Replacing smoke detector alarm battery help

[Bystander]

I haven't replaced them

That's not the landlord's responsibility? I'd tell you to check the local fire & building codes, but that's being a little "pushy" toward the landlord without knowing what/how the lease reads.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

If it is making noise and it isn't blasting you out of the house, something is wrong with it or the building alarm system.

Time to make a phone call tomorrow.

 

[dlgoff]

What's a "mic"?
[edit]
The model number is readable in your pic: http://www.thesignalsource.com/documents/GX93.pdf
It's a remote horn (speaker) for a building-wide evacuation from the master building alarm panel. It doesn't have a battery backup.

What's a "mic"?

Could be a speaker used as a mic.


Could be a mic used as a speaker.

 

[jedishrfu]

One other note is to be careful when throwing out 9V batteries, some house fires have been traced to these culprits.

Safety experts recommend placing electrical tape on the terminals to prevent a short. One expert even suggested adding the electrical tape to the battery case before installing it so you'll remember to tape over the terminal posts when removing it.

Another potential area is the family junk drawer where unused batteries, keys, tools... are often tossed. 9V batteries have been known to combust when a key, pen clip or paper clip shorts the terminals or even two batteries touching terminal to terminal.

 

[edward]

One other note is to be careful when throwing out 9V batteries, some house fires have been traced to these culprits.

Safety experts recommend placing electrical tape on the terminals to prevent a short. One expert even suggested adding the electrical tape to the battery case before installing it so you'll remember to tape over the terminal posts when removing it.

Another potential area is the family junk drawer where unused batteries, keys, tools... are often tossed. 9V batteries have been known to combust when a key, pen clip or paper clip shorts the terminals or even two batteries touching terminal to terminal.

Do not put a 9 Volt battery in your pants pocket with your keys. I don't know why but I had to do it twice before it was burned into my brain.

 

[BobG]

Do not put a 9 Volt battery in your pants pocket with your keys. I don't know why but I had to do it twice before it was burned into my brain.

Why do you wear your pants on your head?

As to the original question: You need to have the apartment building manager replace the alarms (or at least let him task the building's facility manager to do it). The apartment building manager needs to ensure ALL fire alarms are in working order since a dead smoke detector in one apartment could have a catastrophic effect on all of the residents. They should check the alarms once a year and replace the batteries often enough that a detector chirping would be a very rare occurrence.

 

[Astronuc]

Do not put a 9 Volt battery in your pants pocket with your keys. I don't know why but I had to do it twice before it was burned into my brain.

or change/coins. I did that, and it was amazing how fast and how hot it got.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Put in brand new alarms and the speaker still chirps

 

[jedishrfu]

I found this reference that talks about resetting it since it may still retain the error code for a low battery

http://sacramentopress.com/2010/08/...ries-but-my-smoke-detector-wont-stop-beeping/

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

I found this reference that talks about resetting it since it may still retain the error code for a low battery

http://sacramentopress.com/2010/08/...ries-but-my-smoke-detector-wont-stop-beeping/

yeah I've done that a few times with no luck. I think it must be the control panel in the lobby

 

[russ_watters]

Put in brand new alarms and the speaker still chirps

I found this reference that talks about resetting it since it may still retain the error code for a low battery

http://sacramentopress.com/2010/08/...ries-but-my-smoke-detector-wont-stop-beeping/

It doesn't appear to me that the speaker and your alarms are directly related to each other, so that isn't surprising to me.

If it is keeping you up at night and your landlord won't come immediately to fix it, I'd be inclined to rip it out of the wall.