Which Zone For Panic Button In An Application With Multiple Smoke Sensors Connected?
Which zone for panic button in an application with multiple smoke sensors connected to available 24-hour zones – can we piggyback?
A: This is a trickier issue than it first appears. We would not recommend piggybacking a panic button unless there were 2 buttons installed in the same space, as it would make police response challenging. Even then it’s not best practise.
Making your situation more difficult is that you should not wire smoke sensors in the same 24-hour loop either, though we tend to think that when they are in the same location this might be permissible. You’d need to check regulations to make certain.
There are additional elements of complexity here relating to response to activation of 24-hour zones. For example, a smoke/fire alarm should sound a distinct siren/horn/PA and strobes, as well as notifying a monitoring station and fire response where appropriate.
Which Zone For Panic Button?
Meanwhile, a panic button will activate the external and internal siren, a strobe, and it will notify the monitoring station of a panic event. But a hold-up alarm will be silent and will notify a monitoring station and possibly local police directly. There will be no activation of sirens or strobes at all.
What’s the answer in your case? We tend to think its going to be installing an expander that supports your 24-hour zone requirements, allowing the system to be designed in such a way as to deliver proper reporting of the full range of events your client is seeking to monitor.
Panic Button Requirements
Panic buttons must always be wired directly to a circuit of the alarm panel that’s designated 24-hour. This zone must be continuously operational even if all other zones have been turned off when the alarm is deactivated or in home mode. It’s vital to make sure that panic buttons are not wired to zones that can be accidentally isolated.
Issues with 24-hour panic zones are less of a problem with the latest wireless systems, which can be activated by keypad, fob or app, but even with these it’s possible to commission them wrongly, or for users to deactivate the function, rendering them inoperative.
When a panic device is wired to a 24-hour circuit, the control panel can include processing designed specifically for panic button requirements – the signal will be passed more or less instantly.
But an alarm zone may have variations to account for the different purposes the zone might be employed to handle. Such variations might include small delays while the control panel counts signals in a bid to confirm that an event is occurring before signalling.
Panel features designed to keep false alarm signals to a minimum can delay panic reports.
Which Zone For Panic Button?
When installing panic buttons check all connections and work with the monitoring station to ensure they raise an alarm immediately. You want to use devices have a guaranteed to life of 10 years or more, and the circuitry and switching connections within them needs to operate first time, even if it has not been activated for 12-18 months.
In hardwired applications best configurations will be latching plus reset with operated indicator or non-latching, automatically resetting with an operated indicator.
It’s important that panic buttons are regularly checked to ensure they are operative and checking panic devices should be included when undertaking checks of smoke sensors.
Just be sure to advise the monitoring station before you activate them. You can find out more about 24-hour alarm zones here or read more SEN news here.
“Which Zone For Panic Button In An Application With Multiple Smoke Sensors Connected?”
