A couple of (hopefully straight forward) questions about connecting mains smoke alarms. I had asked but no response in a thread I made in the alarms forum, so hoping to get a quick reply here.
1) Do smoke alarms not need to be fused? No FCU needed?
2) Building Regs appear to state that there must be a way to isolate the alarms without isolating the lighting? Is this correct? If so then I presume I will need some switched spurs?
Basically I will be connecting the alarms into 2 (or possibly 3) of the lighting circuits. 3 alarms will be radiolinked together and 3 non-radiolinked alarms will be hardwired together along with one of the radiolinked units).
From Building Regs:
1) Do smoke alarms not need to be fused? No FCU needed?
2) Building Regs appear to state that there must be a way to isolate the alarms without isolating the lighting? Is this correct? If so then I presume I will need some switched spurs?
Basically I will be connecting the alarms into 2 (or possibly 3) of the lighting circuits. 3 alarms will be radiolinked together and 3 non-radiolinked alarms will be hardwired together along with one of the radiolinked units).
From Building Regs:
The mains supply to the smoke alarm(s) should comprise a single independent circuit at the dwellinghouse’s main distribution board (consumer unit) or a single regularly used local lighting circuit. This has the advantage that the circuit is unlikely to be disconnected for any prolonged period. There should be a means of isolating power to the smoke alarms without isolating the lighting.
Mains-powered smoke alarms may be interconnected using radio-links, provided that this does not reduce the lifetime or duration of any standby power supply below 72 hours. In this case, the smoke alarms may be connected to separate power circuits.