CO Alarm prices. Try Lloyds Pharmacy £12-99

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Alfie168

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Having said "ouch" when I saw a price of £39-95 for a battery CO Alarm in the Force 4 Chandlery brochure, I thought it worth mentioning that Lloyds Pharmacy do a CO Alarm for £12-99.

"We've got lots" said the cheerful lady in the Boston branch.

Worth having if you are gaseous mariner.

Tim
 
Cheapest i have heard off. You dont have to have gas to get killed by CO . Oil or Solid fuel can be just as lethal.
 
I bought a fire blanket from Lloyds Pharmacy over a year ago, it cost £2.99 if I remember, so much cheaper than I have seen them elsewhere.
 
I bit the bullet when I was flush and bought one from Tescos.

http://direct.tesco.com/q/R.202-0277.aspx

Yes, I thought £30 odd QRK was a bit high but oh, what the hell.

In my lounge, I run a wood stove burning, only seasoned hardwood and not coal. On occasion, I had headaches when running the fire and always put it down to just being knackered.

I got home one day and I was surprised to feel nauseous and on checking the alarm, it was reading '44' on the LCD display!

I left the room and went somewhere for about 10-15 minutes and forgot about it. The nauseousness left and on my return to the room, the piezzo alarm was sounding and the reading was above 80, so I ventilated the room and the numbers fell.

I have also fallen asleep in the same room only to be awoken by the CO alarm sounding and the display reading 90, I felt really ill with a thumping headache, so it does work.

I always thought that a wood stove drawing in fresh air and using an open flue was quite safe, how wrong could I be?

Just out of interest, the room and other parts of the house always smells of woodsmoke which I find quite pleasant but the CO alarm has returned me to the realities of CO poisoning and the alarm usually displays very low numbers from zero up to 8 or 12, so I am always looking at it.

I look at it as much as I do the single-hand Tide Clock and the Vion 4000 barometer.

What price life - £38 quid!!

One quick edit point, if you remove the battery, a large red plastic 'flag' appears from behind the unit to remind you that it won't work even if you miss the fact that the LCD is not displaying any numbers, hopefully a zero!!
 
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Cheapest i have heard off. You dont have to have gas to get killed by CO . Oil or Solid fuel can be just as lethal.

[/ QUOTE ]

I know..it was just a weak joke about peoples bottoms really. I spend my working day trying to prevent council tenants getting CO poisoning from their own actions..I only unblocked four ventilation grilles today (out of eight gas safety checks I did today) /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif

In fact the solid fuel statistics for CO poisoning were pretty appalling until the use of coal receded, and I gather that the recent narrowboat fatalities were caused by a faulty solid fuel stove.

Be vigilant, and use your common sense. As to the wood burning stove, you need to check the ventilation is adequate, that the flue length is correct and that the termination is correct, and not in a 'dead air' location. There are rules and regs, and even the most basic of flue flow tests using smoke bombs can tell you if the fumes are being properly removed. I'd say get a professional solid fuel engineer in...but then I have to say that don't I /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif Most situations like yours can be resolved pretty easily without too much financial pain.

Tim
 
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know..it was just a weak joke about peoples bottoms really.

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It would need to be a strongly built machine to cope with the emissions from some of the guys I have sailed with. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
 
I have a CO detector in the lounge and an open fire burning wood. The highest reading I've ever got from it is 12ppm and that was holding it above the flames. The alarm does not sound until it reads 30ppm. In the room it always reads zero. The unit works ok. I used it in the garage while I was running the outboard!

Could there be a problem with your chimney?
 
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Cheapest i have heard off. You dont have to have gas to get killed by CO . Oil or Solid fuel can be just as lethal.

[/ QUOTE ]

{SNIP}
In fact the solid fuel statistics for CO poisoning were pretty appalling until the use of coal receded, and I gather that the recent narrowboat fatalities were caused by a faulty solid fuel stove.

Be vigilant, and use your common sense. As to the wood burning stove, you need to check the ventilation is adequate, that the flue length is correct and that the termination is correct, and not in a 'dead air' location. There are rules and regs, and even the most basic of flue flow tests using smoke bombs can tell you if the fumes are being properly removed. I'd say get a professional solid fuel engineer in...but then I have to say that don't I /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif Most situations like yours can be resolved pretty easily without too much financial pain.
Tim

[/ QUOTE ]

Indeed, solid fuel stoves are currently a major risk area in regard to fires and CO poisoning. But not just affecting narrowboats, the last serious incident was on a sailing vessel.

The last fatalities (about a year ago) were on a grp cruiser linked to the outboard exhaust. The other significant cause of CO on boats is exhaust fumes and the biggest danger is from petrol engines - especially outboards, generators and pumps.

Still cannot be complacent with gas though, for example older three-way fridges continue to feature in the stats every so often.

Over the past ten years, on average two boaters dies and two more need hospitalistion every year from CO poisioning.

By way of further illustration, here's a compelling story from the states about someone who apparently should have trusted the information - source boattest.com (USA)

After a career of “trusting the instruments” ex-pilot takes batteries out of his alarm and drops dead

Brig. Gen. Stephen L. Vonderheide was a veteran pilot used to trusting his instruments.

The following article is based on a report filed by Augusto (Kiko) Villalon to the USCG, which asked that the accident be investigated. Kiko Villalon is a veteran of the boating industry and is known to virtually every boat builder in the U.S.

When Vonderheide’s fiancée, Annette Oaks, did not hear from the retired general on Jan. 1, she called the San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Dept. They investigated and found the 61 year-old general dead in his boat. The generator was still running. A single power cord was found running from the boat to a shore power connection, but the breaker was thrown and no electricity was getting to the boat.

CO was the obvious cause of death

Fire department personnel tested the air inside the vessel and found 530 ppm of CO in the salon. There was also a propane gas heater in the main cabin, but it was turned off. Subsequent tests of this unit by the Sheriff found it to be safe, registering only 1 ppm on his CO meter after start up.

Upon inspecting the engine room, which was directly below the salon, Villalon discovered the corroded generator exhaust manifold which had a long crack that was 2 mm wide. (See picture above.) That is where the trouble started, pumping exhaust gas into the engine room. But how did the CO get from the engine room into the main salon above?

A panoply of problems. Note the 12” splice in the exhaust connected to the corroded elbow from the wet exhaust pot. Note the flexible 6”ventilation tubes” which go through the engine room overhead into the salon to vent overboard, well above the waterline.

Villalon found a 1/4” gap around the engine room ventilation tube where it pierced the salon sole. Even though these tubes were hidden behind joiner work, eventually the CO found its way into the salon and set off the Kiddie combo smoke/CO detector. The detector was found on the galley counter with one battery removed, the only way to silence its annoying alarm.

The CO detector worked

The detector was tested, later with its original batteries, next to an engine exhaust port and after 45 seconds the alarm went off loudly announcing with a recorded voice that there was carbon monoxide present. It seems fairly obvious that the general thought the unit was mal-functioning, so dismantled it.

Villallon says that 530 ppm is not a particularly high reading, but enough to render a person unconscious, and if alone, “eliminating the possibility of recovery.” He says that in similar cases he has found CO concentrations in the thousands of ppm.

At the Sheriff’s request, a Delta Marine Sales mechanic inspected the generator installation and stated: “We believe that the probable cause for the crack is due to a fairly common failure in this application due to age and metal fatigue.”

Villalon points out that “lack of proper inspection and maintenance of the exhaust system was the cause of the incident.”
 
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