"sms" wrote in message
...
On 6/10/2013 1:59 PM, Robert Green wrote:

Americans over the age of 65 are one of the groups at greatest risk of
dying in a fire. On average, more than 900 Americans age 65 and over die
in
fires. People over the age of 85 die in fires at a rate five times
higher
than the rest of the population. However, there are a number of
precautionary steps older Americans can take to dramatically reduce
their
chances of becoming a fire casualty . . . Cooking accidents are the
leading
cause of fire related injuries for older Americans. The kitchen is one
of
the most active and potentially dangerous rooms in the home.

I think the reason that you don't see auto-shut-offs on cook tops is
that appliance manufacturers don't want consumers using such a device as
a timer rather than as a fail-safe shut-off. There would almost
certainly be liability issues the first time someone had a fire and
insisted that the auto-shut-off timer should have prevented it.

I suppose you're right. It does seem odd that people would find fault with
a device that automatically shuts off the burners/range top since there
isn't any sort of safety shutdown on them now. In addition to an
auto-timer, ranges should have a remotely locatable temperature sensor that
would shut down the burners if the temperature in the cabinets or range hood
directly over the burners/heating elements reached a critical level.
Considering all the safety devices that are developed for the electrical
"grid" in the house (AFCI, breakers, GFCI's, etc) ranges and toaster-ovens
seem pretty far behind the times.

The motion sensor device to shut off the electricity after a short
period of time does make some sense because it requires that the stove
top be attended. A 15 minute manual timer connected to a relay that's
connected to the cook top power would also be okay because it would
constantly have to be reset. Ovens are less of an issue if it's left on
unattended because a fire is much less likely.

Thanks for the idea, Steven. I could easily hook up the electric toaster
oven to an X10 motion sensor and have it shut off the toaster oven if it's
unattended for more than 10 minutes. Might even be possible to create a
photocell sensor that detects when the inside of the toaster oven is too
bright thus indicating it's on fire inside.

Since the toaster oven has a mechanical switch that has to be depressed to
start the cycle I am not too worried about the X10 system inadvertently
turning the unit on and starting a fire. It would take both the activation
of the appliance module AND a press of the "start" button to turn it on.
The motion sensor system would do away with having to start the separate
timer for each use. Putting the toaster on an X10 module would be I could
use a number of conditions to evaluate when to turn off power to the unit.
I could even use a smoke detector to activate the shut-down sequence with a
little soldering. I already have X10 compatible heat detectors that can be
used to sense when the area above the toaster over is warm enough to
indicate a potential problem.

I wish I could implement the same system to monitor the gas range. I
suppose I could try to find an electronically controllable gas valve and
install it on the gas line going to the stove. That way I could interrupt
the gas flow to the stove when a hazard was detected just like I can control
the toaster oven.

Not sure that would pass muster with the codemeisters but it should since
the goal is to reduce the chance of a fire started by the range top. The
biggest problem I can see is that the stove is pilot-lighted and when gas is
restored, the pilot light must be relit. I suppose that's only a problem
for devices with pilot lights since there's no "vampiric" gas flow to keep
the pilot light going on piezo-starter equipped stoves.

It's easy to get distracted from cooking (like when I heard the neighbor's
dog chewing up the mailman) long enough for disaster to strike.

--
Bobby G.