I was looking at buying an STI Stopper and something caught my eye, the pull station in the picture. Anyone know the brand and model by chance? (it looks to be fake just not sure)
Pretty sure its just a generic image to keep it from being represented as brand specific. Plus, they don’t have to worry about using another company’s logo, name, or pull station design in their photos.
Yeah it’s some sort of fake pull station.
They have other fake ones on their site too, and some real ones oddly enough.
I’m surprised nobody’s shared this great marketing video for the Stopper II yet.
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Does anyone really think Stoppers work to prevent false alarms? I’ve pulled Stoppers off walls during service work and inspections and have them squealing, and in some really high profile places like schools, and NEVER has anyone even batted an eye or questioned what I was doing.
To me, they are great for physical protection of pull stations. Loading docks, parking garages, questionable apartment buildings, absolutely! But as something to prevent false alarms, maybe they work, but I think if someone is going to pull the alarm, a squealing plastic box isn’t really going to stop them. They will still pull it!
Related question, I wonder how many people have pulled off the Stopper during a real fire and thought the fire alarm was activated by that action alone and never pull the pull station?
That is very true, some serious lawsuits could posisibly arise because of it.
The way you described it makes them sound like the car alarms of the fire alarm world. Made with good intentions, but disregarded and useless when put into use.
Agreed. We use just the normal stoppers without sounders, purely for protection. Especially on suppression systems!!!
Normally we stick them on gyms or any harsh environment where a pull station could get excessively dirty or washed down.
Good analogy. I had a hotel that was concerned with false alarms, didn’t really have a problem but the guy was concerned and he wanted to install Stoppers. Told him we not waste his money on the alarmed units. If someone was going to pull the alarm, they are going to pull it. Spend that money on cameras at all the exits!
Does anyone else other than me find this hilarious?
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Which part is humorous?
The only way they would be useful is if someone went to pull the fire alarm, and another person was able to hear the squeal of the stopper, recognize the sound, quickly go to it and catch the person responsible for setting it off. Makes me wonder if anyone has actually been caught from a stopper before…
I agree with Lambda, cameras are the best way to go. Or, as someone put it to me, the pull stations were installed in places where only certain people can get to it.
I can see that point initially, but you might be looking at it from a point knowing that it’s only a small local alarm. What I have found to be true over the past 20 plus years that I have used stoppers, is the person that goes to maliciously activate a pull station doesn’t know that, and in “their mind”, they are setting off a security alarm to “somewhere” or they are being recorded etc.
Where there are pull stations without Stoppers, we will have random to infrequent false pull activations, and when we install Stoppers, the problem stops. If not, we do also use small covert or hidden cameras as well as having a very large digital camera network. So a lot of cameras in the area that do add a level of deterrence, and do provide decent pic’s of goofballs that do stupid stuff……We also do follow up each alarm and as to why due to the possibility of it beginning serial arsonist testing to see what our responses are, and we do prosecute.
We caught a kid, he was 19, which was pulling a station for the third time and asked him why? He said he wasn’t ready for a test that day and or the other days, and didn’t think it was a big deal. He found out with his parents that it was a bigger deal than he though after he was charged and expelled.
As a University, we have approximately 2,500 pull stations in service in our various buildings; dormitories, class room, office, research, daycare, hospital and our indoor/outdoor sports facilities on three campuses. Of those 2,500 pull stations, we have about 1,900 with Stopper II’s on them and feel that they do provide a good deterrence to malicious activations because students know that they will bring immediate attention to their actions.
Day Care’s especially need Stoppers, because when you’re about 40 inches tall, and you’re working on your ABC’s and you see this nice red thing on the wall that has the word “Pull” on it, what’s a kid gonna do……
Where we have stoppers in use, false pull station alarms are non-existent.
A number have also posted very great points that Stoppers provide good physical protection of a fire alarm pull stations, and in some instances suppression pull stations in harsh environments.
Now that being said, one aspect of Stoppers that is of a great concern to me as a campus fire and life safety systems inspector, and that Lamda brought up below:
“Related question, I wonder how many people have pulled off the Stopper during a real fire and thought the fire alarm was activated by that action alone and never pull the pull station?”
We have had a couple of these over the years where there was a burnt fluorescent light ballast or small trash can fire, and a staff member lifted the stopper, and upon hearing the stopper sounder, thought they had activated the main fire alarm, and left the building without actually pulling the pull station.
That is an ongoing debate in the industry right now, to have alarming or non-alarming stoppers. Although this has not happened but a few times on our campus, it is somewhat of a concern, but overall stoppers do a very good job, any other thoughts?
Paul
At our middle and high school 0 false alarms becuase of the Stopper IIIs
To me, that’s 1900 batteries you have to service. And I’d take a few false alarms over a few missed ones any day of the week!
I think the main deterrent for the stopper is having to lift the cover prevents people from casually yanking the pull while walking by, do all your stoppers have sounders? Do the ones without sounders generate more false alarms?
Also I’m guessing kids are less likely to cause false alarms now versus when we were kids. Used to be a stern look or a slap on the wrist (a long with a beating from the parents when they found out), now they probably have all kinds of charges they automatically hit someone with, like causing panic or something.
That’s what I was wondering - do they actually deter false alarms or just a feel good measure. With you having such a large sample size, 1,900 pull stations with Stoppers installed, you can almost say for certain they have an effect. Now, here’s the question, why does it work? Is it the physical barrier in that there is an extra step involved in pulling the pull station or just visually placing the pull station behind “glass” makes people think it shouldn’t be messed with? And in that case, are the sounder alarms even necessary? I don’t know if I buy the theory that if you lift the cover, security will be after you - because if you just pull the pull station, security will be after you anyway (along with a bunch more people)!
It’s interesting, we don’t get may malicious pull station activations, or at least don’t hear about them, around here. It’s rare I get a customer asking about it. In fact, the entire time I was in school (K-12) I only remember the fire alarm being pulled once on purpose for the entire 13 year period. And that was before Stoppers, cameras, cops in schools, etc.
Yep, Stopper III’s, Cause those are a thing.
Anyways, I’m a little late to this topic, but I agree, it probably wouldn’t stop most people. And also the fact that someone could pull just the stopper and think that was the fire alarm in a real emergency is… a little concerning…
I agree. One day at my local zoo, a young child knocked a Stopper off a pull station in the “Big Cat House”. Even though it was only that sounder going off in a small area, the zoo staff verbally evacuated the rest of the building.
Now I’m starting to wonder… What was the Stopper I? A guy standing in front of the pull station with an air horn? 
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