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Subject:
A better smoke detector
Category: Business and Money Asked by: asa893-ga List Price: $50.00 |
Posted:
19 Nov 2005 12:01 PST
Expires: 19 Dec 2005 12:01 PST Question ID: 595201 |
I would like information about any smoke detectors which make use of the following technology: http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4206456.html http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=/netahtml/srchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=4,112,310.WKU.&OS=PN/4,112,310&RS=PN/4,112,310 Briefly, the smoke detector is light sensitive and becomes more sensitive at night. This reduces nuisance alarms during the day yet is more sensitive at night when most fatal house fires occur. I've looked and haven't found any smoke detector which does this. This seems like a good idea and shouldn't be expensive to implement. Why wasn't this done, especially since the patent is now expired? Are there economic or legal reasons this would not make a good product? I have some money to invest and I would also like some advice as to whether investing in developing a smoke detector as described above would be a good idea. Would it be a successful product? How much money would be required? How should I proceed given that I can't get a patent for the idea? |
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There is no answer at this time. |
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Subject:
Re: A better smoke detector
From: canadianhelper-ga on 19 Nov 2005 13:05 PST |
Link to study conducted by NIST on Optical Fire Detector vs current cheaper tech. http://smokealarm.nist.gov/ |
Subject:
Re: A better smoke detector
From: canadianhelper-ga on 19 Nov 2005 13:08 PST |
Honeywell makes one http://www.ademco.com.au/Products_Fire_FDD_2151.asp Search strategy : Optical smoke detector |
Subject:
Re: A better smoke detector
From: markvmd-ga on 19 Nov 2005 13:47 PST |
I question how you would (or if you could) sell such a device to the public. If the sensitivity during the daytime is attenuated, you run a serious liability risk. Furthermore, winter is probably when most house fires occur-- celebrating Christmas seems to be inviting fiery Death, according to firemen-- and it is dark most of the time then. You make breakfast while it is dark, you make dinner while it is dark, you are gonna have false alarms while it is dark. Finally, if the thing is photosensitive, turning on a light near it makes it think it is daytime and it will operate at reduced sensitivity. But an intriguing idea is one that requires agreement from multiple (2 or 3, not too far apart, maybe 6 feet) sensor locations before sounding an alarm. Or a detector that increases sensitivity during, say, midnight to 6AM. Heck, you could jury-rig up such a thing easily-- have added detectors connected to a timed power source that only comes on at designated hours while one or two are always on. To be safest you really need an alarm to be stupid. Isn't the Honeywell photo-optical smoke alarm the same as the old photocell alarms? Those used to be set off by not only cooking smoke but shower steam as well. The "sniffer" types were not fooled by steam but were more sensitive to cooking smoke. |
Subject:
Re: A better smoke detector
From: asa893-ga on 20 Nov 2005 11:27 PST |
> Honeywell makes one > > http://www.ademco.com.au/Products_Fire_FDD_2151.asp This is not what I was asking about. There are two common technologies used for smoke detectors, photoelectric and ionization: http://chemistry.about.com/cs/howthingswork/a/aa071401a.htm What I am asking about is a smoke detector which uses either of these technologies in combination with a photo-electric sensor to adjust the sensitivity of the detector, making it more sensitive at night, where a smoke signal is more likely to be caused by a real fire. |
Subject:
Re: A better smoke detector
From: asa893-ga on 20 Nov 2005 11:44 PST |
> I question how you would (or if you could) sell such a device to the > public. If the sensitivity during the daytime is attenuated, you run a > serious liability risk. Yes, liability risk is an issue. However if a detector were less sensitive during the day and more sensitive at night, there might be a net positive benefit. There are more fatal house fires at night than during the day. I suspect one reason smoke detectors do not always work properly is that people remove the battery because of too many nuisance alarms. Less sensitivity during the day might help here. > Furthermore, winter is probably when most house fires occur-- > celebrating Christmas seems to be inviting fiery Death, according to > firemen-- and it is dark most of the time then. You make breakfast > while it is dark, you make dinner while it is dark, you are gonna have > false alarms while it is dark. I'm suggesting the optical sensor would be sensitive to inside lighting levels, not outside. Inside the house when people are active there are usually some lights on. Even when making breakfast early in the morning there is usually more light in the kitchen than at 3am. > Finally, if the thing is photosensitive, turning on a light near it > makes it think it is daytime and it will operate at reduced > sensitivity. Yes, if someone leaves a light on all night then it wouldn't work. Of course it's not perfect, but I think in most cases it would help. > But an intriguing idea is one that requires agreement from multiple (2 > or 3, not too far apart, maybe 6 feet) sensor locations before sounding > an alarm. Or a detector that increases sensitivity during, say, > midnight to 6AM. Heck, you could jury-rig up such a thing easily-- have > added detectors connected to a timed power source that only comes on at > designated hours while one or two are always on. Yes, this might be a good idea if all the detectors were not overly sensitive. Having 2-3 detectors going off in a nuisance alarm would be really annoying. It's also a bit more complicated and expensive to do this. > To be safest you really need an alarm to be stupid. I disagree. I think a smart alarm which is able to sense when people are home and if they are active would be better. |
Subject:
Re: A better smoke detector
From: amn1-ga on 13 Jun 2006 15:12 PDT |
This is semi related. See the following for a potential detector that has patent protection that has not been commercialized: http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=736260 http://www.nextedison.com/ |
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