After last night’s incident with the CO detectors going off, Vince did a little research. It’s amazing what you learn when you delve into a subject. We’ve never had a CO detector that had a read out to tell you what your levels of CO are in the room. They went off if there’s a problem but we didn’t know what the level of CO was when they went off. Like last night . . was it “just a little” or was it “evacuate the house now”? Any alert and my preference is evacuate the house or, at least go to a room that should be farther from the source, and open all the windows.
After reading about them half the night (while I was busy sleeping!), Vince decided he wanted ours to have a readout.
He bought one at Home Depot and three at Walmart. I think we’re good on CO detectors now and I feel much better knowing exactly what the reading is.
This one is in the hallway between the two extra bedrooms. He put one of these back up in the master bedroom too since it fits on the same mounting screws and we don’t have to put more holes in walls.
This one is in the closet with the water heater. It plugs in but has a lithium battery backup. I’m happy to see this one has a zero reading because I was thinking it must have been the water heater since the stove wasn’t on and we certainly aren’t using the heater. Apparently it was something to do with the wind and the water heater vent on the roof because we’ve never had that happen before. Vince was right . . that was what he thought, but you can never be too sure when something like that goes off.
The fourth one is similar to the one in the water heater closet in that it’s electric and has a battery backup. Vince wants me to take that one to Missouri. There was one in there already. Chad said he thinks it’s the same one I bought when they moved in that apartment nine years ago. I bought a new one and took it there but it doesn’t have a readout.
While I really don’t know enough about them to suggest that everyone should replace theirs with one that has a readout, please . . if you have gas or a fireplace or wood stove in your home, make sure you have a working CO detector and always make sure your smoke alarms are working properly.
Ava says
We have a friend in Colorado who got CO2 poisoned a few years back. He still has symptoms from it. He didn’t make it to work, didn’t wake up, so his work knew something had to be wrong. They went to his apartment and he couldn’t be roused, they called 911. They think it was the water heater.
Judy Laquidara says
That’s about all it could have been last night. Even if it was the wind messing with the exhaust, it was still from the water heater. CO is scary!
Verna says
One winter about 25 years ago, my mother passed out at work and they found she had C02 poisoning. Snow was covering one of the vents. We were lucky; she ended up being just fine. Scary, though!
Nelle Coursey says
Sometimes a little bit of lint or dust can get in them and cause them to go off. We have at least 1 and maybe 2 of them. I know we have smoke alarms upstairs and downstairs. I have been trying to replace the old ones with the newer ones that have the CO2 alarm on them.
Judy Laquidara says
We never buy the two in one. When we’re traveling, I always take a CO alarm from home with me. Hotels, cabins, etc. have smoke alarms and I trust that they keep the batteries up but I don’t trust that they have CO detectors. Many of the newer hotels are all electric and it doesn’t matter but the cabins we stay at in AR have gas stoves and gas water heaters.
Cheryl says
Co is nothing to mess with. I’m so glad y’all are safe. My great aunts went off three nights ago @ 2:30am. We called the fire department & they said it was needing to be replaced, so they did it for free. Hers was only about seven years old. I feel much better now knowing she’s safe. She 87 & lives by herself.
Judy Laquidara says
I knew they didn’t last forever and thought maybe ours were old but they were manufactured in 2018 so I guess we replaced them last year and I didn’t even remember that we did that. I’m much more confident with the ones we have now that actually have a numeric readout.
Glad your aunt got her issue resolved!
Liz A. says
What we just found out about co detectors — the have a specific life span. One started squealing at 2:00 and new batteries (yes, we tried multiple) wouldn’t stop it. Pulled it off the ceiling to find a chart on the back. The sequence we were getting said to replace, it had reached its lifespan. Within 40 hours another one did the same thing. Our home is 7 years old. The lifespan of co detectors is 6-8 years. It’s been a long week around here….