One thing I hear as soon as I introduce my role as "Fire Protection Engineer", all the time, is "wow you're a rare bird."

Not sure if it's a compliment or not. 

To be fair they don't always say "bird", sometime's it's "duck" or "unique" or "oddball", but the sentiment is the same.

Fire Protection pros (engineers, designers, project managers, estimators, plan reviewers, inspectors) - we're all rare birds.

That acknowledged - where do we look for more help?

If we need help, and we're ready to train new hires, where do we even look?

For larger organizations, this may be well charted. We know X and Y school has related programs, so we go there. Or we know Z technical college has good students, so we go there. Or we badger our employees to always be thinking about hiring their friends or family. Whatever works.

But one of the key questions I kept coming back to in this space was - if most of us don't start in fire protection - which we now have some data to back up that notion - then where do we come from?

If we're looking for new hires to train up - where are they?

Last week we looked at the industries that fire protection professionals started in, and we broke those out by their current organization type.

This week we're looking at that same period in the career - when we first started in fire protection - and are looking at what education we had at that time.

Many studies about the fire protection industry look for current education status - do you have a fire protection degree? High school? Associates? Bachelors? Masters? 

But that doesn't tell us very much. When someone is in the industry for five years and goes to get a Master's in Fire Protection, well, they're already in the industry.

If we're looking to recruit new people to the industry, knowing that someone has a Master's in Fire Protection, and they got it after they were already in the industry, well that's not helpful.

So here, in this question from our study, we asked specifically what education each person had when they first entered the fire protection industry. 

And here are those results:

DESIGNERS / ENGINEERING TECHNICIANS SPECIFICALLY
This breaks down individuals who are working as designers or engineering technicians (119 response):

Where do fire protection professionals come from?
 
This is a follow-up to the first article in this series where we are discussing takeaways from our industry sourcing survey.
 
What do we hope to answer?

1. How do people even hear about fire protection?
2. Do most in the industry go straight into fire protection? If not, where do they come from?
3.  Why do people go into fire protection?

 
Last week we answered #1, today, we’re covering where people actually come from. I’ll break this out again by the source (A/E, Contracting, AHJ/Gov’t, and Insurance/Manufacturing/Users) as it perhaps is the best way to get suggestions for future recruiting.
​

SO, WHERE WAS OUR FIRST "REAL" JOB?
 
ARCHITECTURAL & ENGINEERING SPACE
For Architecture & Engineering (139 applicable responses):

CONTRACTING SPACE
For Contractors (178 responses):

AUTHORITIES HAVING JURISDICTION / GOVERNMENT
For those in government and AHJ roles (64 responses):

TAKEAWAYS
What do you find interesting? What takeaways do you see in the data?

Personally, here's what I found interesting or surprising about these notes:

SO MUCH OF THE INDUSTRY DOESN'T "START" IN FIRE PROTECTION
We mentioned this last week, but anecdotally it seems as though many people in the industry didn't exactly 'intend' to end up in fire protection. The data from our survey seems to suggest the same consistently throughout the different user groups.

OF THESE FIELDS, CONTRACTORS HAVE THE MOST PEOPLE WHO "STARTED" IN FIRE PROTECTION
We'll dive deeper into this later on, but so many in contracting get in "because" of friends and family that it would make sense that their first "real" job is directly in the fire protection industry. That said, there's still just as many people even in contracting that didn't first start out in fire protection as people who did. 

I would imagine the same wouldn't be said for fields like architecture, structural engineering or mechanical engineering.

HOW FEW PEOPLE IN AHJ/GOVERNMENT ROLES STARTED IN FIRE PROTECTION
Personally, I was very surprised at how few people in AHJ and Government roles actually started in fire protection from the survey. This is also our most limited data set, so I can't take away too many conclusions from that subset.

HOW BIG OF AN INFLUENCE MECHANICAL ENGINEERING HAS ON FIRE PROTECTION
Traditionally, fire suppression has been a "subset" of mechanical engineering. This can be seen in the way project specification divisions used to be arranged, or how many mechanical engineers have traditionally specified fire suppression systems.

All of fire protection isn't just in fire sprinklers, of course, but the data we get continues to say that of people who didn't start in fire protection, the most popular starting point was mechanical engineering.

I would think the next few weeks will also support the notion, but if we need to find good people - it's time to start recruiting the best mechanical engineers!

The next part of this series will cover college degrees when we 'first' got into fire protection, which could help highlight exactly where we started out and what we had pursued prior to being in the industry. 

Why is all this important? 

Well, if you're a team leader, a recruiter, a manager, or someone in a role where you need help - then it's time to start recruiting!

Where do you go? Where have people gone before? Where do we, as an industry, have the most luck in finding talent?

Well - look at the data. Check out your user group (are you a contractor? engineer? AHJ?), and see where people historically have come from. That's the first hint on where you might have the most success first.

​We'll go deeper on this in the next part, for now - have a great rest of your week!

I’m excited today to start a series on the who of fire protection.

We’ve seen salary surveys in the past. We’ve seen studies on what degrees people have.
 
But – what about the questions that we all really want answered about how we all got into fire in the first place?

MY BIG QUESTIONS: 

• Why do people actually go into the fire protection industry?
• Do most people go straight into fire protection?
• I can’t find any help - where should I be looking?
• What other areas do fire protection people come from?
• How do people even become aware of fire protection?

 
The awesome thing is – because of your help – we now have data to answer every one of these questions – and we will.

SURVEY RESPONSES
A few weeks ago I posted a survey and we received 443 anonymous responses from you. Thank you!

The 443 total responses include:

• 143 from the Architecture & Engineering space (generally consulting firms),
• 168 from the sprinkler design and contracting space,
• 64 from fire departments, Authority Having Jurisdictions and other government bodies, and another
• 36 from other organizations (like insurance carriers, brokers, trade organizations, manufacturers, and major client/users)

For this series, and in splitting out the date, I will use these four different categories:

• A/E (architecture & engineering),
• Contracting,
• AHJ/Gov’t, and
• Insurance/Manufacturing/Users

Each of these different groupings seem to each show different trends and tendencies, and I think the takeaways will be better showcased by doing so.

THIS SERIES OF ARTICLES
Originally I thought one article could summarize the data and give helpful feedback, but after going through and categorizing over 3,100 different data points (yes, I read and categorized all of them), I found a lot of interesting takeaways that I don’t want to skim over.

So that said, today’s post is the first in a series where I answer each of these big questions.
 
GROUND RULES FOR THE SURVEY & DATA USAGE
A few ground rules that I think are really important here.

If you’re less interested in the nuts and bolts – I suggest skipping down to the findings below.

#1 LOOKING IN THE REARVIEW FOR CONCLUSIONS ABOUT THE FUTURE 
First – I like to think I have a good grasp on how to speak about the industry in a way that would resonate with someone new. I like to think that. However, I’m terrible about it.

I once talked with a nice lady on a plane who asked what I did and I tried to explain what my version of fire protection engineering is. After we talked for most of the flight I mentioned that the industry has things like smoke control, fire modeling, hydraulic calculations, etc. She said I should always start with that stuff, because what I’d said I did sounded incredibly boring. And she was a nice lady!

I’m not great at reading other people’s motivations. Most of us aren’t.

So in order to answer questions about – “how do I pitch fire protection?” or “where should I be looking for help?” – I think we first have to look at ourselves and find out who we are.

Where did we start?

Why did we get into the field in the first place?

If we can answer those questions about ourselves, by looking backwards, then that just might be the best possible answer on how we address industry concerns and issues moving forward.
 
#2 I HAVE NO AGENDA HERE
Second disclaimer - I didn’t come into this with an agenda. The questions (which can be seen here) do not suggest, prompt, or give examples for any specific end result.
 
#3 ALL QUESTIONS ARE OPEN-ENDED FOR UNPROMPTED ANSWERS
Third – each question was open-ended. This is critical. When we’re asking for things like “how did you first hear about fire protection?” or “why did you go into the fire protection field?”, it’s imperative that we don’t suggest ideas. That would poison the well. We needed authentic, unprompted responses. And that’s what we got in this survey.

Just as a quick example – if I ask why you went into the field and laid out seven reasons – naturally we’d select the top ones and move on. That’s not truly representative. Each person has their own reasons, and that’s what I wanted to seek out. It’s not good enough to say “career opportunities” as the reason to get into the field, what we actually need to know is what the unprompted reasons are.

This point becomes really important when we’ll get into reasons why people get into the industry and where they became aware of the industry. When we get data that says that 19% of all designers and engineering techs got into the field in part because they felt it was “interesting” or 12% thought it would be “enjoyable”, well, those are unprompted sentiments. We didn’t put those words into mouths or give A/B/C/D options – that’s what you, the industry, is telling us about why you chose to get into the field.

#4 I'VE CATEGORIZED AND DID MY BEST TO STAY TRUE TO YOUR INPUT 
Last – it isn’t helpful to have a survey that says 443 different things and just give that back.

So, in reading everything that was submitted, I categorized and tried to group responses into themes. I did my best to stay true to the original response in every case.

If someone said they thought the salary would be great, or the pay, or the money – well that’s pretty easy to categorize together.

Others weren’t as black and white, but I did my best to stay true to your responses and in no cases put words in anyone’s mouths. That’s the last important point before we hop in.
 
So what are we covering today? Today I want to talk on awareness.

TODAY'S DATA: HOW DID YOU FIRST HEAR ABOUT FIRE PROTECTION?
We, in the fire protection industry, have been described as “niche” and “specialized”. You’ve probably heard many times how people didn’t really know a fire protection industry “existed”.

So, how do people first become aware of the fire protection industry?
​
To this, we had a lot of different responses. ​

​
​Here's a quick summary of how people hear about fire protection, in total:

Few notes on the summary table:

• "Industry" includes learning while in another job, hearing about it from a mentor or boss, or from an internship.
• "Research" includes researching beyond firefighting, finding the industry online, while looking for jobs, or by reading articles.
• "Advertisement" in this context includes ads in newspapers, online, or by recruiters.
• "An Organization" here includes Churches, Fire Explorers, or Boy Scouts.

​BREAKDOWN BY GROUP
Here are breakdowns of this question by different user groups:

ARCHITECTURAL & ENGINEERING SPACE
For Architecture & Engineering, the top ways people first became aware of fire protection are (139 applicable responses):

#1 Learned about it while working in an adjacent industry/space (35%)

• Note: only 45% of people here started out in the fire protection industry. Of those that didn't start in fire:
  • 45% reported doing Mechanical-related work,
  • 22% reported Plumbing,
  • 10% from manufacturing or oil & gas related work,
  • 9% from Electrical-related work, and
  • 8% from drafting.

#2 Have family or a relative in the industry (10%)
#3 Originally wanted to be a firefighter/am a firefighter (9%)

CONTRACTING SPACE
For the Contracting space, ways people became aware of fire protection are (172 applicable responses):
​
#1 Having family or a relative in the industry (24%)
#2 Having a friend or family friend in the industry (19%)
#3 Learned about it while working in an adjacent industry/space (19%)

• Note, only half (50%) of participants started out in the fire protection industry. Of those that did not:
  • First “real” jobs included Construction (18%),
  • Mechanical-related work (10%),
  • Drafting (9%), and
  • Retail (9%).
  • Other notable but less common were Plumbing-related work, Architectural work, and Military Service.​

FIRE DEPARTMENTS, AHJs, & GOVERNMENT
For Fire Departments, AHJs, and Government entities (63 applicable responses):

#1 Originally wanted to be a firefighter/am a firefighter (32%)
#2 Learned about it while working in an adjacent industry/space (21%)

• Note, only 42% of people here started out in the fire protection industry (this includes firefighters). Of those that did not:
  • 27% started in Construction,
  • 8% started with Military Service, and
  • 8% started in Civil.
  • Smaller but notable initial fields were Plumbing, Architectural, Building Department, and Facilities work.

#3 Have family or a relative in the industry (6%)

INSURANCE, MANUFACTURING, ORGANIZATIONS & CORPORATE CLIENTS
For Insurance, Manufacturing, Organizations and Corporate Clients (34 applicable responses):

#1 Learned about it while working in an adjacent industry/space (29%)

• 56% of respondents here started out in the fire protection industry.
• Of those that did not, there were no themes that emerged; many of these respondents came from different fields.

#2 Have family or a relative in the industry (21%)
#3 By Recruiting or Career Fair (18%)

TAKEAWAYS
So what does this mean? What are the takeaways here? What trends are there?

#1: Most People do not start out in Fire Protection.
This has been a suspicion for some time. Even counting firefighters as “in the industry”, only 48% of respondents (213) started their first “real” job in fire protection. The remaining 228 respondents started somewhere else.

This is commonly spoken around the industry, but I’m not sure that we’ve ever had some data to support it.

What does this mean?

If we’re looking to source talent, it can’t all come from high school, community college, technical schools or universities. Over half of those in the industry are already in some other field.
 
#2: Contractors Spread the Word via Friends & Family
The top ways how those who work for contractors hear about fire protection is overwhelmingly by family, a friend, or relative (43% combined).

This is very different than everyone else, where that’s half as likely to happen.

What does this mean?

For one – kudos to contractors for spreading the word. Those who are now in the industry and work for contractors overwhelmingly heard about it from family and friends.

​For two – this word-of-mouth among contractors is a very important part in sourcing talent. We’ll get into the data there as we get further along.
 
#3: Don’t Discount the Allure of Firefighting for Industry Awareness
It seems like half of my son’s preschool class want to be firefighters when they grow up. My 5-year old daughter wants to be a firefighter for Halloween. I doubt either of them have any that I work in the fire industry.

The allure of firefighting is an asset we probably overlook too much.

I wouldn’t say that we’re all some version of a pyromaniac in this industry, but I would contend that we’re all at least somewhat fascinated with the spectacle of fire itself.

What does this mean?

The appeal of firefighting, and as a means that brings people to the industry, actually shows up in the data as far as awareness. I wonder if we couldn’t play that up a little more.

So if you’re a student in a technical field and have had some buried fascination with firefighting? Well, here’s a whole industry on it. Join the cause.
 
WHAT'S YOUR TAKE?
From the data we’ve looked at today, those are my biggest three takeaways. What do you see?

What’s a surprise, and what is not?

​Does any of this back up your anecdotal experience? Join our discussion here.

I hate surveys. Hate 'em.

Somewhere about 3 years ago it seemed every corporation attended the same weekend seminar and decided that they would hound you for a quick 25-minutes survey after any interaction. 

Like - any - interaction. 

My wife had a short phone call with the nurse line for the pediatrician and she received three emails, a text link and a voicemail to complete a survey about it. Crazy land!

Today - this survey - is not about the LLC; it's a quick study to get information that you all have been asking for.

First, the whole reason I first created meyerfire.com was to find unique ways to contribute to the industry. I love the fire protection industry. I really do.

I enjoy the people, I enjoy the attitude, I enjoy advocating for fire protection as the underdog trade.

If you've read some of these posts for awhile, I hope you've gathered that. This site is truly nothing more than my best attempt to serve you with helpful things that allow you to do great work in the world. At the end of the day, or at the end of our career, ultimately, saving lives is what we're all hoping to achieve. If you haven't read about what we're all about, I gush about it in more detail here. Worth poking around there if you haven't already. 

So what does that have to do with today's post?

I get asked all the time - "how do I find talented people?" 

   "I need a sprinkler designer."
   "I need an estimator."
   "I need experienced help."
   "I need more new hires."
   "The kids out of school these days!"

On, and on.

I’ve had some great conversations on this and ideas to share. 

But perhaps the most important piece is getting the data in the first place.

Where does talent actually come from?

That’s this week.

While I'm the one collecting the inputs - the results are going to have some key indicators for you. This is not a salary survey. This is not a "where is everyone" survey. This is a look at where we come from, and how we got started.

​The survey is short, simple, and I'll share the results with you within 3 weeks from today.

Please, please, please, take this 2-minute, 6-question survey:

Thank you so much! I very much look forward to sharing some ideas and insights that we can gather from the data.

​- Joe

Awhile back I wrote a piece on sprinklers in electrical rooms. At the time I was asked relatively frequently about when sprinklers are required or allowed to be omitted in electrical rooms.
 
I guess intuitively, we recognize that electricity and water don’t mix well. We don’t want to address one problem (fire) by creating a new hazard (electrocution) with water in areas that it doesn’t have to be.
 
In principle, I personally have just about always provided sprinklers in electrical rooms unless they were specifically requested not to be provided by the owner or AHJ; and in those cases, I followed the code path in the IBC or NFPA 13 accordingly.
 
It seems as though the premise behind not including sprinklers is when the type of electrical equipment present a relatively low hazard or fuel source, and there is no storage. In that situation, a combination of 2-hour fire-resistance-rated enclosure with approved fire detection (assuming a smoke and/or heat detector here) will mean that a fire within the room will be recognized, and the rest of the building will not be compromised as a result.
 
Providing pipe within an electrical room isn’t always an easy feat. NFPA 70 tells us that electrical equipment requires dedicated zones, and pipe shouldn’t be run above panels without drip pans or other methods of avoiding drip hazards above electrical equipment.

Now are sprinklers in electrical rooms problematic? Generally not (in my experience).
 
Can pipe routing be made to avoid electrical equipment? Usually yes. I try to only run one branch line into the room, most often above the door (since no electrical equipment is on the door), and stick pipe only above walking pathways within the room.

Does the code or standards express any concern or guidance on this? Yes, both the IBC and NFPA 13 address the situation.
​
One line that is included in the IBC specifically says that sprinklers “shall not be omitted from any room merely because it...contains electrical equipment”. To me, that’s a fairly explicit way of suggesting that the presence of electrical equipment alone isn’t a justification for omitting sprinklers. Now there are code allowances and necessary provisions to do so, but the suggestion is not to simply avoid sprinklers just because there is electrical gear.
 
Despite it being awhile since that article, I have had a few requests to make this one into a flowchart, which I’m happy to present today. A special thank you to Alex Riley, PE, who contributed to the code research for this flowchart.

We previously have introduced different types and combinations of threaded fittings - which have been around for more than a century.

Here we're introducing another common way to join pipe; using grooved fittings. 

Use of "mechanical" couplings that could allow faster joining of pipe came to life in 1919 by Lieutenant Ernest Tribe. Just a few years later the Victory Pipe Joint Company renamed itself to Victaulic (a combination of "victory" and "hydraulic"), and grew to expand the technology worldwide. 

Today, Victaulic and other manufacturing leaders provide grooved fittings that are often used for pipes in fire sprinkler systems. It is not uncommon for both mains and branch lines to be grooved today.

What are common grooved fittings, and how do they work? Let's introduce them. 

PIPE
Let's start with the pipe. In order to give grooved fittings an opportunity to "grip" the pipe and remain in place, they need an opportunity to resist the pressure of the water that is trying to "pull away" the pipe from the fittings which join them together.

In order to create a groove in the pipe, steel can either be "roll groove" or "cut groove". Roll groove pipe involves pressing an indentation into the pipe near the end of the pipe. This allows a grooved fitting to slip over the end of the pipe and fit into the groove. Roll groove pipe has the advantage of not reducing the pipe thickness, so it can have more tolerance for corrosion than thinner pipe, similar pipe with threads, or pipe with cut grooves.

Pipe which is cut groove involves cutting into the pipe rather than pressing it. This cutting removes a portion of the pipe wall, making a thinner but smooth interior pipe wall. This thinner wall makes it more susceptible to corrosion, however, for pipe systems with a minor slope, the smooth inside of the pipe does not create a ridge where water can sit and corrode the pipe.

ELBOWS & TEES
Let's start with the basics. Elbows allow bends of 90-degrees (most common), 45-degrees, 22-1/2 degrees, and 11-1/4 degrees.

Why not every possible angle? What if I need to have a 60-degree bend because of my building?

First, it wouldn't be economical to make a fitting of every bend. Second, is that using just two 90-degree elbows back-to-back we're able to create a "swing joint" and make any angle we could want, just by changing the elevation of the pipe that's being joined.

One notable specialty with the grooved elbow is a "Drain Elbow", which has the elbow except it includes a drain outlet at the bend of the elbow. This is used all the time with fire department connections which come down a wall and need to be capable of being drained (to avoid having water-charged pipe freeze and burst). This is also called a "Drain-El" or is a Victaulic #10-DR.

COUPLINGS
Nice sketches, Joe, but that's not how things look in the field!

That's because unlike threaded fittings, the actual pipe joining is by a grooved coupling. The coupling has malleable iron bumps that grip the indent of one groove (pipe/fitting) and connect it to the second groove (the other pipe/fitting). 

OTHER FITTINGS
There are a host of other fitting types. Grooved Reducing Tees? Yep. Less common. Less common can equate to more expensive, or at least that's what I hear from contractors familiar with all the pricing nuances.

What other grooved fittings do I often see? 

Reducing fittings, which is a concentric, single-cast piece of metal that has a large groove on one end and tapers down to a smaller groove on another end. One note of caution is using these in the vertical orientation; I've heard it is much better, more stable, and stronger to use a reducing-fitting as opposed to a reducing-coupling when in a vertical orientation. One of my clients goes so far to say to not use reducing couplings at all (where the coupling itself has two different groove sizes). I wouldn't have the expertise to gauge that myself.

There are also reducing adapters, than can accept a flange connection and convert it to a reduced groove connection. 

Crosses are also available, as are caps (like the Victaulic #006 shown above on the right) which can terminate the end of a branch line. These caps even have 1-inch threaded opening options for easy auxiliary drains. 

If you're looking to explore the extend of all available grooved fittings, I'd invite you to check out manufacturer's catalogs or do a simple google search for grooved sprinkler pipe fittings. The manufacturer's product data can do a whole lot of good in clarifying what's been created and listed for use in sprinkler systems.

Have tips, tricks, or things to consider about grooved fittings? Comment below.

​That's all for this week - hope you have a great rest of yours.

When teaching the basics of sprinkler layout, I find it far too easy to jump right to talking about sprinkler spacing distances and the coverage area in relatable terms.

SPRINKLER SPACING AS 225 SQFT & 15x15
I say that a sprinkler is limited by a coverage area limit, and by a maximum spacing. I then introduce an example for Light Hazard with an acoustical ceiling tile, and explain that the limits are 225 sqft and 15-ft x 15-ft.

That's all technically correct. And, as an example, it's a common one for those of us that work regularly with light commercial buildings. 

However, by giving that example, there is a whole series of assumptions built in that I completely gloss over. 

UNDERSTANDING THE PATH
Experienced Designers & Engineers will tell you (they've told me), that to teach the fundamentals correctly we really need to start with all the considerations and assumptions that go into a sprinkler layout.

Is the structure combustible, noncombustible, or limited-combustible?

Is the construction Obstructed or Unobstructed?

Are we assuming standard-spray sprinklers, or something like ESFR or Extended Coverage? 

I've gotten caught making basic mistakes - spacing sidewalls inappropriately because I just assumed that a 14x14 spacing applied regardless of the construction type. 

I could be wrong here, but my guess is that even experienced people have made the same mistakes I have on sprinkler spacing because we've glossed over the combustible nature of the ceiling.

A PDF FLOWCHART
Partially to satisfy my own curiosity, and partially because we're getting into a lot of detail with teaching these concepts on the University platform (all our PDF resources are there), I've broken out these different paths and decision trees in a new pdf flowchart. Click above to download the full PDF version.

EVERYDAY USE?
Unlike some of the other charts and checklists we've created, this probably isn't one I'm going to be referencing daily. There's typically only a few common limitations that apply to most of the work that I do.

However, just as a concept, I find it interesting how the considerations of combustible/noncombustible construction, obstructed and unobstructed, exposed members versus non-exposed members all play a part in how NFPA 13 tells us to properly protect each space. This can be helpful as a teaching tool in introducing the spacing concepts.

Hope you have a great rest of your week!

This week I'm happy to debut an update to one of our popular tools, the K-Factor selector, which is a part of the Toolkit. 

This tool quickly calculates the actual pressure and flow across different types of sprinklers. It's helpful when we're trying to select the best-possible sprinkler for a hazard. 

Even for light hazard areas, a standard k5.6 sprinkler may not be the 'optimal' sprinkler, from a hydraulic perspective. We touched on this when looking at whether the flow through a sprinkler is governed by the density and area or by the k-factor and minimum pressure.

In short, the minimum flow through a sprinkler can be driven by the coverage area of the sprinkler multiplied by the density of the hazard, or, it can be driven by the k-factor of the sprinkler and the minimum pressure that sprinkler requires. 

In either case, it's important to make a quality selection for the k-factor if we want to reduce the required pressure and flow that a system will demand. Less flow usually means less friction loss, which can result in more efficient systems and smaller pipe sizes (saved cost of material and labor). 

The updates to this tool make it mobile and tablet friendly, and also now clearly indicate what the 'optimal' sprinkler k-factor is for flow and for pressure (hint: they're not always the same). If you're a Toolkit user, just click the image above to see the updates. Thanks!

Last week we debuted a remote area cheatsheet detailing some tips for quick-response reduction, slope adjustments, and dry, double-interlock pre-action and storage area adjustments. 

We're all about bringing fire protection pros around the world together (globally), and so today I'm happy to also add a metric version of this same cheatsheet. We plan do to updates like this with our content going forward.

To download, just click below. If you're a University user, you can get all of our latest cheatsheets, checklists and summaries under your University Dashboard. Thanks & have a great week!

It's been too long since our last cheatsheet! Happy to bring about a new one to the table today. 

One number that I seem to always need to crunch when laying out or reviewing fire sprinkler systems is the remote area adjustments, and the minimum width of a remote area. This applies specifically to the Density/Area method of Hydraulic Calculations in NFPA 13.

The formula is simple enough, w = 1.2 x sqrt(remote area size), where w is the minimum remote area width, and the remote area size is our final adjusted remote area that we're using.

Now for a routine calculation with a remote area of 1,500 sqft, I pretty much have the 46.5-foot area width memorized. Why is it important? The minimum width dimension tells us how wide our remote area needs to be. It's the dimension parallel to the branch lines, that captures as many sprinklers as it can along the branch line. 

We take this minimum area, see how many sprinklers this area covers, and round up to the next whole sprinkler. It's our minimum width dimension that we're not allowed to reduce.

The 46.5-foot dimension might be easy enough to remember, but what about when a remote area is reduced using the quick-response reduction? What if the ceiling is also sloped? 

Adjustments to the remote area are a process on their own, and each have implications for the minimum remote area width.

If you're using our Toolkit you already know we have tools that will compound the calculations for you. Our Quick-Response Reduction tool will adjust the remote area size based on the ceiling height, and our System Estimator tool will adjust for quick-response, sloped ceilings, dry and pre-action systems, high-temperature sprinklers, and more:
​

But, there are still times where I just want to quickly glance at my remote area size and translate that into a minimum width. That's what today's cheatsheet is all about.

​This quick reference PDF helps address a few things: 

• You can quickly see the adjustments for quick-response sprinklers, based on the maximum ceiling area.
• You can see cumulative adjustments, like multiple 30% increases or quick-response reductions on sloped ceilings
• You can quickly translate a remote area size to the minimum remote area width that is required.

I hope this one is helpful for you as conduct or review hydraulic calculations on your projects. Any tips, feedback or improvement ideas, be sure to let me know. 
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Thanks & have a great rest of your week!