SOS !!-home alarm help needed please

longforgotten

Well it all started with what I thought was a very chirpy bird outside, it got louder which then made us think it was our alarm. Went outside to check, the red light was bobbing back and for, the alarm was pretty loud but possibly not full welly.

Husband went to alarm box but it did not respond to the pin numbers being pressed or any other button for that matter. Husband took front off alarm box and took leads off battery. Then went to electic meter and turned off electric. During this time the alarm stopped for a while, started again and so on, chirpy sometimes , loud at others. Electric is put back on and husband then starts pulling out ,and putting back in, fuses in fuse box. Its at times like this you realise that the writing on the fuses have faded and you don't know which fuse relates to which bit of the house , except for the one for the damned cooker ! Anyway something must have happened while pulling the fuses out as the alarm box in the house started to do the usual bleep , pressed pin numbers and all now appears well.

Anybody know what has happened please. Both of us are thinking the worsed that it may go off again during the night. If it does go off in the night we intend to find and pull out the relevant fuse at the meter and get the battery out from the alarm box, if we do that should the alarm stop straight away.....

We would be so grateful for any advice. Why do these things happen on a Sunday !!!

fwor

Disconnecting the power and the internal battery probably won't stop it, as the external bell box is probably fitted with a self-activating module, which has it's own batteries.

It's designed so that if someone cuts the wires to the bell box the alarm will sound - exactly what will happen if you disconnect all power to it.

It's not easy to diagnose a problem like this without being there with test equipment, but a likely cause is that the internal battery in the alarm box is not charging, either because the battery is knackered or the charging circuit has failed.

The internal battery is usually 12volt, so if you have a meter to hand it would be worth checking that to see if it's not up to that level.

longforgotten

Thank you for the reply it is much appreciated.

We wondered if it was the internal battery even though when the battery went before it behaved differently. No lock out on the alarm keyboard last time. But I do so hope its the battery. We shall try it out tomorrow by turning off the power to see if the battery kicks in. No joy there we'll arrange to get it checked.

Thanks again

Just thought then, if it goes off in the middle of the night is it up the ladder to the outside alarm and find the battery !!??

PROLIANT

Oh happy days, been here before, unfortunatly for the bell box it did not survive the toll of my hammer, after I stotted the hammer off it about 10 times so it would STFUP!

fwor

PROLIANT wrote: »

it did not survive the toll of my hammer

Ah yes - the Big Hammer of Correction. It seldom fails.

To the OP: quite often it ~will~ start up during the night, because the battery voltage in the alarm box typically falls as the temperature goes down.

Usually the external chirp will get louder the lower the voltage, but beware: There will almost certainly be a tamper switch on the external bell box, so expect it to change to full volume as soon as you open it!

If it's not too hard to get at I'd disconnect it now, in preference to being forced to do it at 2 in the morning...

bockster

to anybody who's alarm goes doolally (is that how you spell it?) i would recommend fitting a new battery before you do anything else, normally cost £10 or less, and has been the cause of almost all alarm probs i have looked at.

longforgotten

Would love to err on the side of caution and disarm the alarm but not sure how to do it. Intend to take our chances overnight and check the battery in the morning.

Having said that, there's a lump hammer in the cupboard.........

Reluctant_spender

Was it professionally installed? If so then if it does go off then it should only sound for 20 minutes. I appreciate that at 2 o'clock in the morning 20 mins is a bloody long time

bockster

to check/change the battery, you need the engineer code. check your manual and/or try 1234 - program. (depending on what alarm it is) check for a manual online if you don't have it.

longforgotten

We're fine in changing the internal battery as we've done it in the past ( twice).If it had been any day but Sunday I would have popped off to B&Q and bought a battery.

Last time it played up because we had an electricity cut and the the alarm went off as the battery was dead. This time no electricity cut, funny chirping,... just made us think it was something other than the internal battery.

It was professionally installed approximately 15 years ago and has worked fine. It has not been annually serviced though. We changed the alarm to ring for only two minutes rather than twenty minutes many years ago. Ours will stop ringing for a short while and then start up again if the problem still exists so two or twenty minutes it may still keep going on and off....

totalsolutions

Replace the 12v battery first - good for 3-5yrs. Yuasa brand usually, from Maplins. The chirping could be the internal sounder running, enter <code> then reset button. Is the last "exit point" switch ok?