Scottish Government - Fire & Smoke Alarm Laws

Soldato
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With the announcement that all homes in Scotland are to have interlinked Fire & Smoke alarms fitted by February 2022, I thought it could be a good idea to get a thread setup to help us Scottish members on the board.

https://www.gov.scot/publications/fire-and-smoke-alarms-in-scottish-homes/

I'm in the difficult situation that as part of a home renovation I fitted a Nest Thermostat and Nest Protect Alarms. My Nest Thermostat is in the middle of my Hall along with one of the Protects, they are both in the exact centre of my bungalow, the second Protect is at the end of my Kitchen beside my Garage door. My combi boiler is in the garage and I figured it was the best place to put the alarm to safe guard the Kitchen for smoke and any potential Carbon Monoxide leak from the boiler in the garage.

By the looks of the government legalisation they don't meet part of the standard to do with Heat Detection. I'm surprised that Google haven't commented on this publicly and/or addressed a fix?

I really don't want to rip out the system to have to replace it. Anyone else in a similar situation?
 
Don
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You only need heat detection in your kitchen, but it must interlink with the other smokes (CO doesn’t need to interlink). Do Nest do a heat detector yet?

Critical things they need to meet the legislation is either hardwired for power or have a tamper proof battery (10 years life), and all smokes and heats communicate to each other.

Also, for a private dwelling it won’t be enforced (but potentially may cause issues if you have a house fire with insurance).
 
Soldato
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You only need heat detection in your kitchen, but it must interlink with the other smokes (CO doesn’t need to interlink). Do Nest do a heat detector yet?

Critical things they need to meet the legislation is either hardwired for power or have a tamper proof battery (10 years life), and all smokes and heats communicate to each other.

Also, for a private dwelling it won’t be enforced (but potentially may cause issues if you have a house fire with insurance).

Nest doesn't sell a separate heat detector. I can't find any public statement or announcement from Nest/Google about this government legislation and how its going to effect their products sale in Scotland.

My existing Nest Protects are the hardwired version. According to the regulations you are required to have a Smoke Alarm in your main living space (Living room/Lounge or the room you use he most) the battery version of the Nest Protect has user replaceable batteries, so again if they need to be tamper proof batteries I don't think these would meet the regulations?
 
Don
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According to the regulations you are required to have a Smoke Alarm in your main living space (Living room/Lounge or the room you use he most) the battery version of the Nest Protect has user replaceable batteries, so again if they need to be tamper proof batteries I don't think these would meet the regulations?
Nope. The legislation was brought in because they found most house fire deaths in homes with detectors installed were where the batteries had been removed from the detectors as far as I’m aware.
 
Associate
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Yeah I'm in the same situation, put 3 Nest Protect's in 2 years ago, standalone heat detector and carbon monoxide alarm in the kitchen.

Having to rip them out and put dumber alarms in because Google don't seem to be doing anything.

Bloody annoying
 
Soldato
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Nope. The legislation was brought in because they found most house fire deaths in homes with detectors installed were where the batteries had been removed from the detectors as far as I’m aware.
Why bother, seems like darwinism to me. If you're stupid enough to remove batteries....also I can't see how it would be enforced, although I assume all new builds would have it in. Interestingly, our extension (in a UK house) had to have a linked system pit in, but wasn't expensive to do.
 
Soldato
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Yeah I'm in the same situation, put 3 Nest Protect's in 2 years ago, standalone heat detector and carbon monoxide alarm in the kitchen.

Having to rip them out and put dumber alarms in because Google don't seem to be doing anything.

Bloody annoying

You are not wrong! I don't know why I'm not surprised Google Nest can't be bothered to even acknowledge the problem and give help and advice to effected customers.

I'm really annoyed as well as I have my Nest devices working perfectly within Homebridge allowing me to add them to my Apple HomeKit setup and control everything with Siri.

I think I'm going to be looking at FireAngel Pro devices.
 
Don
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Why bother, seems like darwinism to me. If you're stupid enough to remove batteries....also I can't see how it would be enforced, although I assume all new builds would have it in. Interestingly, our extension (in a UK house) had to have a linked system pit in, but wasn't expensive to do.
It'll be upto councils to enfore it with landlords, they can be fined upto £10k I think if they aren't in compliance. Private owners will be left to their own devices - it might pose an issue with buildings insurance if your house burns down without them would be the only potential issue.

I fitted an AICO setup in my flat I'm going to rent out, cost £200 odd for a CO, battery heat, battery smoke and a wired smoke to fit the existing wired base I've got in my hallway. Other than the CO, they all communicate together, dead simple to install and pair up.
 
Associate
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Google Next don't care because UK sales are tiny compared to the rest of the globe. They are not really that bothered if they don't meet the requirements of UK Laws, they sell plenty elsewhere.
 
Soldato
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Our house is only about 20 years old and came built with those interlinked hardwired smoke alarms.

They are annoying as ****, to the extent one day in a rage I ripped one out of the ceiling leaving a hole in the plaster.

Cooking anything, the ******* would go off, the one time we actually had a fire (left oil in a pan) I came down, kitchen full if smoke, pan on fire, and nothing.......

******* useless.

I've now replaced them with standard battery smoke alarms, ones that have like a 7 minute silence button thing. Much better.
 
Man of Honour
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Our house is only about 20 years old and came built with those interlinked hardwired smoke alarms.

They are annoying as ****, to the extent one day in a rage I ripped one out of the ceiling leaving a hole in the plaster.

Cooking anything, the ******* would go off, the one time we actually had a fire (left oil in a pan) I came down, kitchen full if smoke, pan on fire, and nothing.......

******* useless.

I've now replaced them with standard battery smoke alarms, ones that have like a 7 minute silence button thing. Much better.

Had that at my old house after they put in hardwired interlinked alarms for regulations reasons with the loft conversion. Forever going off from cooking or occasionally someone near the house smoking, one time something actually caught fire, fortunately not in a position to spread, not a thing.
 
Caporegime
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Had that at my old house after they put in hardwired interlinked alarms for regulations reasons with the loft conversion. Forever going off from cooking or occasionally someone near the house smoking, one time something actually caught fire, fortunately not in a position to spread, not a thing.

If it's going off when cooking your extractor fan is the issue not the smoke alarm.

It's battery was likley dead when it didn't go off. Otherwise what else would do that?
 
Man of Honour
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If it's going off when cooking your extractor fan is the issue not the smoke alarm.

It's battery was likley dead when it didn't go off. Otherwise what else would do that?

Extractor fan was a horrid old thing but it didn't seem to take much, below the point you'd bother with turning the extractor on to set it off.

It was mains w/ battery backup so not a dead battery - it would beep super annoyingly when the battery got low or died.
 
Associate
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It's easy enough to power up alarms from light ceiling roses but making them interlink is a big issue - especially if you don't want ugly plastic conduit run around the house. Are they allowing wifi interlinked alarms these days?
 
Associate
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I wouldn't use wifi interlinked smoke alarms. RF or dedicated radios yes. If your power goes off and you lose the wifi you could lose your interlinking of your smoke alarms. Fire Angel wireless use dedicated radios to talk to on another.
 
Soldato
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We just use battery ones. Have heat and smoke both in the kitchen and landing. CO in kitchen and lounge. Works fine. Having something I can't silence if someone burns the toast though? No thanks. The whole house can hear the alarms well enough even when the low battery blip starts. There is no need to start shoving one in every room like some crappy youth hostel/student halls.
 
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