I ordered this to replace the 9120B with battery backup and ordered in a hurry. This model is the SAME THING without the battery backup. Since I was replacing the one in the kitchen, and the only one of that floor. I just put the 9120 in one of the bedrooms and put the old 9120B downstairs (for some reason we have 5 upstairs and only 1 downstairs). It will be alright and saved me $30. It fit fine in the 9120B slot and activated my other alarms all over the house when I tested it. BRK Brands 9120 Hardwire Smoke Alarm
My house came wired with about 12 of these with the battery back-up. Since the 9 volt battery is supposed to power the entire system when electricity is lost they must be replaced fairly frequently. They test at about 8.25 volts when required to be replaced. I have purchased a couple of these non-battery units to replace the ones in the cathedral ceiling that requires a ladder to replace and will invariably start chirping at 2am on a cold winters morning. I have also replace the one in our unheated attic which suffers the same fate.
As long as I can get to the unit I'll stick with the battery back-ups but for those hard to reach places these electric models as a better choice.
These BRK smoke alarms have issued alarms twice now, which lasted several hours each and resulted in lost work time. Initially, two of these would beep every minute and nothing I tried would stop it, so I had them replaced, and then these seemed to be OK, but almost every night we would hear a 1 second alarm. Then 2 weeks later, the alarms went off steady and nothing we tried would silence or reset them. We even had the gas company come out to check the gas applicances for CO2, since 2 of the units also had the CO2 detectors built in, but everything checked out fine, so I just started unplugging the units until the alarms stopped. A few days later, the remaining 3 alarms that I still had connected started another false alarm and eventually stopped. I don't have time to put up with issues like this, and it can result in not even believing your smoke alarms, when it may be a real fire! I only purchased these because they were plug compatible with the First Alert, but I will have to rewire the plug and purchase a better quality brand.
After 10 years with another brannd, we were looking to get rid of the pesky batteries. These fit the bill, were inexpensive and easy to install. I'll take the chance that a fire will start when the power goes OUT while I'm sleeping. I'd have to get hit by lightning, or a meteorite, both unlikely but sure to wake me. 8*)
I bought one of these because it was easier than getting the landlord in to replace a defective smoke detector. It plugged directly into the old wiring, but the mounting ring was a slightly different size than the old smoke detector. Not a big deal, it still only took me five minutes to install. This communicates with the others in the house, just like the old one (i.e., when one signals smoke, they all do).
Note that this one does not have a battery, so you must have house power to it. I'm not saying that's bad or good, it just depends on what you need (in my case, I was happy to not have to worry about a battery).
Bought 4 of these to install in a clients home. Was having trouble finding 120vac alarms without battery back up. These were mounted quite high and would have been nearly impossible to change batterys twice a year. They worked great.
After reading all of the positive reviews, I bought 6 of these smoke alarms for my home. Installation was very quick and easy. My husband installed all 6 (according to the instructions) within an hour. It has been two weeks now, and EVERY DAY at random times during the day (3am, 4pm, 9am) for no reason at all, each smoke alarm BEEPS. The sound is piercing and has woken us up in the middle of the night on several occasions. We've read the instructions and even contacted the company about the erratic beeping and were told that it "may happen from time to time." Unfortunately, we threw out the boxes, so we cannot return the alarms to amazon. If anyone has sleeping children, I suggest you buy a different alarm.
This is an excellent smoke alarm if you don't want battery back up and don't want to have to replace batteries at 3 in the morning. We have a back up generator so we never needed battery back up. The alarm is easy to install and does what it is suppose to do.
Be warned. When they say no more than 12 alarms don't try to use 13, and no more than 1,000 feet of wire between the first to last. I tried to install a thirteenth alarm and they all went off. Then I tried to install one over 1,000 feet away and they went off again. The instructions were absolutely correct. When I called their customer service people they answered with a live person and he told me exactly what the instructions said, no more than 12 and under 1,000 feet or wire. I am happy with the alarms but if you need more than 12 and one or more has to be over 1,000 feet away you will need a different type of alarm.
This smoke detector was a replacement for an earlier model that we had whose emitter had decayed to levels where the detector would periodically go off. Replacing it with the newer model was not too difficult. It required my removing the old mounting ring and placing the new ring that was custom for the replacement model. This took perhaps 10 minutes at the most.
How do you rate a smoke detector that doesn't do smoke detecting? You can periodically spray some artificial smoke in its direction to see if it will go off. I suspect that perhaps only 1 household in 10,000 or more does this regularly. The bottom line is that I don't know how well it is working. It isn't going off any more because of the depleted radioactive source used to activate the alarm. I have to depend on the testing laboratories who rate these things for the pluses and minuses.
All in all, I have a new detector that seems to be working replacing the old one and an increased sense of security which may or may not be juustified. - Smoke Detector - Smoke - Smoke Detectors - Brk Brands'
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