Neighbour's House Alarm Going Off Since 11 o clock last night

elmyra

Hey all,

Our neighbour's house alarm has been going off since 11 last night. My housemates have been suffering through it since then and I have since I got home at 5 am. None of us have got any sleep and we've called the local gardai three times but they insist they can do nothing. They say nobody else has complained but we're probably hearing it far worse than everyone else because we are semi detatched from them. One of my housemates climbed the wall to see the name on the alarm system which is DH Alarms but we couldn't find this through the phone book, 11850 or the internet. We're actually going mental and can't take another night of this. Any ideas?

mikemac

Any bad smells possibly indicating dead bodies

Seriously, there's an easy solution.
Climb over the wall again at look for an outside ESB meter on the wall.
Open it(there's some generic tool) and trip the power.

Alternativly, just rob the place. Sure the guards aren't going to come as you said in your post

Boston

micmclo wrote:

Climb over the wall again at look for an outside ESB meter on the wall.
Open it(there's some generic tool) and trip the power.

Then the alarm will continue to go off, and you will be unable to stop it. They have a back up power supply for that reason. Also since when are esb meters outside, and since when can you turn the power off from one. You really are just posting ****e.

mikemac

Boston wrote:

Then the alarm will continue to go off, and you will be unable to stop it. They have a back up power supply for that reason. Also since when are esb meters outside, and since when can you turn the power off from one. You really are just posting ****e.

You may well be correct about the backup power but this sort of thread comes up in Accomadation forum every month or so and I've seen this suggestion every time.

As for posting ****e.
So you've never seen a ESB meter on on outside wall???
Have you been living in an apartment/flat or terraced house all your life??

Any semi detached house I've ever lived in has had the ESB meter on the wall at the side of the house. There is a tool you can get to open it and then trip the power.

edit: spelling

sheepshagger

I feel your pain mate - its happened to me. . .theres not much you can do until the people get back. . . is it worth asking any of your neigbours if anyone has a mobile number for the owners?

Boston

micmclo wrote:

You may well be correct about the backup power but this sort of thread comes up in Accomadation forum every month or so and I've seen this suggestion every time.

As for posting ****e.
So you've never seen a ESB meter on on outside wall???
Have you been living in an apartment/flat or terraced house all your life??

Any semi detached house I've ever lived has had the ESB meter on the wall at the side of the house. There is a tool you can get to open it and then trip the power.

Post pics of meter and trip switch. I've worked in alot of houses and I've never seen that. I've seen the gas box being placed outside however, and you can open that box with a tool to turn the gas off. This is a safty feature. Does your home actually have the esb meter outside, or are you persuming the gas box contained an esb meter? The "I've seen it suggested before" is not an indication that it's correct. I'm sure there will be en electrician along soon enough to give a definitive answer.

elmyra

There's no outside power box.

We did try the other neighbours for contact details but the couple only moved in a few months back and nobody really knows them yet. This could last til Monday evening, they go away, presumably home, every weekend and often presumably come back to work on a Monday morning but dont come to the house until the evening. I will have to be committed by then if this noise doesn't end!

copacetic

micmclo wrote:

You may well be correct about the backup power but this sort of thread comes up in Accomadation forum every month or so and I've seen this suggestion every time.

As for posting ****e.
So you've never seen a ESB meter on on outside wall???
Have you been living in an apartment/flat or terraced house all your life??

Any semi detached house I've ever lived in has had the ESB meter on the wall at the side of the house. There is a tool you can get to open it and then trip the power.

edit: spelling

in fairness you do seem to be posting rubbish, any proper alarm install has backup power so 'tripping' the power won't work. You also can't 'trip' the power from an ESB meter.

Nehpets

The attitude problems displayed in this thread are unreal. And there has only been about 5 posts!

About the alarm.. buy earplugs?

Little-Devil

elmyra wrote:

Hey all,

Our neighbour's house alarm has been going off since 11 last night. My housemates have been suffering through it since then and I have since I got home at 5 am. None of us have got any sleep and we've called the local gardai three times but they insist they can do nothing. They say nobody else has complained but we're probably hearing it far worse than everyone else because we are semi detatched from them. One of my housemates climbed the wall to see the name on the alarm system which is DH Alarms but we couldn't find this through the phone book, 11850 or the internet. We're actually going mental and can't take another night of this. Any ideas?

Its easy, if you know the neighbours well and are friendly throw a brick threw the window and ring the guards and report you saw someone trying to break in and now the alarm is going off.

We had the same problem a few weeks back, i had a few words and hopefully it doesnt happen again.

Dudess

Maybe do a google of some big alarm companies - like Dyno Alarm (think that's what it's called) and they might be able to throw some light on who the company is. It might even be part of them.

elmyra

we really dont want to go that far or damage their house, we dont know them that well at all...

1 of our number has been dispatched to tesco in search of earplugs though, thank you, good call!

philstar

i can sympathise it happened to me when i was renting in dublin years ago:(

just out of interest how long do those house alarms go on for...until the owners switch them off??

Dudess

Been there too - trés annoying.

Why does this, along with really painful toothaches (usually abscesses), always happen at weekends?!

Although the above are actually more likely to happen on bank holiday weekends or even longer holidays, so OP, count yourself lucky!

The time it happened to us, we phoned the call-out number. The guy was in the pub and refused to come out to us. And he kindly let us know that there is a code but he's not entitled to give it to us.

Definitely do a google to track down 24-hour support numbers.

Do you know anyone/anyone who knows anyone who works in security/alarm installation?

claire-g

on the earplug thing, Quies wax earplugs are the best, you probably wont get them in tescos, try a late night pharmacy. You get them in a box so only need to buy one box for about 5 people cause theres loads in them.

DonJose

elmyra wrote:

the couple only moved in a few months back and nobody really knows them yet.

Can you remember the estate agents who sold the house, if so give them a shout, they should have contact details of the owner.

jhegarty

CRO shows there is no DH Alarms registered....

ixoy

Boston wrote:

Post pics of meter and trip switch. I've worked in alot of houses and I've never seen that.

You're wrong on this one Boston. When I lived in Portmarnock originally, the ESB meter was on the outside of the houses. It most certainly wasn't the gas as we didn't have gas. The meters are still on the outside of most of the houses out here if you're that curious.

elmyra

DonJose wrote:

Can you remember the estate agents who sold the house, if so give them a shout, they should have contact details of the owner.

Yep it was Sherry Fitz but they are uncontactable at this hour!

We have got ourselves some earplugs so not too bad now! We will be able to sleep at least!

Revelation Joe

Hmmm...most modern alarms switch off the bell after twenty minutes and then just leave a strobe flashing. There's obviously no monitoring on it, otherwise someone would have responded by now.
Cutting off the power will not help, as that would set the alarm off anyway. They have a back-up battery for that reason.
The callout guy won't give you the code for security reasons, obviously you could be any Tom, Dick or Harry! Nor will he come out unless the Gardai or the homeowner asks him.
I've never heard of DH Alarms but then, I'm way out in the sticks!

Can't think of anything to suggest I'm afraid...

mathew

Meters on most modern houses are outside, theyre behind the white door thingy on the side of the house. If they were inside, the ESB guy would be ringing your doorbell every 2months to go in and read your meter, running the risk that you may not be in.

The outside things looks something like this
(the white yoke on the wall)

The fuses or circut breakers on the other hand are inside. They look something like this

Brian Capture

Revelation Joe wrote:

The callout guy won't give you the code for security reasons, obviously you could be any Tom, Dick or Harry! Nor will he come out unless the Gardai or the homeowner asks him.
...

But the poster is not 'any Tom, Dick or Harry'.

He is their immediate neighbour and presumably he can prove this.
Therefore the code should be given to him.

Karoma

Hmmm.

elmyra: unless you have a key to your neighbour's house, or can gain access via the attic or a ladder. There's not much you can do. Stop rining the Gardai - at most, they'll call out and inspect the premises for any signs of attempted entry, roll their eyes and wander off.

But the poster is not 'any Tom, Dick or Harry'.

He is their immediate neighbour and presumably he can prove this.
Therefore the code should be given to him.

It seems to be a 'she'. Secondly, although it can be a nuisance to the neighbour, not all neighbours can be trusted and given the code. And what good is the code unless she can gain access to the control panel anyway?

As for switching off the electricity: as pointed out, this is a daft idea. It'll just keep going until the battery dies.




OP: just suck it up, and have words with the neighbour when they return / drop a letter in.

nobodythere

Get a ladder, go up to the alarm box and just batter the **** out of it till it stops.

If possible.

Karoma

grasshopa wrote:

Get a ladder, go up to the alarm box and just batter the **** out of it till it stops.

If possible.

It's awkward as hell and deafening. Chances are you'll break before the alarm.
And unscrewing the box and snipping wires isn't going to be easy if it's a half-decent alarm.

Saruman

Just goes to show how effective alarms are.. chances are they went away and turned on their alarm. In fact thats the wrong thing to do as no one pays attention to alarms other than wish they would turn off.
They are only effective internally in the house if you are in there and as such they should be internal alarms so neighbours cant hear it.
Boston is wrong about ESB meters being outside, they are on any house i have ever seen. However that was not his real point, he was saying you cant "trip" the esb with the meter box and even if you could take it apart and trip it, there is always the backup.. although there is only so much battery life

There is no solution other without trying to damage their alarm box. Otherwise just wait for them to come back.

445279.ie

I feel sorry for you having to listen to the alarm noise, but isn't is a sad reflection of modern society that we don't know out neighbours.

Lucky enough to having gotten to know the neighbours and they have a key to my house and the alarm number.

Mr.Nice Guy

The gardai can't do much. Your best bet might be to contact your local authority. There's an article on the matter here.

The law in Ireland governing this area is Section 108 of the Environmental Protection Agency Act 1992 and the Environmental Protection Agency Act (Noise) Regulations 1994.

While the law does not specifically mention an exact level or standard of noise that is illegal, it is clear that if neighbourhood noise is affecting the quality of life of a citizen, you have a right to complain. Your local authority has the power to investigate complaints about neighbourhood noise and also has specialist equipment that measures levels of sound.

Karoma

If it's a repat issue, then you go to the council... not now. Not if it's once-off and not if it's the weekend.

Saruman

Would the council not require the Gardai to make a physical intervention anyway? and since they cant do anything.....

If you do not want to Damage the property, then you could try stuff a load of towels around the alarm to drown out the noise and then sleep with some white noise to drown out the rest.. like a fan or something.

Boston

ixoy wrote:

You're wrong on this one Boston. When I lived in Portmarnock originally, the ESB meter was on the outside of the houses. It most certainly wasn't the gas as we didn't have gas. The meters are still on the outside of most of the houses out here if you're that curious.

Fair enough; and can you turn the power off from it? mathew: I've never seen anything bar the gas in those white boxes.

DublinWriter

claire-g wrote:

on the earplug thing, Quies wax earplugs are the best, you probably wont get them in tescos, try a late night pharmacy. You get them in a box so only need to buy one box for about 5 people cause theres loads in them.

Seconded. All other earplugs are rubbish.

When your neighbour gets back get them to reconfigure the alarm so that it rings only for 10/20 minutes.

intheknow

I find a tin of expanding foam through the vent at side of alarm box works a treat !! Its a lovely sound as the goo begins to set ! slowly strangling the offending item :rolleyes:

Boston

intheknow wrote:

I find a tin of expanding foam through the vent at side of alarm box works a treat !! Its a lovely sound as the goo begins to set ! slowly strangling the offending item :rolleyes:

Have you done this? I don't think you have. The external alarm box isn't where the sound comes from. In fact a lot of the time its just an empty box. Normally the box just provides a strobe light.

copacetic

Boston wrote:

Fair enough; and can you turn the power off from it? mathew: I've never seen anything bar the gas in those white boxes.

as a fair few people have said 99% of houses have a meter box outside, gas is in a seperate box, they both tend to be white. However, again as most people have said; you can't turn off the power from a meter box.

Boston

copacetic wrote:

as a fair few people have said 99% of houses have a meter box outside, gas is in a seperate box, they both tend to be white. However, again as most people have said; you can't turn off the power from a meter box.

I don't think it's anything like 99%, I've worked in enough houses to know thats not the case. However, its probably a case that the majority of new builds are like this. Point stands however, the op was talking ****e if you can't turn off the power from one and even if you could the battery would keep going for several hours.

mikemac

Boston wrote:

I don't think it's anything like 99%, I've worked in enough houses to know thats not the case. However, its probably a case that the majority of new builds are like this. Point stands however, the op was talking ****e if you can't turn off the power from one and even if you could the battery would keep going for several hours.

Boston,

First of all, I'm not the OP and you state: the op was talking ****e but I think you are referring to my post.

You have called my post s**** twice now but I've yet to see a useful suggestion from yourself and you obviously don't know as much about houses as you think you do.

Possibly you are more familiar with terraced house in the city centre but I'm amazed you've never seen an outside ESB meter. Basing this on your recent post in Accomadation forum(where you got two streets mixed up and I helpfully corrected you)

I was unaware that you cannot turn the power off from a domestic ESB meter. The one I am most familiar with is the meter on our farm and there is a trip switch on it, much like a fuse box. This is probably a different design

I'm obviously wrong about the ESB idea but I was just copying it from the Accomadation forum where I know you post so you've probably seen this suggestion before.

Any good suggestions from you or do you just like slamming my posts?

fred funk }{

Most ESB meters are outside in those white plastic boxes.
You can pull out the fuse enough to kill the power to the house but DONT, by doing so will defrost everything in the fridge.

Most external bell boxs are real and dont just have a working strobe!

The only thing you could do is get a ladder and open the box and cut the siren wires, if you cant open the box do the expanding foam trick, works great.

If all else fails get a lend of a shot gun and blow it off the wall.

thebaz

i despise all alarms -- house and cars -- it should be illegal for alarms to go of for more than 30 mins -- where i live you can hear one every night nearly -- i'd be much more inclined to do a vigilante act on a house that had no alarm , than one with that irratating racket -- no deterent IMO -- alarms are getting more irratating and common , and less effective as a deterent

Boston

micmclo: Inside or outside, its irrelavent, the advice was wrong. Also more then likely it's illegal. Messing with an esb meter is illegal. So yea, I will slam any advice which is just regurgitating crap posted elsewhere, without actually a thought. .

fred funk }{:

Most Esb meters are not outside in those white boxes. Most are inside, but that aside, I'm unsure what this "fuse" you speak of is. Could you give a description? The "fuses" are contained in a fuse box which is definitely not outside. There used to be an old type switch near the meter, back in the day, but you're talking 30 - 40 years old.

Most external bell boxs are real and dont just have a working strobe!

Obviously an external bell box is an external bell box. However There's normally an internal bell, and depending on how cheap a system you got, an additional external, a lot of the time it's just a box. Point is an internal bell is standard. So your plan is certain to fail

The only thing you could do is get a ladder and open the box and cut the siren wires, if you cant open the box do the expanding foam trick, works great.

Have you actually done this "expanding foam trick" you claim works great? You realise you're advising someone to do criminal damage to private property?

elmyra

It finally stopped this morning when the neighbours came home. I called in next door to ask them if they could set it go off for less time in future because of the length of time it had been going off. I was really very polite about it considering my sleep pattern the past two nights. They basically told me where to go. I hate people.

Boston

elmyra wrote:

It finally stopped this morning when the neighbours came home. I called in next door to ask them if they could set it go off for less time in future because of the length of time it had been going off. I was really very polite about it considering my sleep pattern the past two nights. They basically told me where to go. I hate people.

Well yea, its the crappy cheap system they bought/came installed. Chances are there is no way of setting time.

Ok a suggestion from me on what can be done.

It's probably a particular door or window that is setting the alarm off. These have Vibration seniors on them which are adjustable. So you can increase the tolerance to shock. Doors tend to have both a vibration senior and and magnet senior, if the alarm is being set off by a knock at the door (post man/milk man/ whatever) the vibration senior can be removed. The alarm will still go off if someone gives the door a solid bang due to the magnet detector, however not as easily. You'll need someone with a clue about alarm systems to do it, I've done it in my own home, and I'm sure all the lads offering BS advice here would be willing to help.

You should make the point to your neighbours next time you see them, that an alarm is pretty useless unless you have someone to call the gardi. And that for the sake of good relations it would be an idea to do what I've outlined above.

elmyra

Well then they could atleast apologise to the 5 girls who've had very little sleep in two nights. One of my housemates went to work yesterday after getting zero sleep on Friday night. She was shaking with tiredness yesterday evening. It's not good enough.

Snake Plisken

elmyra wrote:

It finally stopped this morning when the neighbours came home. I called in next door to ask them if they could set it go off for less time in future because of the length of time it had been going off. I was really very polite about it considering my sleep pattern the past two nights. They basically told me where to go. I hate people.

The cheek of them I'd go ahead and report the wagon to the local council for noise polution, I'd also check with the neighbours directly across the road from the house to see if it annoyed them to as its normally the houses right across from my house that cause the most pain when the alarm goes off, if it did tell them you've asked the offending neighbour to sort it out and see if they will do the same.

Snake

Trojan911

elmyra wrote:

It finally stopped this morning when the neighbours came home. I called in next door to ask them if they could set it go off for less time in future because of the length of time it had been going off. I was really very polite about it considering my sleep pattern the past two nights. They basically told me where to go. I hate people.

How rude of them. This happened to me a couple of weeks back & I too called the Gardaí only to be told they had no powers to silence it, just do the routine check for signs of forced entry. They did say I could come in next morning and they would deal with it by way of a noise complaint, however my immediate neighbour silenced it at 4.30 in the morning by doing something to the ESB box on the side of the house & the alarm stopped 12 minutes later.

Ahh de bliss........


TJ911...

thefinalstage

Trojan911 wrote:

How rude of them. This happened to me a couple of weeks back & I too called the Gardaí only to be told they had no powers to silence it, just do the routine check for signs of forced entry. They did say I could come in next morning and they would deal with it by way of a noise complaint, however my immediate neighbour silenced it at 4.30 in the morning by doing something to the ESB box on the side of the house & the alarm stopped 12 minutes later.

Ahh de bliss........


TJ911...

Batteries only have so much power.;)

Dudess

Absolute c*nts! They didn't even apologise? That's actually mind-boggling! I would have thought you'd be guaranteed an apology - and a major one at that. If it was me, I'd be mortified. I'd probably go out and buy you a bottle of wine or something.

Yep, gather as many neighbours as you can and maybe you should call over as a group.

They told YOU where to go, therefore feeling absolutely no guilt whatsoever, rather annoyance at you for having the "audacity" to tell them? As I said, mind-boggling...

stovelid

micmclo wrote:

You may well be correct about the backup power but this sort of thread comes up in Accomadation forum every month or so and I've seen this suggestion every time.

As for posting ****e.
So you've never seen a ESB meter on on outside wall???
Have you been living in an apartment/flat or terraced house all your life??

Any semi detached house I've ever lived in has had the ESB meter on the wall at the side of the house. There is a tool you can get to open it and then trip the power.

edit: spelling

I think you mean tripping the power from the fuse box inside the house
micmclo.

I think only the gas supply can be switched off from an outside box.

AFAIK, tripping the electricity won't work as the alarm will be connected to the mains.

elmyra wrote:

It finally stopped this morning when the neighbours came home. I called in next door to ask them if they could set it go off for less time in future because of the length of time it had been going off. I was really very polite about it considering my sleep pattern the past two nights. They basically told me where to go. I hate people.

Don't think you can specify the alarm length OP

There should really be a facility where a text can be sent to a home owner if the alarm is set off.

daisyholeR

My ESB meter is on the outside wall... just throwing that in.

Boston

stovelid wrote:

There should really be a facility where a text can be sent to a home owner if the alarm is set off.

A system that smart would be able to reset after a half hour.

stovelid

Boston wrote:

A system that smart would be able to reset after a half hour.

Of course but it would be much more fun to get a text in Ibizia saying I'm currently waking up the neighbours, get your f*cking mate round to turn me off, wouldn't it?