Existing Smoke Alarms

[gizmosrcool]

When my house was built, the builder installed regular 110v w/battery BU smokes and they are tethered together. There are 8 of them. My original Ademco alarm included another smoke and they put it in the 2nd floor common hallway at the top of the stairs and its right next to one of the builders. Now that that I have replaced the Ademco with an Elk, I want to tap into the builders smokes and if they go off, have it trigger a fire alert on the Elk. It also would be cool to have the Elk tickle the builder smokes if the alarm sensors something on the 2-wire or some of the 4-wires I plan on installing in the basement. I plan on finishing the basement and adding 4-wires there.

I have no idea how these tethered units work. How when one goes off, it triggers the rest to go off. But it does and that makes sense. So everyone knows one of them has been alarmed. Can anyone point me in the right direction here? Anyone do something like this?

Thank you, T.

 

[JimS]

There is a recent thread about similar things here:

http://www.cocoontech.com/index.php?showtopic=10787&hl=

Sensing the tripping of the builder smokes can be done with available hardware. I haven't seen anything that allows you to set off the smokes from the panel. It could probably be done by providing 9V on the signal wire but it would have to be isolated. You might have to build the circuit yourself and that gets into all sorts of safety issues...

 

[gizmosrcool]

OK.

Starting to figure this out. I was a little confused as the original builder installed unit in my basement has a transformer on it + a 14/2 into it and one 14/2 out and one 14/3 out. On the transformer was two brown wires and I had no idea where that went. It finally dawned on me that the brown wires were for the door bell ringer and button. Dooh. Always wondered where the doorbell got power. I guess I will redo this and tie the door bell into the Elk. I can then replace that unit in the basement with one that has a relay and then tie that into the panel. Bam. that should do it.

Thx for the hint.

Cheers. T.

 

[mustangcoupe]

I dont think it is possible to set-off the smokes from the elk though...

 

[gizmosrcool]

I agree. I think it would be hard. So I am not worried about that anymore. I will get the warning from the Elk's speakers. I have decided to place a speaker on each level. So three speakers yapping at us should do the trick.