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Fire Research Division

Home Smoke Alarm Project, Alarm Response Calibrations

Report of Test FR 4020
December, 2003

Thomas G. Cleary
Building and Fire Research Laboratory
National Institute of Standards and Technology

This Report of Test presents data from a series of alarm response calibration tests as part of research into the performance of smoke alarms.

Introduction

The purpose of these tests was to provide a consistent calibration of all of the modified alarms used in the fire test series. The modified photoelectric and ionization alarms were exposed to smolder smoke and soot from a propene flame. CO alarms were exposed to smolder smoke that contained carbon monoxide. Full details on the alarm calibration procedures can be found in NIST Technical Note 1455 [1]. The alarm naming convention is described in NIST TN 1455, along with uncertainty estimates for each measurement.

Test Data

Each data file worksheet is identified as “Smolder” for smoldering smoke exposure and “Flame” for flaming soot exposure followed by a number incremented for repeated tests. A _s1, _s2, or s3 appended to the Smolder worksheet indicates it was used to generate the calibration equation for either test sequence 1 (SDC 1-15), test sequence 2 (SDC 20-28) or test sequence 3 (SDC30-41) respectively. In general, alarms were re-calibrated if they were used in a test sequence, or after they were repaired.

CO Alarms

The worksheet columns for CO alarms include:

CO-1-1 CO-1-2 CO-1-3 CO-1-4 CO-1-5 CO-1-6 CO-1-7 CO-1-8 CO-1-9 CO-1-10 CO-1-11 CO-1-12 CO-1-14 CO-1-15 CO-1-16 CO-1-17
CO-2-1 CO-2-2 CO-2-3 CO-2-4 CO-2-5 CO-2-6 CO-2-7 CO-2-8 CO-2-9 CO-2-11 CO-2-12 CO-2-13
CO-3-1 CO-3-2 CO-3-3 CO-3-4 CO-3-5 CO-3-6 CO-3-7 CO-3-8 CO-3-9 CO-3-10 CO-3-11 CO-3-12

Photoelectric Alarms

The worksheet columns for Photoelectric alarms photo-1 and photo-3 include:

Photo-1-1 Photo-1-2 Photo-1-3 Photo-1-4 Photo-1-5 Photo-1-6
Photo-3-1 Photo-3-2 Photo-3-3 Photo-3-4 Photo-3-5 Photo-3-6 Photo-3-7 Photo-3-8 Photo-3-9 Photo-3-10 Photo-3-11 Photo-3-12

The worksheet columns for Ionization alarms include:

Ion-1-1 Ion-1-2 Ion-1-3 Ion-1-4 Ion-1-5 Ion-1-6 Ion-1-7 Ion-1-8 Ion-1-9 Ion-1-10 Ion-1-11 Ion-1-12
Ion-3-1 Ion-3-2 Ion-3-3 Ion-3-4 Ion-3-5 Ion-3-6 Ion-3-7 Ion-3-9 Ion-3-10 Ion-3-11 Ion-3-12 Ion-3-13 Ion-3-14 Ion-3-17
Ion-4-1 Ion-4-2 Ion-4-3 Ion-4-4 Ion-4-5 Ion-4-6 Ion-4-7 Ion-4-8 Ion-4-9 Ion-4-10 Ion-4-11 Ion-4-12

The worksheet columns for aspirated alarms include:

Asp-1 Asp-2 Asp-3 Asp-5 Asp-6 Asp-7 Asp-8 Asp-9 Asp-10 Asp-11 Asp-12

Acknowledgments

The home smoke alarm project was sponsored by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U.S. Fire Administration, and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Affairs, Underwriters Laboratories. The National Fire Protection Association (In-kind contribution), and National Research Council Canada, (In-kind contribution).

References

[1]  Bukowski, R.W., Peacock, R.D., Averill, J.D., Cleary, T.G., Bryner, T.G., Walton, W.D., Reneke, P.A., and Kuligowski, E.D., Performance of Home Smoke Alarms: Analysis of the Response of Several Available Technologies in Residential Fire Settings, Natl. Inst. Stand. Technol., Tech. Note 1455 (2003).

For further information, contact Thomas Cleary, thomas.cleary@nist.gov, (301) 975-6858, fax: (301) 975-4052

The policy of the National Institute of Standards and Technology is to use metric units of measurement in all its publications. In this document intended for the construction and building materials industries, however, in North America certain non-metric units are so widely used instead of metric units that it is more practical and less confusing to include certain measurement values in customary units only. In addition, to maintain the integrity of the original data as collected, original units used by the instrumentation were maintained for this Report of Test.

 


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Last updated: 11/30/2003