You know that your safety and security is to important to leave to a communications company or relying on your own knowledge of fire codes and standards, so you hire a professional security company to install the system.
Smart decision!
But not all companies are the same.  We were recently called to a potential customers’s home to take over the monitoring of their existing system. We found the following Caddx NX-6 panel.
How many violations of manufacturer’s instructions or code can you find?
See below for the violations we identified to the homeowner.
Yellow arrow – Identifies the bell/sire wire that was disconnected from the control panel. When the fire alarm system was tested, no notification appliances responded….so the home could have burned to the ground and the homeowner would have NOT been notified locally.
Green arrow – Identifies the siren / bell loop that had been bypassed so the homeowner was never notified that the siren was no longer functioning.
Red arrow – instead of using 18 gauge / two -conductor wire, as is the industry standard, company paralleled two 22 gauge conductors from a 4-conductor wire in violation of the national electrical code 310.10(H)(1) 2011 edition.
Blue arrow – There could have been a blue arrow at each zone, as the end-of-line (EOL) resistor is mounted in violation of the manufacturer’s instructions. These EOL resistors allow for supervision of the circuit and are required to be mounted the the electrical end of line to work.
