g. living room or kitchen, if the cable route is difficult or disruptive a long-life battery only interlinking smoke or heat alarm may be used instead
· All smoke and heat alarms must be installed on the ceiling in each room/area
· A Carbon Monoxide (CO) alarm should be installed close to all fuel burning appliances (excluding an appliance solely used for cooking) and in any room where a flue is installed or runs through
· CO Alarms do not need to interlink to each other and do not need to interlink to any other smoke or heat alarms
· CO Alarms can be battery only type but the battery must be long-life and last for the full working life of the CO alarm
· CO Alarms can also be connected to the mains power but the connection cannot be by a removable plug and the detector should have an indicator and warning to alert users when its working life is due to expire
· The new legislation applies to all homes in Scotland - whether that be private homes you live in, rented flats and homes from a private landlord or rented flats and homes from social housing
· Stricter fire, smoke, heat alarm, CO detection may be required in some private and social rented accommodation and will be stricter in HMO properties where each bedroom must also have fire detection devices installed
· The new legislation covering all homes comes into force on 1st February 2022