Conference misery::feline_v1

    
    What happened to Beverly's cattery, Nancy?
    
    Just a suggestion on an alarm, how about your local fire dept.  They
    may have some ideas.
    
    Pat
    

    Be careful with the local fire department if you are over your
    city's cat max limit.  They can and might report you.  Beverly's
    cattery caught fire, right?  If I remember correctly, many cats were
    lost in the blaze.
    
    Are you doing an alarm that goes to the fire department, or a sprinkler
    system?  I have smoke detectors in our place but that is all.  Would be
    interested in what you are planning on doing.
    
    Jo

    re: Beverly - yes.  She had a terrible fire in her home about 2 years
    ago and lost just about all her breeding stock and kittens and two
    dogs.  It was horrible!!!!!!  I've had a fire alarm on my mind ever
    since.
    
    I am planning on having smoke detectors with an automatic dialing
    system installed.  As far as I know local fire/police departments
    will not let you connect directly to them.  You must go through
    a service that charges a monthly fee.  That's what I plan on doing.
    I hadn't even considered sprinklers.  Might ask about it, but I"m
    sure its very expensive.  
    
    Nancy

    
    
    A very good idea indeed.... Good Luck

    I think that a note on alarm systems for a cattery is perfectly
    acceptatble in this conference. However, I  would appreciate it if the
    names of contractors/vendors not be mentioned directly in this note. If
    you wish to let Nancy know about of a contractor you are reccommending,
    please do it via private mail.
    
    on a second note, you might try asking about this in HOME_WORK.
    
    Deb

    Thanks Deb and others.  We have settled on a company after looking
    at three.  I'll describe what we're doing and tell you the cost to
    give you folks some ideas.
    
    We have a 94 year old colonial.  Its two floors, 6 rooms.  We have
    a second story deck off the back of the house.  We also have all new
    thermal pane windows.
    
    We will have alarms set on the front and back doors, plus on the door
    leading up from the basement.  A burglar is not going to stay
    in the basement since there's nothing down there to steal.  We could
    have used a motion detector down there but this is just as good and
    there's no way around it.   
    
    We will also alarm the three windows on the second floor in the back
    that are accessible from the deck plus the one to the diningroom
    from the back of the house since its protected from view and a burglar
    could work undisturbed and relatively unseen on that side of the house.
    The alarm person told me that the double pane windows are VERY hard to
    break so that someone would need some time to get through them.  They
    aren't likely to try and go in from the front or side of the house
    because its too visible.
    
    We will be putting combination smoke/heat detectors in the following
    locations - basement, stairway to second floor and diningroom.  One
    consideration in placement of fire detectors was that we have doors
    between kitchen & hall and livingroom & hall that we keep closed in
    the winter to keep the heat from rising upstairs.  Hence we need
    a fire detector someplace in the downstairs other than in the hall-
    way.  The doors would prevent enough smoke from getting through 
    until it was way too late.
    
    We can add on at any time and I'd like to add more fire detectors
    in the future since we have dropped ceilings downstairs.  That means
    that if a fire started in the livingroom then there would have to be
    a 2 foot layer of smoke on the ceiling before any could spill over
    into the diningroom where the smoke detector is.  
    
    The cost of all this including tax and the first month's fee for
    monitoring (Oh and it includes the keyboard and control panel and
    telephone interface) is a hair under $900.  As a comparison, one
    other local company we talked to wanted about $1500 for similar
    coverage.
    
      Nancy

    I forgot to mention - the monitoring fee is $25/month and we
    agree to go with this company for 3 years.  Since I got a referral
    from a friend for this company I have no problem with that agreement.
    
    I should add that the monitoring includes burglary, fire, "panic" and
    silent alarm.  One of the other companies brock this all down -
    you got Burglary and panic as the base and had to pay extra for the
    other two.  By the time it was all added up it cost the same - $25.
    
    One thing to watch out for when you talk to these folks is who owns
    the equipment.  One company who advertises on TV frequently and only
    charges about $400 for their base package retains ownership of the
    equipment and can come and take it back if you decide you don't want
    to purchase monitoring from them any more.  We will own this equipment
    and the money we pay can be deducted from capital gains when/if we 
    sell the house.
    
    Another thing to check on is false alarm charges.  It is my
    understanding that the police department in your town/city may
    charge you after so many false alarms in a particular time period.
    There's nothing you can do about that - however, the monitoring
    company may charge you as well.  So find out about that too.
    
    If you want more info feel free to contact me.
    I'm respecting the moderators' requests not to list names of companies
    but I'll be happy to discuss it off line.
      Hope this has been helpful.
       Nancy