Hardwired Heat Alarm with Battery Backup, BRK Brands HD6135FB

Smoke and CO alarms are essential for most spaces in a residential structure. They are not appropriate in areas where smoke, high humidity, airborne particles, or trace amounts of carbon monoxide are considered normal. This includes furnace rooms, laundry rooms with gas-fired dryers, and similar rooms. The HD6135FB heat alarm is the right device for these areas. It is similar in appearance to the BRK smokes and smoke/COs that are part of my installation, and interconnects seamlessly with them. For new construction or renovation, installation is as close to turnkey as it gets. Install a dedicated 3-wire circuit that hits all of your alarm locations. (The third wire, usually red, is a signaling trunk for the alarms. It must not be connected to current.) Install a ceiling work box at each location. A separate plastic mounting ring is attached to the ceiling box with the included screws. Connections are made to a pigtail connector: black to black, white to white, and red to orange (which needs to be stripped). No ground. Attach the connector to the alarm, and rotate onto the mounting ring. Pull the plastic battery disabling strip from its slot, and your installation is complete. This device includes an infrared remote sensing module, which responds to just about any button press from most consumer electronics remote controls. In my tests, it did not work with my Onkyo receiver's remote, but responded just fine to VOL or CHANNEL presses from my TiVo remote. This is a clever and insightful application of what amounts to "spare parts." I would guess that many people have remotes to products that they no longer use. Throwing in a couple of batteries and leaving this near the alarm is a great reuse of an otherwise-useless device. This alarm is designed to sense temperature rises, and will thus work well in locations that are inherently high-temperature, such as a furnace room. For obvious reasons I don't plan to test it with live flames, but will need to trust the manufacturer and Underwriters Labs on this one. The horn is loud, though this is not relevant in my application because an interconnected smoke in my bedroom will also sound if the alarm is triggered. The interconnect system works as designed, and the latching feature (a red light continues to blink after the alarm condition goes away, so you know which one tripped the system) is useful. I recommend this unit as part of a larger system.

Easy in install

When our home was built the electrician put a standard smoke detector in the attached garage, connected to the whole house system. That's not appropriate due to dust and temperature changes causing false alarms. We'd pulled it out YEARS ago. This heat detector easily replaced the smoke detector and integrates into the system with the smoke/CO detectors in the living space. Good price, easy install, and the right product for the application. Thankfully, no fires yet to test the function.

First one was a dud on arrival. Put the battery in and it wouldn’t shut up. Kind of makes me wonder about their quality. Also and I have seen this over the years… they will just beep for no reason like they need a battery when they don’t. The whole unit needs to be replaced. Is that a feature to tell you to replace it? I don’t know, but they do it eventually.

This is a fine product for what it is. IT IS NOT is a smoke detector, and it MUST NEVER be used to replace one. It does not provide protection for people in sleeping or living areas. PLEASE DON'T BUY THIS to use as a "less sensitive smoke alarm!" It is not for bedrooms, hallways, living rooms. It is intended and certified for unoccupied spaces like garages, attics, furnace rooms. It will alarm at 135 degrees, much later than a smoke alarm would have sounded. IT DOESN'T REPLACE SMOKE ALARMS. I trained and worked in fire protection systems for two decades. I have installed this unit in my boiler room, attic, and garage. But I have ionization detectors and photoelectric detectors in the living areas. It scares me that people think a HEAT alarm is early-warning protection for your family; it's NOT. Please get a SMOKE detector for the areas where people sleep. Put this only where it's supposed to be.

[This is the same review that I posted for the BRK 9120 smoke alarm, except for the information beginning with "NEW."] I have a house that's ~14 years old, with an interconnected Kidde smoke and heat alarm system. One of the alarms started going off randomly, and since I couldn't detect the culprit, I decided to replace all of the alarms. Turns out that smoke alarms should be replaced every 10 years anyways. Doh! I bought six of these smoke alarms and three heat detectors; these detectors will tell you which one sounded if they are triggered, and they are very inexpensive. I am assuming that they'll work in a real emergency. :) The installation was quick, about five minutes per alarm. For each alarm, I removed the Kidde alarm entirely (alarm + mounting plate + three-wire connector) and then installed the BRK alarm (three-wire connector + mounting plate + alarm). The BRK alarms do not come with mounting screws or wire nuts, but I already had these from my prior alarms, so not a problem. With regard to battery backup, you only need one 9-volt battery for an entire interconnected system. The BRK heat alarms I got have battery backup, so I didn't need battery backups on the smoke alarms. Note that Kidde and BRK alarms are not compatible on an interconnected system, so you have to go all Kidde, or all BRK/First Alert alarms (the same company makes both BRK and First Alert). Also, the Kidde and BRK three-wire connectors are different, so you cannot reuse the connectors. The only possible gripe I have is that once the BRK connectors are plugged in, they're very tough to unplug. Perhaps this is a good feature with regard to safety! [NEW] While not entirely a gripe, the foam label on the back of the heat alarms surprised me since it made inserting the alarm into mounting plate difficult. On my first heat alarm, I trimmed the foam off, thinking that it was a production mistake, but then the heat alarm didn't entirely lock well into the mounting ring. Since the other two heat alarms also had (what appeared to me to be) oversized foam labels, I left those labels as is, for a friction-based attachment to the mounting ring (versus a locking attachment). Not a big deal in any event, just leave the foam label intact. And finally, I wrote the installation month and year in black marker on one of the alarms, to aid in reminding me when to replace them, although I probably should have used their "born on" date, June 2011, or better yet, written "6/2021" as the expiration date.

Work as advertised and appreciate the design, quality and value.

The HD6135 Heat Alarm by BRK is easy to install. If you already have a hardwired BRK alarm it just plugs right in. If you do not then the included plug simply connects to your power and then plugs into the alarm. The IR remote control silence/test feature is cool in that you can use your TV's remote control to test the alarm. We have not had a problem with remotes inadvertantly setting off the alarm, but it has been installed in the furnace room away from TVs. We have had no false alarms, and, thankfully, no real alarms either. I have copied the specs from the BRK website: » 135F Fixed temperature and Rate-of-Rise » Thermistor heat sensor » 9V Battery Backup » IR Remote Control Silence/Test uses most remote controls to temporarily quiet unwanted alarms and test alarm functions » Latching alarm indicator - remembers which unit initiated an alarm » Two silence features - can silence the low-battery chirp for up to eight hours or temporarily silence an unwanted nuisance alarm