Home Security On my mind again

[dieselalles]

And learn what these words mean and burn them into your brain before you ever have to use deadly force...

"Officer, I was afraid for my/my families life!"

... In your home, your car, a parking lot or in line at the 7-11, this is your #1 defense to prosecution.

This is a great thread. In our new place, the only defense I have is that I'm a light sleeper with a double-barrel Fox 12 gauge shotgun (that I've killed a da-zillion ducks with) and my trusty Kimber .45 ACP officer's model semi-automatic pistol and ten years of military training and decades of hunting experience. But that's not enough. I need to build up some kind of perimeter security around my home. And this thread is lit a fire under me...

On another note, something to think about, is security beyond your home. We recently had a horrific crime occur in Knoxville, just a couple hours away, where a young couple was carjacked and unspeakable, horrific things were done to them. See Urban Legends Reference Pages: Murders of Christopher Newsom and Channon Christian

You never know when you might be called on to protect yourself or your family. Some people go a lifetime without ever having a crime commited against them. Others aren't so lucky. I try and live by my old Boy Scout motto, "Be Prepared". So get a gun, GET TRAINED and get your CCW.

 

[dmccarty]

Jeese Soundguy,

I'm not sure which is worse, your discription of those old PC systems...

Or *** ME *** knowing EACTLY what you are talking about.

The first micro computer I worked on extensively was a PET 2001 with a chicklet keyboard, tape drive for storage, and 4K of memory. Yes 4K. We eventually got a system with a full keyboard and 16K. I looked real hard at buying a TI99, Atari 800, the 400 was just a toy, , and an Apple II/II+. Ended up paying $800 mail order for the Apple II+.

Years later when I bought my first IBM PC 1, and I played around with those 8086 clone chips, , I bought a color PC Monitor/TV from Sears. I think it was $300 or there abouts. Its was an awesome deal. A color monitor and TV. Just a monitor would cost $300ish. And the TV had a button that when pushed would make the screen go green for those who like the look of green screens. I had a Herc CGA card driving the monitor. I STILL have and USE that TV today! Its in my kids room hooked up to Directv and a DVD player! I think I got my money out of that purchase.

Back to the subject.

When we built the house I looked at the cost of installing an alarm system as well as a fire sprinkler system. Long story short, I called up the insurance company and asked what kind of savings would I see on my insurance payment with both of these systems in the house. The answer? Not much. That told me the odds of my house burning down or being robbed was pretty low. So neither system was installed.

The wife is always concerned about locking the doors when we leave the house. I try to lock the doors but don't really worry about it. We are very isolated. You can't even see our driveway from the gate across the road. There might be 50 people that know that the house is up the road if we include all of the contractors that built the house. ALL our doors have glass. If the place is going to get robbed I would rather them just walk in than bust out the glass panels and make a bigger mess....

Now if WE ARE HOME its a different story. We have the GSD model alarm system. Not only does she have a 90 pound bark and growl but she has big sharp teeth. In a few weeks we will have a rescue golden arriving to bolster the GSD alarm system.

If the thug still wants into the house with two dogs barking there is a plan to handle that contingency.

My parents had an alarm system in the last house when I was still living at home. We kept it turned off due to the false alarms. When I worked at a retail store we had constant false alarms. Most alarms are false ones. Police repsond to many many many alarms and very seldom has there been a crime.

I just dont see alarms working for most people. I'm sure they are needed in some places though.

Later,
Dan

 

[MossRoad]

A properly designed, quality alarm system will not give false alarms, unless you count the human errors like when someone forgets to disarm it and then walks in the door. Which brings up another point... I've never had an alarm system that requires the owner to enter the house, then disarm the system. That seems counter to common sense. I want that thing to go off as soon as a door is cracked open. No delays. No warning beeper that I have 15 seconds to turn it off. This can be accomplished by keypads or remote controls for very minimal cost.

 

[Soundguy]

I had that same pc monitor tv combo!

I also remember using a pc / pc jr.. actually had basic on rom on the MB... I always drueled over pc this guy toted into work.. what I think was an amstrad pc 'luggable' with an amber screen.

Ahh the glory days... Setting options with jumpers.. cutting traces on cards that were hard configured.. etc.. Having to replace 8250 serial uarts with 'new' 16450's only to find out the fifo buffers were buggy, and then having to get 16550afn uarts to replace those new 16450's so yuo could multitask the machine and not drop characters comeing in via modem.. etc... course that meant running a fossile drive for most of that software too... I liked BNU.. but eventually jumped to X00 for easy of use.. etc..

Programmers were 'real' back inthe old days.. they could write awesome programs that hardly touched resources.. when visual basic and ectensive GUI software hit.. that threw the baby out with the bathwater...

Most of the kids and young adults today don't realize the old iron that some of us had to use.. computers with bootstrap loaders and card wallopers.. 8" drives.. etc.. With technology making a decent leap every 18 months.. it's astonishing to look at the first pc ( ibm) at 4.77mhz and then look at and average computer you can buy at a box discount store.. probably a dual core 4 ghz processor.. etc..

Soundguy

Jeese Soundguy,

I'm not sure which is worse, your discription of those old PC systems...

Or *** ME *** knowing EACTLY what you are talking about.

The first micro computer I worked on extensively was a PET 2001 with a chicklet keyboard, tape drive for storage, and 4K of memory. Yes 4K. We eventually got a system with a full keyboard and 16K. I looked real hard at buying a TI99, Atari 800, the 400 was just a toy, , and an Apple II/II+. Ended up paying $800 mail order for the Apple II+.

Years later when I bought my first IBM PC 1, and I played around with those 8086 clone chips, , I bought a color PC Monitor/TV from Sears. I think it was $300 or there abouts. Its was an awesome deal. A color monitor and TV. Just a monitor would cost $300ish. And the TV had a button that when pushed would make the screen go green for those who like the look of green screens. I had a Herc CGA card driving the monitor. I STILL have and USE that TV today! Its in my kids room hooked up to Directv and a DVD player! I think I got my money out of that purchase.

Back to the subject.

Dan

 

[RoyJackson]

Oops!!!!!!
I think we went off topic...

 

[ctpres]

A properly designed, quality alarm system will not give false alarms, unless you count the human errors like when someone forgets to disarm it and then walks in the door. Which brings up another point... I've never had an alarm system that requires the owner to enter the house, then disarm the system. That seems counter to common sense. I want that thing to go off as soon as a door is cracked open. No delays. No warning beeper that I have 15 seconds to turn it off. This can be accomplished by keypads or remote controls for very minimal cost.

I agree with instant doors concept BUT. Are you trying to protect people or property? If protecting property, then having all doors instant and turning alarm off before entering is OK. However if the objective of the security system is to protect people, then it is a different story. With timed entry points the system continues to offer some protection during the most vulnerable part of the coming home cycle. There is some safety in car or home with locked doors but when entering home you are very vulnerable. If entering a timed entry point and anythings happens you will miss the allowed entry time and things start happening or you can enter special duress/police code which will silently get you help. With or without a security system it is a good idea to use operator to open garage, drive in and close overhead door before getting out of car. Some even use shoplifting mirrors or CCTV to be sure noboby is in garage with them before exiting car

 

[MossRoad]

I agree with instant doors concept BUT. Are you trying to protect people or property? If protecting property, then having all doors instant and turning alarm off before entering is OK. However if the objective of the security system is to protect people, then it is a different story. With timed entry points the system continues to offer some protection during the most vulnerable part of the coming home cycle. There is some safety in car or home with locked doors but when entering home you are very vulnerable. If entering a timed entry point and anythings happens you will miss the allowed entry time and things start happening or you can enter special duress/police code which will silently get you help. With or without a security system it is a good idea to use operator to open garage, drive in and close overhead door before getting out of car. Some even use shoplifting mirrors or CCTV to be sure noboby is in garage with them before exiting car

With a remote control keychain fob, you can turn off the alarm before entering the building, and keep your finger on the panic button as you do so, should something happen. With some systems, you can even turn the lights in and around your home on from the driveway, before you go in.

 

[JoeR]

A friend of mine used to design security systems for nuclear power plants for DOE. The one thing he told me is the best security systems detects intrusion before the perimeter is breached. He recommended glass break sensors, but that would be too late since the intruder has already compromised the structure. He said small dogs are really good since they can hear movement outside the home and alert the occupants. Although, dogs can be unreliable if they are distracted by something. He said motion sensing lights or beams are good, but large animals can cause a false alarm. Of course, it would detect a person before they gained entry into the home.

Joe

 

[SpringHollow]

Regarding pepper spray in alcohol, the local city police department was talking to me about pepper spray a number of years ago and mentioned when possible they used that first, then a Taser, then a gun. I mentioned a taser might ignite the solvent (methanol or ethanol) in the pepper spray and offered to run some tests. Fortunately, they had test cans of pepper spray as well as the real stuff. We went to the fire department's training facility and I hung up some T-shirts. We hit them with the training spray (same solvent but no pepper oil) and then I got to play with the Taser. That was neat but the T-shirts went up in flames. A suspect would have been a crispy critter if they hit him with a large amount of solvent based pepper spray and then a Taser. Water based pepper sprays would not have this problem. We did one real test - boy that pepper spray is nasty indoors even with the windows open!

Ken

 

[pennwalk]

I'm still thinking about home security. Now that it's on my mind I'm hearing about break ins all around me. I found out a friend had a break in last week. Broad daylight. He thinks he was in the office at the house when it happened. It is a working farm with hands around all day long. The bad guy popped the metal back door with a crow bar like it was nothing and grabbed his wifes jewelery.

Here is a page I found on security in case any of you are thinking about it. Public Safety

We are working on it but the more we do the more issues we find to work on. It almost seems like a miracle that we haven't had a problem.

Chris