COMMERCIAL FIRE ALARM SYSTEMS INSTALLATION
Commercial fire alarm systems are fire detection systems that are used in industrial or commercial applications (like fire alarm systems to be installed in factories or to be installed in production plants).
The commercial fire alarm system is different than the residential or office fire alarm systems but it also has some similarities. The similarities between commercial and residential fire alarm systems that are both fire alarm systems could be:
• Conventional or addressable fire alarm systems depends on which system you would apply.
• Cabled or networked or wireless fire alarm system with various topologies according to their infrastructure installation method .
The difference between residential and commercial fire detection systems is that in commercial fire alarm system all the fire alarm parts should have more protection than the normal residential fire alarm system.
Fire alarm system components like:
• Central station fire alarm control panel.
• Smoke alarm system or heat alarm detectors.
• Notification appliance devices.
What we mean by more protection is that the fire alarm system can withstand harsh environmental conditions like water and dust. So, all outdoor commercial fire alarm system parts should have higher IP protection than normal.
What is IP protection code?
IP code is the abbreviation of International Protection marking or Ingress Protection.
This code consists of two numbers which determine or indicate how much the equipment could withstand harsh environmental conditions especially in industrial or commercial fields’ applications (dust and water).
If you have a fire alarm panel with box enclosure of IP 44 what does it mean? It simply means that the fire alarm control panel could be used in environmental conditions that it could withstand solid objects with greater than 1 mm in diameter (like wires) and it could resist splashed water from all directions.
If you used the fire alarm control panel with an IP 44 in harsher environmental conditions (like usage in areas with possible direct projection of water from water nozzles), this fire alarm panel will not survive and the water will get inside the panel and it will reach the main electrical card and the card will be damaged. So you should use in this case a fire alarm control panel with at least IP 45 protection code.
In the IP code the first IP number is an indication for the ability to protect from solid objects, in the mean while the second IP number is an indication for liquid media protection. Here under in the following table you can find the summery for the IP code that is used in the commercial fire alarm systems:
So when you install a commercial fire alarm system and you are going to install some of fire alarm system parts in outdoor areas according to your application you should confirm that these outdoor fire alarm components are IP coded and their protection withstand the exact environmental conditions of the application.
One more thing is that sometimes some fire alarm control panels come with and IP protection less that the desired IP protection.
What should you do in this case??
Don’t be upset!
You can use these low IP protection fire alarm panels but you should put them inside an additional IP protected enclosure which has the required IP protection according to your application’s environmental condition.
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