A random thread for small things that don't really warrant a thread of their own

[mcshroom]

Let's try the right thread this time: -

The house across the road from me appears to be on fire! It also has two Fire Engines outside.

[hellymedic]

Let's try the right thread this time: -

The house across the road from me appears to be on fire! It also has two Fire Engines outside.

That's not small! Hope all are OK! Remember when party chez parent came to an abrupt halt a few years ago...

[mcshroom]

The two fire engines have gone home. Apparently everyone was safe according to the policeman who knocked on my door.

The fire was in the downstairs flat of a converted council house. It's a flat that regularly gets visits from the police, and last summer was subject to a dawn raid, complete with battering ram. The police were knocking on doors asking if we'd seen anything suspicious before the fire started.

[hellymedic]

Fires are still SCARY!
Glad nobody wasi njured.

[citoyen]

We had a big fire in our garden tonight. But it's ok, I started it deliberately. Got a bit bigger than I'd anticipated though, and the pear tree is now a bit suntanned on one side.

[ElyDave]

We had a big fire in our garden tonight. But it's ok, I started it deliberately. Got a bit bigger than I'd anticipated though, and the pear tree is now a bit suntanned on one side.

Did one of those a few weeks ago, the fence got a bit singed. I was using the dustbin incinerator

[T42]

You get done for that over here.

[ian]

We had a big fire in our garden tonight. But it's ok, I started it deliberately. Got a bit bigger than I'd anticipated though, and the pear tree is now a bit suntanned on one side.

My friend decided to impress his children with his manful knowledge of fire in a similar way. Bonfire was set. Flames roared. The sky lit. Wildebeest stampeded. You know the drill.

Fortunately, the fire station is directly opposite his house, so his wife could just dash across the road to fetch them.

[Cudzoziemiec]

I saw three fire engines attend an alarm in the old people's flats opposite the sports centre yesterday afternoon. I don't know why it needed three – presumably in case some old people needed rescuing? – but there was no sign of fire or smoke and the firemen weren't exactly rushing.

[Kim]

While we're on the subject, we were rudely awakened by the fire (or possibly carbon monoxide) alarm going off at 6:42 this morning.

I leaped out of bed, grabbed a dressing gown and a sturdy CO2 extinguisher and inspected the house for signs of fire.  Nadgering my Achilles from lack of stretches in the process.  The alarm stopped as I got to the kitchen, and I didn't find any signs of smoke, dust, steam, excess heat, or weevils.  CO seems unlikely, as the boiler wouldn't have been firing overnight other than for a few seconds to pre-heat the hot water in its heat exchanger, and the heating came on in response to me going downstairs without further effect.  The CO detector was happily blinking its "everything okay" light.

It's all a bit puzzling, as while the system has annoyed me with nocturnal battery beepings from time to time we've never had a false alarm that wasn't due to actual combustion before.


Meanwhile barakta had thought it was a doorbell and had employed duck-and-cover tactics.   

So, new procedure:  Remove duvet from bed when getting up in response to fire alarm.  (Hopefully in the effort to retrieve it barakta will notice the flashing blue lights, strobes, and displays with "FIRE!" written on them in large unfriendly letters.)  Then check on her before heading downstairs.

[billplumtree]

While we're on the subject, we were rudely awakened by the fire (or possibly carbon monoxide) alarm going off at 6:42 this morning.

I leaped out of bed, grabbed a dressing gown and a sturdy CO2 extinguisher and inspected the house for signs of fire.  Nadgering my Achilles from lack of stretches in the process.  The alarm stopped as I got to the kitchen, and I didn't find any signs of smoke, dust, steam, excess heat, or weevils. 

I had similar last week with my smoke alarms, apart from the alarm stopping bit.  No smoke or anything remotely like it.  They are all wired together, so all four were sounding - which makes sense if there's a fire downstairs and I'm upstairs in bed, but makes it a bugger to debug a false alarm.

They showed no signs of stopping, so I went round unplugging and de-batterying them.  On the final one, a dead wasp (or maybe it was just stunned, I dunno) fell out of it as I took it down.

[Kim]

Three more false alarms since then, during which we managed to find the offending detector (the one that's triggered flashes a blinkenlight while it's going off, the linked ones just make noise - which is great, except that the blinkenlight stops along with the source of the triggering, meaning you've got to leap out of bed and run around with eyes that won't focus peering at dim LEDs on the ceiling while the alerting system re-enacts the Nostromo's self-destruct sequence).

Anyway, I removed the offending unit from its base (which switches it off) and there hasn't been another alarm since - not that that's statistically significant.  I'll be giving them all a blast of compressed air later.

Why is it so hard for manufacturers to design these things in a way that allows you to troubleshoot them properly?  All it needs is for the one that's gone off to blinkenlight the fact for five minutes afterwards.  It's the same with the low battery alarm - the offending unit chirps every 45 seconds.  Slaved units chirp once and then every 4 hours.  Brilliant.  Except that in the real world what happens is you get a single chirp, the battery voltage goes back into spec, and they all stop.  The only way to work out which one is causing the problem is to memorise the intensity pattern of chirps from the n units so you can make an educated guess as to how far away the one with the low battery is, then start probing around with a multimeter.

One of my pie in the sky generation rent dreams is to own a house where I can install a proper fire panel and wired sensors/sounders, with a single central backup battery and actual diagnostics.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Meanwhile the neighbours are thinking "Sounds like that nice young couple next door are up to their electrical games again." That is, assuming they think you're either nice or young.

[Kim]

I expect one set of neighbours can't hear it over the dog.  The others are BloodyStudents (so no strangers to spurious fire alarms), and would think we're ancient, except they're either asleep, or got up at 5am for hockeyball training.

I do wonder what they make of my bastard-noisy compressor, thobut.  And, on the rare occasion we have reason to use it, the turbo-trainer.

[Cudzoziemiec]

A bike mag in Poland once did a comparison test of turbo trainers under the heading The Neighbours Won't Sleep.

[spesh]

A bike mag in Poland once did a comparison test of turbo trainers under the heading The Neighbours Won't Sleep.

 

[ElyDave]

I don't think mine care about the noise of the turbo trainer, Led Zep at >> louder than turbo trainer is likely to escape even my outside brick built gym/shed

[Mr Larrington]

Some friends of mine were once unable to figure out the source of the strange noise and vibration afficting their hotel room in Ghent.  The Mgt investigated.

"Ah," they said, "there is a cyclist in the room above yours.  On rollers."

[fuzzy]

Thisnunit recommends todays Google Doodle

[PeteB99]

United airlines progress from injuring their customers to killing them.

Although at least this one was a rabbit.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-39715188

[T42]

Thisnunit recommends todays Google Doodle

+1. Hope it doesn't hit a rock on its way through.

[hulver]

I'm fed up with getting constant static shocks at work. Must be some combination of my chair and clothes. As soon as I get up, I get a painful static shock whenever I touch anything metal. I've got so much build up I can feel the hairs on my arms standing up when I get close to a wall.

I've taken to holding my keys, and grounding myself on the radiator when I walk out of the of the room. At least this is less painful, as the shock is over the surface area of my body touching the key, rather than the tip of my finger. Still makes me twitch though.



Hence this attached to my keys. Touching the end of the resistor to the radiator discharges through that, a much smaller shock results. I think I'll try a 100k resistor tomorrow, the 47k I picked does well, but still results in a (much smaller) blue spark.

[hellymedic]

Surgeons' shoes have been earthed, from the days when static sparks could ignite flammable anaesthetic gases in an atmosphere of enriched oxygen, causing fires and explosions round vulnerable patients.

Maybe you need earthed footwear?

[citoyen]

I got so fed up of static in the office that I took to walking around the place in my socks, which seemed to solve the problem. This attracted a mixture of derision and scorn from my colleagues. They thought I was just being a bit bohemian.

Now I work from home, I wear my slippers most of the time.

[Kim]

I'd expect about 1MΩ in an anti-static wrist strap.  That said, I've got an anti-static mat on my electronics bench that's wired to mains earth through something similar, and that still hurts if I touch it after picking up a charge on the way across the room.  Or you could use one of those neon indicator lamps.  Probably won't help the pain, but would look cool.

The best way to reduce the pain of a static shock is to make contact with a part of the body that isn't crammed with pain receptors.  Back of the hand, elbow, leg or something, rather than your lips^[1] or fingertips.  (And from the department of advice you hope never to need: If there's actual current involved, touching the suspicious conductor with the back of your finger means the shock contracts your fingers out of the circuit, rather than clamping on.)


_{[1] There's a humidity level below which walking across the room to kiss your partner is considered harmful.}