Have a unique scenario I'd be interested in other's take on. Eight-story building with automatic standpipes and a fully-sprinklered building. There's multiple scenarios where the building is close enough to an adjacent building that the exterior wall needed to be rated. In order to keep the fire resistance rating Tyco window sprinklers were installed in conjunction with glass to provide up to a 2-hour fire resistance rating.

The issue is that the sprinkler system experiences a working pressure of up to 220-230 psi, while the window sprinklers are only available as rated up to 175 psi.

We've proposed adding pressure reducing valve to the seven floors affected by this situation, but that introduces its own issues aside from cost. We've also suggested replacing the glass with a rated glass.

Are there other alternatives we haven't explored here? Would be interested in others' opinions.

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Solution | Posted 06/06/19

Without the context of a specific project or problem, when would you recommend creating a separate, detached fire pump house versus a fire pump room inside a building?

Is is purely a risk perspective? Do you recommend fire pump houses only when a pump is feeding multiple buildings, or a campus?

I've only had a few projects that used a fire pump house, and it has generally been in retrofit situations or when the pump is next to a water storage tank. In either case the pump house overall cost more than it would have should the fire pump room been within the building (even despite the simple construction of the pump house). Just curious on getting another perspective.

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Solution | Posted 06/05/19

June marks the early beginning to what we call 'prep season' around here. As part of that beginning, today is the first day that Week 1 of the MeyerFire PE Prep Series begins. 

What is the PE Prep Series?
The MeyerFire PE Prep Series is a 20-week weekly series of timed 1-hour, 10-question simulated PE Exams. We simulate the types of questions and pace of the exam with instant graded solutions emailed immediately following each exam. 

The Leaderboard
One of the most fun and advantageous parts of being a part of the Prep Series is that you get to see each (1) your progress in getting better at exam-type questions, and (2) see how you compare against others taking the exam. Each Monday (after a week is up), the Leaderboard will be posted here on the Daily page. 

This year already has nearly twice the participants as last year - already over 1/5th of all of this year's examinees. If you want to be a part of the PE Prep Series, track your progress and see how you stack up, you can learn more information and join on here.

Starting tomorrow you'll now see sample PE Exam problems alongside the Daily questions you're used to seeing here. This will be at least the third year I've published daily exam questions during study season, and the response has been bigger and better each year. 

How it Works
Each weekday I'll post a sample Fire Protection PE Exam question that mimics the style and length of an exam question, and the following day I'll post the solution. As always, feel free to comment or guess your answer after the question is posted.

We manufacture dust collectors and pre-pipe fire sprinklers within them with a couple fusible fittings.

We pressure test the pipe at our shop, however, when a contractor connects to them in the field, are there any code/standard requirements to check the system for leaks after connecting to the system?

We put on our drawings that the contractor should test for leaks, however, we're trying to determine what requirements exist for this application.

​The problem we're running into is that the connection is supposed to be made and checked before installing cartridges. If a leak occurs, the contractor could address and not get the paper cartridges all wet with running water down at the floor. In this last case they didn't, and I'm trying to address future installation of systems and make sure the contractor checks for leaks. 

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It's another record-breaking month with the most contributions to date - thanks to you who come to learn and share your expertise and help make this community more impactful. Here's May's top contributors:

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As best I can tell there's no listed bracing method for longitudinal seismic bracing for CPVC. Traditionally we've addressed this by placing a tee with a short pipe stub perpendicular to a main and braced that perpendicular pipe with a "lateral" brace, which acts longitudinally on the main. The downside to this is that it's not concentric to the main, but it's pretty close.

Is there a better way to brace CPVC pipe longitudinally?

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I've looked for it but I'm having a tough time coming up with the code section. Where does the requirement for a bell on the face of the building come from?

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From my uneducated perspective both concrete anchors and wood attachments that most people use in the field are not the prescriptive methods outlined in NFPA 13, but instead listed products that are easier to install.

In the interest of learning more about what's actually preferred by contractors, are there any good articles or book content anywhere that could help bring me up to speed on these various hanging attachments? Any help is appreciated.

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A project we're working on has an existing basement area that is broken up into many small existing rooms. Each room has varying ceiling heights and different grid directions.

The remodel that is going to be done will change all of these small spaces into three areas with a consistent new ceiling height that is about the average height of the existing ceilings.

If you are the engineer preparing bid documents in a scenario like this, would you call out for full pipe replacement, or only to modify the existing branch lines?

I would be interested in how others approach this issue prior to bid.

On one hand, modifying the existing system has the potential to save a significant amount of pipe, but could require some large stretches be raised to accommodate new ceilings and would require a good handful of labor to relocate sprinklers.

On the other hand, while an all-new pipe arrangement may cost more in material, it would be better able to coordinate with new HVAC ductwork and ceilings in the space and could possibly reduce the labor time with a pre-fabricated install.

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Hope everyone is having a great week. We're wrapping up this week's Daily Forum with a poll for use of software for hydraulic calculations. Don't see the poll below? Vote here.

If you would like to see your question (or poll) posted, please send it in or email us at info@meyerfire.com. Thank you!
​

Someone had asked about life safety Revit families and any recommendations. We do fire alarm design and are increasingly seeing BIM become the standard when working with architects.

Does anyone have any recommendations on where to find quality fire alarm Revit families? We're not manufacturer-specific design but are looking to improve our older basic devices.

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I've taken technical writing courses and have experience working with MasterSpec, US Military specifications, vendor specifications, and various ownership standard specifications.

I'm giving an internal training to our younger staff and I'm particularly interested in opinions from contractors and vendors who regularly read a variety of specifications for bidding.

What advice would you give for those who write specifications? I'd be interested in helping train our staff as well as improve myself.

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In my experience I've seen a handful of methods in Revit to create life safety plans, and in general they're all developed by the teams I've worked with using a combination of "rooms" and "railings" to calculate occupant loads and travel distances. 

Is there any third-party add-ins or software that others use that could possibly help streamline these efforts?

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For years on my code calls I have asked the Authority Having Jurisdiction what the maximum distance the nearest hydrant is allowed to be away from a building's fire department connection. I get answers that range from 50 feet to 400 feet or even more.

I was looking into the code basis behind this question, and the only applicable section that I found is the International Fire Code, Section 507.5.1.1 that addresses hydrant locations for standpipe systems:

"Buildings equipped with a standpipe system installed in accordance with Section 905 shall have a fire hydrant within 100 feet (30 480 mm) of the fire department connections. Exception: the distance shall be permitted to exceed 100 feet (30 480 mm) where approved by the fire code official."

Is there any relevant requirement for hydrants near fire department connections for sprinkler-only systems?

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Pressure Reducing Valve are commonly used to prevent excess pressure upon systems when supplies exceed the NFPA limit of 175 psi.

There has been much discussion regarding the 'application' of these valves when hydraulic calculations are being provided to the discharge of the PRV and determining the pressure margin available.

Currently, we have been instructed to calculate the system back to the PRV, use the PRV's friction loss calculator to determine friction loss through the valve and subtract that from the outlet setting to establish outlet pressure. This is then used as the available pressure at the outlet; minus the demand and you're left with the margin.

I'm not sure that I agree that the valves 'friction' loss need to be considered unless you are at a point where the PRV can no longer provide the set pressure (when the supply is unable to provide sufficient inlet pressure to overcome the internal friction loss).

Are there any 'papers' written for direction or other sources anyone might recommend?

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A dormitory has 1/2-hour fire barriers separating each residential unit. On each side of the 1/2-hour wall, penetrating the 5/8" gypsum, are shower valves that serve showers within bathrooms on each side.

The shower valves have the valve assembly itself and an opening that's covered with a metal escutcheon. These would qualify as a membrane penetration under the International Building Code.

For back-to-back vales in the wall, how is this commonly addressed to still maintain the 1/2-hour fire resistance rating?

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Amazon is selling fire sprinklers, escutcheons, and sprinkler guards. Some are UL Listed. But many are not listed for use together.

Because of the strict code requirements for installation and testing, is this appropriate marketing?

Who is liable for improper installation and system component failure? Who approves this?

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Have a project where the client is wanting fully-concealed sprinklers, but the project is insured under FM Global. FM does not approve any fully-concealed sprinklers as quick response.

However, under NFPA 13, light hazard spaces are required to have quick response sprinklers.

How do you normally address this conflict?

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​We're located in a seismic area where PT decks are to be considered cracked concrete for the purpose of hanging and bracing. We see a lot of the Dewalt Mini Undercuts and now the newer Hilti HDP-TZ inserts being used to hang up to 4" pipe from the concrete decks. The data sheets show them with pullouts of under 240lbs.

​How can these be used to hang ANY sprinkler pipe if the minimum required capacity of the hanger assembly is the weight of the water filled pipe plus 250lbs?

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We have a project where a control module is connected to the mechanical controls that is programmed to the variable frequency drive for a fan on a large unit. When a duct detector senses smoke, the control module (which is normally-open circuit) will close the circuit, sending a signal to the mechanical controls which shuts down the unit.

On this project we had a bad set of control modules that didn't work. We discovered this in testing with the local jurisdiction, and swapped out the modules and the system now works correctly. 

Both the jurisdiction and I wondered whether this normally-open arrangement is acceptable. If a control module were to fail, the duct detector would not be able to close the circuit on the module and the fan would remain running. In this scenario, there would be no supervision or way to know that the control module failed other than someone standing at the fan or finding the issue during testing.

My inclination is that in the future these modules could be normally-closed and open upon duct detection. That way if the module fails and opens on its own, the unit will shutdown in a "failure" mode.

Is it code required that this arrangement be fail-safe?

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Basic question but I don't know the history - why do we limit pipe to 21-foot lengths? Manufacturing limitation? Transportation? Just curious on the history there.

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NFPA 14 requires standpipes to be full flow tested for the acceptance testing.

Automatic standpipes are fairly straightforward to test, but how have you seen this applied for manual standpipes in mid-rise buildings?

Is this a worthwhile test that will uncover design/installation flaws?

Also, is there any compromised method to meet this requirement?

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