Stay in the Know

Peak Alarm has been in business since 1969 and now has five offices with plans to open 2 more in the next year.

Peak Alarm has a 5 diamond certified UL listed central station, full service alarm division, full service guard and patrol division as well as a complete AV division.

Fire alarm -

Peak Alarm has a team of trained professionals that have NICET certifications and know the ins and outs of National and State codes including NFPA 72, IFC and R710 to help you from the design phase, fire marshal approval, plans, installation, testing and training. Commercial and residential fire alarm systems.

Keep in mind it is the law to monitor your fire sprinkler systems and if you have an incident and your fire sprinklers dump water before the insurance companies will pay they want to find out when the central station received the FLOW alarm and when the fire department was dispatched. A customer I am working with now has turned his system off during his remodel which is a risk because it is not being monitored.

Depending on the type and occupancy of your building IFC International Fire Code will tell you when a system is required and often there are local codes and laws as well. NFPA 72 will give us other guidelines such as smoke detector spacing, heat detector spacing, information on elevator recall, information on HVAC duct detectors and more.

If your smoke detectors are over 10 years old they should be replaced, the older CO detectors would last 5 years later they came out with CO detectors that lasted longer so now the higher quality CO detectors will tell you when their end of life is. When your normal 120V smoke detectors with 9V backup activate they just activate to warn you of smoke but they are not normally connected to your alarm system. Often separate CO and Smoke detectors are tied to the alarm system so when there is an issue the fire department will be dispatched. There are both wireless and hardwired CO and smoke detectors. The better type of smoke detectors here in Utah are photoelectric detectors, these detectors have light sensors in them and when smoke enters the chamber the light is blocked and the alarm activates. Smoke detectors should be cleaned every 6 months. Certain brands are cleaned with canned air. Some smoke detectors are ION detectors with a small particle of radioactive material and these work fine in duct detectors although they do not work well as home or business smoke detectors in high altitude areas.

A fire alarm system can be simple or can be very complex with dampers being shut down, magnetic doors closing, smoke control systems that move smoke throughout the building and much more. Older or conventional systems are zoned and have several smoke detectors on one circuit. Later on addressable systems were introduced allowing us to know exactly which smoke detector activated or which pull station was pulled. Addressable SLC loops can also have other modules such as CM control relay modules to control other items such as elevator recall. If specific smokes are activated CM modules will send information to recall the elevator to specific floors depending on the situation.

When we submit on fire alarm systems we figure out exactly how much current draw there is on each device and appliance so when the system goes into alarm we can plan on how large the batteries need to be in order to function after 24 hours of AC loss. We also do voltage line drop so we can make sure that at longer distances the devices and appliances will still function We use math and calculations to make sure the fire alarm system will function as it was designed.

The Fire Marshal requires plans to be submitted and normally these are done in CAD or DWG drawings. The permit process is different in each jurisdiction some fire departments require the plans to be submitted to a third party reviewer before they will approve them. Some cities require that a permit fee be paid and some cities do their own reviews depending on the experience of the fire marshal. Sometime you have to submit electronically and sometimes they want up to 4 copies of the plans in printed form. When we submit plans we also submit the equipment list, battery calculations, voltage line drop calculations and datasheets on each piece of equipment.

ACCESS CONTROL

Proximity readers, biometric readers including eye scanners and hand scanners can be used and even a special token downloaded to your phone can allow you to use that credential to read in, maglocks, electronic strikes, door status switches all will be part of your access control system to allow people into your building during certain hours on certain days and when they leave the company you only have to delete them from the system and their credential no longer will work. For the owners of the company and upper management you can have 24 hour access and for other workers they may be limited to certain days or hours. We also have systems that operate on the cloud so you can get alerts and control everything remotely.

Many times you will need to tie the fire alarm system to your access control system for release of the maglocks and sometimes strikes if the fire marshal requires it.

INTRUSION

We have lots of options for security including DMP, Qolsys, 2GIG and others and we have hardwired and wireless systems and we can help you decide on the best fit for you. Security sensors include: Motion detectors, glass break or shock sensors, door status switches, tilt sensors, water/flood sensors, temp sensors, smoke, CO detectors and you can control your garage door, lighting, outlets, thermostat and much more.

There are details and options that many contractors will not even explain to you. One example is that the DMP high power wireless system repeaters will speak to the panel and also each other. Many wireless repeaters only talk to the panel and not each other so they are much more limited than the DMP repeaters.

We have keypads that are normal keypads or touch, we have hardwired keypads or wireless and we even have different types and colors of keypad covers.

We suggest that you use a cellular communicator even when you tie your alarm system to the network, when you tie it to the network it will be much faster to send commands to the panel but it is best to use a cellular communicator as well.

We can tie an AES radio to your system whether it be fire alarm or security and the drawback is you cannot remotely arm and disarm using an AES Radio.

PERS

If your mother or father or grandparent lives alone you may consider getting them medical panic buttons and a PERS system. Let us help you with the information and pricing. This system is the one you hear about “Help I have fallen and I can’t get up”. Also we can tie a panic button for the police or the medial panic buttons to the security systems or we can have a separate system just for PERS medical panics.

There are systems that have GPS that allow the person to be at the store or elsewhere and push the button and the system will still call the emergency services. Peak Alarm currently does not offer this service although we do offer medical or police panic buttons that work inside the home.

HD CAMERA SYSTEMS

We have several options for cameras systems, be aware that commercial grade cameras cost more than non commercial grade cameras and Larry can come to your business or home and go over the options for MP resolution, frame rates, lenses and much more to help you pic the best system for your situation. We have cameras that operate on your WIFI or hardwired cameras that will tie to a recorder NVR.

In order to use WIFI cameras we need to have 120V power close to the cameras and you will need excellent WIFI in order for these cameras to work and 2.5mbps upload speed on the cameras. It is best if we can run hardwired cameras and power them over CAT6 cable and then we can tie the NVR recorder into the network so you can control them remotely. With the WIFI cameras there is a monthly fee with the hardwired cameras there is not a monthly fee unless you need a repair agreement.

Many times it is best to use verifocal cameras outside or in large facilities rather than fixed cameras. Call Larry and he can help you with the different lens options and explain the best route to take.

Verifocal lenses will allow you to adjust the view of the camera from a lower mm view to a higher mm view often from something like 2.8 to 12mm or 5mm to 50mm otherwise when you install fixed cameras for an outside parking lot as an example you will see a very wide view say on a 4mm lens but everyone will appear very small. I have a calculator to help you figure out the best views and which lenses to use.

When we install cameras outside we try to avoid south facing cameras because of the issues with the sun. Also we can install poles to mount the cameras on when needed. Often we need to trench and install cable under the ground in PVC when we install cable outside we use a special burial rated cable. We install cable overhead with special support cables. When we do work that is high up we use special lifts. Recently we did a job in an ice cream storage facility that has freezers that are 20 below and we had to rent special lifts that will function at that temperature. We had to use special fire alarm cable that is rated for those low temperatures as well as special horn strobes that will work in temperatures that low.

Many companies do not plan on many of these types of items when installing equipment. There are many items that lower end companies do not plan for.

Camera systems can also be used for positive training such as thanking an employee that cleaned up an area without being told. Once you complement an employee for this and tell him or her that you saw them do this on the camera system the word will get around that you are looking at and using the camera system. Having cameras capture accidents with the forklift can be great for insurance and training.

At one facility an employee fell down an elevator lift and when asked he said he slipped, when we viewed the video we could see that another employee was chasing him throughout the store with a can of hairspray and the accident was caused by horseplay and this can also affect the insurance.

Another facility was losing food out the back door, we put the cameras in and the food stopped going missing.

Another daycare fired 2 employees 1 month after we installed the camera system for hitting the children. The cameras we installed are not hidden cameras.

NURSE CALL

We can help you install a high tech nurse call system that will record when a nurse responded, how long he or she was in the patient room and when they left etc… We also have more economical systems for clinics and dental offices with or without dome lights using pull cords or push buttons and a master station system.

There are wireless and hardwired nurse call systems

INTERCOM

Most intercoms are video intercoms now and many of them are IP so you can answer the door with your smart phone remotely. Aiphone or Comlit are great options.

Intercom can be with video or without and it can be hardwired or IP intercom

GUARD AND PATROL

Peak Security has over 200 local employees on the Guard / Patrol side and we have both armed and unarmed guards and patrol depending on your needs. Peak Alarm can respond to alarms in Salt Lake or West Valley where the police do not respond. Peak Guards respond much sooner than the police in most cases since we are not responding to other calls like the police.

Alarm response is when we send a uniformed guard in a marked car to respond to an alarm where the police will not respond or in some cases even when the police will respond we will send a guard.

Key response is where we send a guard and he or she goes into the facility with a key to check inside.

Our guards and cars have GPS so we can track if they stay in the car or enter the buildings.

AV AUDIO VIDEO

Peak Alarm can do a small AV set up for you or even a large one with speakers built into the walls and the special theater chairs and screens.

Insurance - licensing - certifications

Peak Alarm is fully insured including liability insurance, workers compensation insurance, vehicle insurance.

Peak Alarm has company licenses for each of their divisions Burglar Alarm Company license, licenses for each of their employees including FBI background checks for each employee. Peak has has a license for their UL listed Central Station, Peak AV and a Separate Company license for Peak Security which is our Guard and Patrol division.

Peak Alarm has a long list of certifications and associations including being rated in the top 100 companies in the Nation in SDM magazine. Peak’s UL Listed Monitoring Station is 5 Diamond certified. Peak AV has industry certifications for high end installations as does Peak Alarm. Peak Alarm is a Netone company which is a national association of alarm companies