Alarm

October 9, 2006 The SignalONE Safety vocal smoke alarm is the only smoke alarm on the market that allows the appropriate caregiver to record a personalized "wake up and escape" message for their child. We wouldn’t have picked that this was such an important feature off the bat, but apparently there’s a growing body of evidence showing that children do not awaken reliably to the tones found in conventional smoke alarms and the key aspect of the vocal smoke alarm is the use of a familiar voice to awaken a child by name and urge the child to escape a burning home safely. A new study, released last week by the American Academy of Pediatrics, showed that 96 percent of children woke up to the recorded sound of their mothers voice in a median time of 20 seconds, compared to only 58 percent who woke up to conventional smoke alarm tones. We’ve seen a few good ideas in smoke alarms over the years, such as the wireless smoke alarm and the ingenious snap alarm – interestingly, none of their compelling features are mutually exclusive. Read More

May 19, 2006 One can only imagine the horrors of finding out the hard way that one was in the vicinity, or indeed, the target of a chemical agent attack. Whilst it’s something most of us will never have to worry about, there are those in occupations where it’s a distinct possibility they might face such a scenario. Those people will be glad to have a GID-3 chemical agent detector in their vicinity. The ACADA is an advanced point-sampling, chemical warfare agent detection system that continuously monitors for the presence of nerve agents and blister chemicals using IMS (Ion Mobility Spectrometry) technology. It provides early warning of chemical attacks and can be remotely deployed, vehicle mounted or carried by soldiers. Read More

August 28, 2005 Some ads tickle us and make us laugh. Research shows these ads grab attention, and IF they are well executed, then the liking for the ad washes over onto the advertised brand. Despite E.B. White’s famous wry prediction ("humor can be dissected, as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process”), humor in advertising has survived extensive dissection, exposing insights into its anatomy, function and origins. Yet it is true that the creation of humorous ads remains a creative process that owes more to intuition than to science. Dr Max Sutherland examines the use of humour in advertising. Read More

July 20, 2005 Primary producers and researchers will jump at the thought of this new innovation – a solar-powered wireless transceiver that can send weather alerts via text or email message. SolarStream works with HOBO Weather Stations for measuring temperature, relative humidity, dew point, rainfall, soil moisture, photosynthetic light (PAR), solar radiation, wind speed and direction, barometric pressure, 4-20mA, 0-5VDC, and pulse outputs. So you can now set the alarms you want and be informed immediately a trigger point is reached. And the weather stations can collect data on all of the above for analysis via BoxCar Pro software. Read More

April 2, 2005 Smoke detectors are something you can do without if you have a death wish, sleep with one eye open like James Bond or have never had kids. That’s not to say that most people haven’t thought of doing without them on account of them being so ugly – they look like they belong in a prison cell, not part of the decor in one’s castle. On top of that, when you want to inspect or replace them, having them screwed into the ceiling is also a bummer. That’s why we love this idea. The Snap Alarm smoke detector simply clips to the chord of any light fitting. This means it can be retrofitted almost anywhere, in a few seconds, without the need for tools by someone with an IQ larger than their shoe size, and it sits in exactly the right place in a room for a smoke detector – high and central. Read More

The Pool Eye Alarm is designed to add another level of security around home pools by sounding an alert, both inside and outside the house, when a child or pet as light as 7 kg falls into the pool. Read More