Re: what is the best wire for a perimeter alarm

["Sue" <sodom@xxxxxxxxxx>]

My brother-in-law, who is an electrical engineer, would wake up from a nap
in his easy chair and walk to the kitchen thru the beam of his PIR only to
have his alarm start wailing.  "Wait", he said to himself, "I didn't arm the
system!"  After this happened several times, he began to wonder, what in the
heck is going on that could arm my alarm?  One evening immediately after
this happened, he mosied outdoors, and lo and behold he could hear his
neighbor talking on his ham radio.  Said neighbor had antennas all over the
outside of his house.  Ron had not used shielded wire for his alarm system.
He re-wired that weekend, and problem was solved.

"Frank Olson" <Use-the-email-links@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:7vZGi.184845$rX4.154898@xxxxxxxxxxxx
> Bill wrote:
>> If you want the *best* wire... In addition to what others said, note that
>> all that wiring running in the walls/attic of a house acts as a big
>> "antenna".
>>
>> The wiring can get voltage running in it induced by nearby radio
>> transmitters, etc. and lightning strikes - causing false alarms
>> sometimes.
>>
>> If you use "shielded" wire and ground one end of the shield (at the main
>> box), this will keep the outside electrical interference out of the
>> wiring.
>>
>> Shielded wire is like TV coax wire which has a metal wrap inside the
>> jacket. But you can get regular 2, 4, [or whatever] conductor shielded
>> wire. It is expensive though.
>>
>> More about this - Faraday Cage...
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faraday_Cage
>
>
> Next you'll be telling him to wire up his keypads with CAT 5E... Shielded
> wire...  sheesh!  We've got alarm systems installed in homes where the
> customer's are running ham radios.  I've not had a single false alarm
> that's related to "radio interference".  About the only "interference" I
> get these days is from young punks driving around with bass speakers the
> size of garbage can lids playing something they call "tunes" at a volume
> level that's gotta be close to 140 dB.  You can actually *feel* them
> coming from a block away.  To top it off, when they stop next to you
> they'll invariably be talking on their cell phones although God knows how
> the heck the person on the other end can even hear what they're saying.