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Remote Fire Alarm For Barns?

Topic Type: 
Question

I am interested in putting together fire alarm systems for two of my barns where I house livestock. Ideally I could set something up that would sound an alarm inside my house to alert me to the danger of a fire. I found fire alarms set up with relays, but they are quite expensive ($70/unit not including shipping). Standard fire alarms are pretty cheap. Any ideas on how to retrofit several to sound a remote alarm?

Thanks.

George

R.J. Steinert's picture

Is that $70 per unit as in you would have to buy 4 or 5 to relay them to your house?

One idea that is not exactly the intended purpose of Fido but... It would detect an unusual spike in temperature from a fire and send you a text message. Though, at the point it's detecting heat it's probably too late. It would be better to take the Fido design and repurpose it with an MQ2 Smoke Detector Shield. A text message might be too subtle of an alarm, I wonder what LOUD alarms there that play well with Arduino.

jeremysmith's picture

Found some decent units ( mobilefireunits.com ) online. Well, that would depend on the specifications you have in mind. Probably multiple units may be used depending the size of your barn.

jbd's picture

Is to detect current going to the speaker (probably with a relay or SCR or somesuch) of a standard smoke alarm, and then the FIDO could send a notice out. You just have to get the voltage levels right :-)