Kidde Recalls

[Canon_Mutant]

Hey, just wanted to inform others that the Kidde Smoke Alarms and Fire Extinguishers I bought at Home Depot about 4 years ago are both on a recall list. Go to Home Depot, Lowes, and all the other outlets where you shop and you should find their recall section. Quite a few of the links on Home Depot don't send you to the right place. I already notified them about this. But, more troubling, is you would not believe the length of the list and how many other things you may well own that are on it? My Ridgid power nailer and a GE Profile range [we got from Lowes] are on it.

We bought this new home 4 years ago and the smoke detectors kept chirping even though the batteries were good so I replaced all of the smoke detectors and bought 3 new fire extinguishers for the home and 3 smaller ones for all 3 vehicles and they are ALL freakin junk!

 

[fleming442]

I recall (No pun intended) seeing something about that on the news a couple months ago.

 

[Canon_Mutant]

It's on again tonight or I wouldn't have known . . . Kiddee has 4 recalls pending on the Home Depot sight.

 

[pagrunt]

Ahhh, the new way of customer interaction. Seems like there are more recalls in the past 10 years than I can remember in the past. As my opinion, seems like as less is made in North America more things end up on recall lists.

 

[UNGN]

The Kidde recall was funny. The parent company I work for bought Kidde about 15 years ago. I thought it was a stupid idea and there were better companies to buy, but I"m just an engineer.

A few weeks ago, our CEO told us that years ago, an engineer came to management and said the fire extinguishers work, but when you try to use them again, they don"t work. This was after they shipped 20 million of them.

The first idea was to put a label on the fire extinguisher "One time use, only". That wasn"t going to fly, so they recalled them. All of them.

 

[UNGN]

My Ridgid power nailer and a GE Profile range [we got from Lowes] are on it.

On my GE profile oven, we got an error, so I go on google and type in the error and the there is a fix using a business card to insulate wire that chafes on an unbroken sheet metal stamping's edge. Sharp metal and wiring generally don't mix.

Took ten minutes and was free. That was like 10 years ago. The oven never has given us another problem.

A few years after doing the fix my boss came to work complaining he just spent $1,000 something on a new oven because his 5 year old one was "fried".

Me: "Did it have Error XXXX?" - Him: "Yes"

Me: "Did you go on google and see the business card fix? You slide a business card between the wires and a sharp edge that shorts the wires" - Him: "No... Really? Bleep...Bleep... Bleeping Bleep!"

 

[pagrunt]

Saw the recall story on the news, they said it goes back to 1974! Hope that was a typo on the telepromter.

 

[UNGN]

Saw the recall story on the news, they said it goes back to 1974! Hope that was a typo on the telepromter.

No typo, that is correct. The 20 Million our CEO mentioned at his 3rd quarter all hands meeting was just since we bought the stupid company in the 2000's. There was 40 Million "defective" extinguishers made in total.

The fire extinguishers work to put out a fire. Just hope another fire doesn't happen a month later, because even if the extinguisher is still full, you are screwed.

 

[tc1959]

I better check ours.....

 

[Bonnewagon]

So I had a total of nine BC extinguishers on hand for boats and home. Eight were in the recall. The one that was not was from a two unit set and the serial numbers were exactly two digits apart!?! Anyway they sent me eight replacements and one was discharged in the box. They used a flimsy yellow tie wrap to secure the grenade style pin and it broke letting the pin get away and it discharghed completely in the box. Another replacement is on the way. Every yellow tie I touched broke immediately so I replaced those with actual 1/16" tie wraps for security. It's bad enough when a BC extinguisher goes off but it's only baking soda. When an ABC goes off the media is corrosive and ruins whatever it lands on. On the boat I am surrounded by Class A extinguisher (water) so all I use are BC for electrical and fuel fires.