Posted by Steve Dashew (January 7, 2007)
Aqualarm
We’ve had Aqualarm ( www.aqualarm.net ) products on our boats going back to the early 1970s. Catching up on our mail recently we noticed a new catalog with some interesting products which we thought might be of interest.
Aqualarm makes a range of engine, bilge, and intrusion alarms, much of which works well for retrofit.
On Wind Horse we are using their exhaust overheat detectors (a collar which straps around the exhaust line) to give us a warning if cooling water has stopped.
We also use their cooling water flow detectors for the engines and genset, and remote fire detectors.
We have two of these in Wind Horse‘s engine room – one between the engines and another further aft, over the generator and diesel heater.
We have used these external engine overheat detector (this last item is mounted on the engine heat exchanger to give us warning of a problem where low engine coolant might not reach the normal heat sensor) for at least 20 years.
The photo above is of a direct wired smoke detector. These units are hard wired to your DC power system, and close a switch, which then sounds an alarm if they detect smoke. If you have an engine room, like we do, this is probably a better bet than a household unit, as an internal alarm sound would be masked by the engine noise and shielding. We’ve ordered one of these to test on WindHorse.
Another interesting product is the “Light Sentry”. This unit senses whether it is light or dark, and turns on a light circuit automatically. Seems like it might be good for anchor lights.
OK, we agree this looks like an Aqualarm catalog, but this is interesting stuff and we’ve had good luck with it over the years, so we thought you might like a head’s up.
December 27th, 2010 at 8:23 pm
Aqualarm: Good stuff; I would rather head out without and oil pressure gauge than a cooling flow sensor.
Comment: Installing water flow sensor just B/4 water enters exhaust injection point instead of at seacock (where most are installed) allows it to detect many additional problems on the engine itself rather than just intake flow.
[Reply]