Personal CO Monitor is a must

icesailor

I would never dispute that.

Where I shopped, there was an old counter guy that was Assistant Fire Chief of a local Massachusetts town Fire Department. He told me of one they provided to their fire personnel. As I remember, it covered over 100 dangerous gasses, and was the size of a cigarette pack. You carried it with you everywhere, After 2 years, you threw it away. It was done. It wasn't all that expensive. But if you were in a fire situation, and it went off, you best beat feet out of there, muy pronto. There was some safety equipment in New Bedford that carried them.

I bought my UEI CO71A instead. I could change the 9 volt battery and I would never see the gasses listed.

Sal Santamaura

j a said:

The good thing is you have one…In Mass one of the laws is they want one placed outside each bedroom group, reason it will warn you before it gets you…But no homes are the same so minimums are set, you got to set them as you feel comfortable

I've got all the code-mandated UL-rated CO alarms right where they must be, outside the bedrooms. However, ever since learning here (probably a dozen years ago or more) about their shortcomings, I don't rely on them for anything but avoiding legal consequences. There's been a CO Experts monitor in our bedroom all that time, each iteration replaced when its sensor end-of-life was reached. George has even made knowing when to buy a new one easy now; they give an audible indication.

j a_2

For the technical stuff I will defer to Tim…I know this, if your in the business of plumbing and heating you best know some basic stuff….I always attended classes I felt were helpful to me…I did attend Tim's school,and defered to his book and my notes when needed..In these days of technology, how can a home owner not be aware of the dangers in there own home….Hopefully people look after the elderly, be it neighbor or family…What happens in a man hole stays in a man hole…LOL

Tim McElwain

I teach and follow the rule for placement of CO Detectors as "Head to Bed", head when standing up and bed when lying down covers the zone in the middle of the room were we all live. CO has a specific gravity of around .97 so it is slightly lighter than air which is 1.0. I was told and have seen some statistics that support the following: As the temperature goes down the density of CO will go up slightly to a point at around 32 degrees it can be about the same density as air.

The other thing about CO and also Hydrogen they are both very explosive in fact flammability limits run from 12.5 to 74% and hydrogen is about 4% to 75%. That is why fire departments vent the upper floors or roof area so they do not get Backdraft which is very explosive as a combination of CO, Hydrogen and Oxygen.

If you have to have a UL 2034 alarm to satisfy the law by all means have one. But the portable CO Experts should be in every home and should move around with you from room to room including on the nightstand at night in yours and the kids bedrooms.