Inspection Information

All buildings or structures occupied in whole or in part for residential purposes upon the sale or transfer, shall be equipped by the seller with approved smoke detectors/ MGL Chap.148 sec. 26F

Effective 4/1/06 (MGL 148 sec. 26F1/2) all residential structures with a fuel or wood burning appliance or adjacent garage must install (per manfacturer instructions) an approved CO detector (battery operated, plug-in with battery backup, hardwire with battery back-up, combination types*), 1 per habitable floor at a minimum, installed so every bedroom has a detector within 10' of its door.

The Medway Fire Department wants to assist all homeowners in making the inspection for compliance a simple step in the transfer or sale of property. The following information describes the proper placement of smoke detector, proper marking/numbering of a property, how to call for an inspection, and the fee for issuing a certificate of compliance.

The State law requires an operating smoke detector on every habitable level, including the basement. Finished attic spaces also need smoke detector coverage. In homes with floor space exceeding 1,200 square feet per floor, a second detector will be required.

First Floor – Smoke detectors should be placed on the ceiling in the hallway near a stairwell to the second floor, unless there is a bedroom on the first floor. In this case, a smoke detector should also be placed outside the bedroom door.~ Placing the detector more than 6 feet from a kitchen or bathroom door will help to avoid alarms set-off by cooking or steam.

Second Floor – The smoke detector must be placed on the CEILING in the hallway common to ALL bedrooms, normally at the head of stairs. The idea is for the smoke to get to the detector before it reaches the bedrooms. Again avoid placement within 6 feet of a bathroom door.

Basement - Smoke detectors should be placed on the cellar ceiling at the base of the cellar stairs. If the ceiling is unfinished, place the detector on the edge of the joist (not in the bay between two ceiling/floor joists). Never place the detector at the top of the basement stairs by the cellar door.

General Information – Smoke detectors should be placed on the ceiling a minimum of twelve (12) inches from the nearest wall. Placement of smoke detectors on a wall is NOT adequate and will result in failure of compliance. Exception: Mobile Homes, HUD Provisions.

Testing Before Inspection – You may already have smoke detectors in your home. If the detector is installed according to regulations, push the test button on EACH detector to make sure it works. A fresh battery should be placed in each detector and marked with a date. Hardwired A/C detectors in newer properties should already be installed properly and only need to be tested for proper operation. Testing of one A/C powered smoke detector should activate ALL the other detectors in hardwired A/C powered smoke detector installations.~

Note -- Properties that were built after 1975 shall have a primary powered (electric) system installed per the Massachusetts Building Code at the time of construction. Battery operated detection may not be substituted for primary interconnected hard wire systems.

To schedule an appointment apply in person during business office hours. Hours of inspection are between 9 AM and 11:30 AM and 1:30 PM and 4:30 PM Monday through Friday, (on the half-hour) each day and are made on a first-come, first-serve basis. The cost of the inspection is $50.00 per unit * payable to the Town of Medway.

The inspector will issue a certificate of compliance after the inspection and payment of the fee. The certificate is valid for 60 days from the date of inspection. You are urged not to wait until the last minute before closing on a property to receive an inspection. As the end of each month approaches, the inspection times rapidly fill up each day and an appointment may not be available.

Smoke detectors are one of the most important safety features of your home. Properly installed, working smoke detectors will give you the early warning you need to safely escape from a fire. But how do you make sure your detectors are working? One important way is to replace them after 10 years.

As electronic devices, detectors are subject to random failures. Product, installation, and maintenance standards are used to assure products work as designed despite this. Part of the technical basis for the first detector product standard was an assessment of expected failure rate, estimated at four per million hours of operation or one every 30 years. Early field studies of detector reliability, notably by Canada's Ontario Housing Corporation, confirmed the essential accuracy of this estimate, restated as a 3% failure rate per year. This means a very small fraction of home smoke detectors will fail almost immediately, and 3% will fail by the end of the first year. After 30 years, nearly all the detectors will have failed, most years earlier.

This is a value judgment. Only 3% of detectors are likely to fail in the first year, and annual replacement would be very expensive, so that doesn't make sense. At 15 years, the chances are better than 50/50 that your detector has failed, and that seems too big a risk to take. Manufacturers' warranties for the early detectors typically ran out in 3-5 years. So, in ten years there is roughly a 30% probability of failure before replacement. This seemed to balance safety and cost in a way that made sense to the responsible technical committees.

If a 30% failure probability still seems too high, remember that replacement on a schedule is only a backup for replacement based on testing. A national study found that when home smoke detectors fail, tend to fail completely. Regular monthly testing will help discover detector failure as well as a dead or missing battery.

The same study showed all the inoperable detectors tested in 1992 were at least 5 years old and predated a 1987 change in product standards that reduced sensitivity to reduce nuisance alarms. Changes in detector chip design, among other improvements, make it likely that electronic failure now occurs at a rate much less than 4 times per million hours of operation.

Replacing detectors after 10 years protects against the accumulated chance of failure, but monthly testing is still your best means of making sure detectors work. Today's detectors are even less vulnerable than the older models to failure.

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