So I just purchased my first zwave smoke detectors to play with and have some general questions.
I purchased some no-logo ones from Monoprice which I believe are OEM’d from Everspring. I saw in a different thread someone commenting that Everspring detectors were not all that reliable with detecting smoke. I couldn’t find anything more than that. Does anyone have any more info on this?
I also have some questions on how smoke detectors can be controlled. Is it possible to silence an alarm that’s going off? It would be nice to be able to shut them up once I’m aware of an issue.
Can the detectors be tested from Vera? It would be nice not to need to drag out the ladder to test a couple of my higher up ones. I thought I read somewhere that First-Alert ones could but I can’t find the thread anymore.
If I have notifications setup on individual detectors I’m sure I can get an email/text/whatever that says “basement detector smelled smoke.” But if I set a few of them up in an association group so that they all go off when one senses smoke will I get notifications from all of them? (I would do some testing myself on this but I have a baby and two dogs and I’m afraid at least one dog will have a heart attack next time the smoke detector goes off. He almost did when I put the battery in and it chirped a few times.)
I’m still trying to think of cool things to do with the smoke detectors as I’m just getting started with them.
[quote=“CraigO, post:1, topic:189644”]So I just purchased my first zwave smoke detectors to play with and have some general questions.
I purchased some no-logo ones from Monoprice which I believe are OEM’d from Everspring. I saw in a different thread someone commenting that Everspring detectors were not all that reliable with detecting smoke. I couldn’t find anything more than that. Does anyone have any more info on this?
I also have some questions on how smoke detectors can be controlled. Is it possible to silence an alarm that’s going off? It would be nice to be able to shut them up once I’m aware of an issue.
Can the detectors be tested from Vera? It would be nice not to need to drag out the ladder to test a couple of my higher up ones. I thought I read somewhere that First-Alert ones could but I can’t find the thread anymore.
If I have notifications setup on individual detectors I’m sure I can get an email/text/whatever that says “basement detector smelled smoke.” But if I set a few of them up in an association group so that they all go off when one senses smoke will I get notifications from all of them? (I would do some testing myself on this but I have a baby and two dogs and I’m afraid at least one dog will have a heart attack next time the smoke detector goes off. He almost did when I put the battery in and it chirped a few times.)
I’m still trying to think of cool things to do with the smoke detectors as I’m just getting started with them.
Thanks in advance.
Craig[/quote]
Smoke detectors are a safety issue. There is not much if any 2 way feedback with a smoke detector for mostly safety reasons and there is strict rules on that. So you can not disable or silence a detector from vera and you can also not test it from vera. Vera simply receives a signal that it tripped and then in vera you can do what ever with that information (alerts, flash lights, unlock doors, what ever). It also sends battery info to vera.
Most smoke detectors have a eye beam that gets broken when smoke passes between the sensor, they also have a test button that you physically push down to break the beam and insure its working. The best way to test a smoke detector is to induce smoke with something like smoke in a can. Trying to test any other way doesn’t give you a true test if its going to work when there is real smoke.
Monoprice smoke detectors are made by Vision. I don’t know if they also make the ones for Everspring. But almost all of MonoPrice zwave devices are sourced from Vision.
Lowe’s leaked Pre BF ad is showing a special on their ZCOMBO smoke/CO zwave device from $39.95 to $29.95. Not sure when that sales starts but I do know Vera received docs from First Alert and the unit should be fully supported in the next firmware.