First alert smoke and carbon monoxide alarm 3 beeps

When there is no fire, the top three causes for a beeping smoke detector are dust inside the smoke alarm and cooking, even though there is no visible smoke and steam.

Why is my smoke detector beeping three times? Smoke detectors beep three times when they go into alarm mode. The beeping is a repeating pattern of three beeps and a pause. This pattern is common with all smoke detectors. The three beeps are caused by smoke, steam, or dust trapped inside the smoke detector. 

First, you need to be sure if the smoke detectors are going into alarm from a real fire in the house or if it’s just a false alarm. If you’re unsure, leave the house and call the fire department.

What causes smoke detectors to beep three times when there is no smoke?

1. Smoke from a fire in another part of the house
2. Cooking, even if there is no visible smoke
3. Steam from a shower
4. Dust trapped inside the smoke detector ( the number one cause of false alarms)

1. Smoke from a fire

If you only have one smoke detector in your house, it will be pretty obvious if there is a fire, but if you have more than one smoke detector, your home’s fire alarms may be interconnected, meaning that when one sensor goes into alarm, the other smoke detectors throughout the house will also go into alarm and start sounding in a three beep pattern. 

Check to see if there are any signs of smoke in other parts of your home to make sure a fire is not setting off a smoke detector.

2. Smoke from cooking

Some smoke detectors are extremely sensitive. There may be times when your smoke detectors start sounding when you are cooking, even though there is no visible smoke.

These smoke detectors are called ionization detectors, and they detect the first stage of fires even before there is any smoke. 

If you were cooking when your smoke detectors started beeping, all you have to do is take a magazine and fan the air around the smoke detector to stop the beeping.

3. Steam can set off the smoke detectors.

Steam from a shower is another common cause of a false alarm, especially if the smoke detector is installed near the bathroom. 

Keeping the door closed or not turning on the fan while taking a shower will cause a lot of steam to build up inside the bathroom. 

When you open the door, a lot of steam comes out of the shower and right into the smoke detector, causing an alarm. Again if this was the cause, take a magazine and fan the steam away from the smoke detector.

4. Dust is the number one cause of false alarms.

I had to cover the first three possible causes, but dust is the number one cause of false alarms.

Dust will settle inside of a smoke detector just as it does anywhere else in your home.

Unfortunately, dust can create the same condition inside the smoke detector as real smoke from a fire does. 

Most homeowners never think about cleaning their smoke detectors, and over the years, enough dust can build up inside the smoke detector to trigger it to go into alarm mode.

Silencing a beeping smoke detector

Sometimes the easiest way of silencing a beeping smoke detector is to press the button on the front of the sensor. This button may be labeled, Reset, Test, or Silence.

Press and hold the button for five seconds to silence it. If it stops beeping, you’re good to go for now, but you will have to clean the smoke detector to prevent it from going off again. I’ll explain how to clean the smoke detector down below.

If pressing the reset button does not silence it, you will have to power down the detector.

Silencing a battery-operated smoke detector

Twist the smoke detector counterclockwise to remove it from the ceiling; if there are no wires attached, the sensor is wireless and powered only by batteries. 

Remove the battery to silence the detector. The battery is located in the front or back of the sensor, under a pull-out tab. 

Silencing a hard-wired smoke detector

If there are wires attached to the back of the smoke detector, then it is a hard-wired smoke detector powered by your home’s electrical system and a battery used as a backup in case you lose electrical power. 

The wires will be color-coded white and black, and sometimes there will also be a third red wire. 

These wires are connected to your home’s electrical system and can be dangerous if you touch a bare wire, so be careful. Only touch the clip securing the wires to the detector. 

A clip attaches the wires to the back of the smoke detector. Squeeze the two tabs together to unplug the clip from the smoke detector. 

After unplugging the clip, open the battery cover and remove the batteries inside. 

With hard-wired smoke detectors, the batteries will be either in the back or the side of the unit concealed behind a pull-out tab. 

Silencing multiple smoke detectors

If your smoke detectors are interconnected, then they are all sounding at the same time. If this is the case, you will have to unplug and power down all of them. 

To make things easier, go to your electrical circuit breaker panel and look for a breaker that’s labeled “smoke detectors.” Hopefully, your electrician has marked all of the breakers. 

By turning off the circuit breaker, you won’t have to unplug the wires from the back of every smoke detector. You will only need to take out the batteries in each one. 

Cleaning the smoke detector

Now that you’ve stopped the smoke detector from beeping, it is time to either clean it and get the dust out of it or replace it if it is more than ten years old.

If you had multiple smoke detectors beeping simultaneously, you would need to clean all of them because there is no way to know which one is causing the false alarm.

The only effective way to clean the dust out of the smoke detector is to use a can of compressed air. 

You can buy compressed air cans on Amazon. These are cans of air typically used to clean out computers and electronics. 

Blow the air into the smoke detector through the openings in the front of the sensor. If the detector is dirty enough to go into alarm, you should see some dust blow out when you spray the air inside. 

After cleaning the detector, replace the batteries, plug in the wiring clip and remount the smoke detector onto the ceiling bracket.

Again, if the smoke detector is more than ten years old, then it’s time to replace it. Smoke alarms have a ten-year shelf life and become less effective in detecting smoke over time. 

You can find good deals on smoke detectors on Amazon.

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