OT where is your carbon monoxide detector | Arthritis Information

Do you have a carbon monoxide detector in your home? You should, and in my opinion, you should have at least two. Experts say to place the carbon monoxide detector in the hallway outside the bedroom so it will wake you if you're sleeping (and that's usually where it's required by occupancy codes). Unfortunately, humidity can set off a false alarm, so putting it outside a bathroom (usually near the bedroom) can be a problem after you've taken a long, hot shower.

But in any case, you should definitely have a carbon monoxide detector in the kitchen and near the furnace, because those are the most likely sources of the gas. If your whole house fills with it and it reaches the bedroom before the alarm goes off, who knows if you'll find out in time.

Tonight I kept hearing an alarm but then it would stop, and I figured it was a false alarm on the detector installed on the ceiling outside our bedroom and bathroom. But I kept hearing it every few minutes, and at one point I was standing near the detector and that wasn't it. I kept looking around, because I remember I took my late grandparents' portable plug-in carbon monoxide detector, but couldn't remember if I ever plugged it in and if so where it was.

Well, it turns out it was plugged in behind the microwave, next to the gas range, and was going off because the gas on one of the burners had been on for over an hour. The exhaust fan had been running so the concentration wasn't as bad as it might have been. Thank god for that detector in the kitchen....if we were back in the bedrooms, the gas would've been really bad by the time it reached the bedroom detector.

So make sure you have at least two detectors, and put one near the bedrooms and one near the kitchen and furnace. They only cost from -50, and don't forget to change the batteries if you get a battery operated one.

Is this necessary if you don't have anything gas powered in the house? Are there other sources of CM that other houses could get?

Here in IL it is required to have one in your house. They say to put it places like by your heater etc

Good question... I looked it up and according to the EPA, sources of carbon monoxide in/near the home include:

"Unvented kerosene and gas space heaters; leaking chimneys and furnaces; back-drafting from furnaces, gas water heaters, wood stoves, and fireplaces; gas stoves; generators and other gasoline powered equipment; automobile exhaust from attached garages; and tobacco smoke. Incomplete oxidation during combustion in gas ranges and unvented gas or kerosene heaters may cause high concentrations of CO in indoor air. Worn or poorly adjusted and maintained combustion devices (e.g., boilers, furnaces) can be significant sources, or if the flue is improperly sized, blocked, disconnected, or is leaking. Auto, truck, or bus exhaust from attached garages, nearby roads, or parking areas can also be a source."

So it sounds like mostly gas appliances and heaters, except for auto exhaust.

Well I don't have any of those.

But I have a detector anyway! Well Katie, now you're protected in case a fleet of buses idles just outside your home! LMAO YES I AM! And who said I was paranoid? Pshaw.....

Yep, I have two. I was never so scared as when I was in the Hospital with my son(viral menenjitis), and there was a whole family that came in with CM posioning. They had to go to area hospitals to get them all in Hypobarric chambers. I decided I never want my family to go through that.

OMG I can see it now....Buses upon buses lined up in front of your apartment...to see what you ask? The Alice in Wonderland lady....You could make money off that...charge admission and everything...Just make sure you have batteries in your carbond monoxide detecters...Those buses are somethin else

YES! I AM SHOUTING!

"When considering where to place a carbon monoxide detector, keep in mind that although carbon monoxide is roughly the same weight as air (carbon monoxide's specific gravity is 0.9657, as stated by the EPA; the National Resource Council lists the specific gravity of air as one), it may be contained in warm air coming from combustion appliances such as home heating equipment. If this is the case, carbon monoxide will rise with the warmer air."

By the time it fills up the house and comes down far enough to trigger the sensor - everybody is dead. It has to be close enough to wake sleeping people up.

Pip

ok then why would it say on mine that thats where I should put it?Another word of warning - don't put your carbon monoxide detector in the same room as your cat's litter pan. The ammonia from the litter pan can goof up the detector so that it doesn't work properly.

KM - I have no idea -

And I could be wrong - but I don't think so. We see all the lawsuits on how anybody died in relation to real estate. Remember my mold posts? There have been some doozy lawsuits in relation to home inspectors and carbon monoxide systems.

All I know is its one of the things I've had drilled into my head. NEVER IN THE BASEMENT! Actually, they told us 'lighter than air' but when I went to a manufacturer website they said something different so thats what I ended up posting.

Another thing I've had drilled into my head is an acre is 43560 feet.

Pip

http://www.homesafe.com/coalert/detect.htm

We leave ours plugged in all year round, and they all have battery backups. We have 2 boiler furnaces and 2 hot water heaters (we live in a deconverted 2-flat with separate utilities). The garage is detached. We have one detector in the basement, one on the first floor in the hallway near the bedrooms, and one on the second floor in the hallway near the bedrooms.

There is nothing wrong with having a CO detector in the basement - it just can't be your only detector, and it shouldn't be close to the combustion appliances, because they can belch out a bit of CO when they start up and that can set off the detector. You should have at least one on each floor of the dwelling.

Our basement detector went off once last fall and neither of other two detectors did. OMG you could hear it all the way on the second floor! We had turned on the heat for the first time of the season and apparently something needed cleaning or adjusting. Luckily it wasn't terribly cold out yet, so we were able to shut off the heat and have the furnaces checked out the next day. I forget what was wrong, but it was about 0 worth of something. It was a valuable lesson - make sure you have your furnaces inspected BEFORE the cold weather starts!!! It also gave us a chance to test out our emergency plan. The kids went to the back door right away, and stood in the doorway with the door open. The husband and I turned off the heat, opened some windows, and checked all the CO detectors. All of ours have PPM (parts per million) readouts. The one in the basement was just over the 100PPM limit (the low-level warning) and the other two didn't register anything. We called the kids back in and checked the CO monitors periodically. The levels never rose again.

OUR HOUSES ARE FITTED WITH SMOKE ALARMS AND CARBON MONOXIDE DETECTORS

Pip

Gotcha Always better safe than sorry, and if a little shouting gets attention, then go for it! I was talking with the security guard here about what happened last night and when he used to do maintenance work for an apt complex, he would often find that people took the batteries out of the carbon monoxide and smoke detectors. When asked, they'd say they couldn't find a battery and needed it for a toy!!

That's exactly why this inspector pushed for hard wiring - people were constantly disabling the systems because of the batteries.

Pip

Great thread. I'm going out to buy two more dectectors for my house. Thanks for the wake-up!
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