I was recently struck by a video posted on LinkedIn that showed the destruction of what appeared to be a large manufacturing machine and the building in which it was housed in less than 40 seconds.
Many fire-detector manufacturers claim their products to be fast, but what does fast mean? Fast, means selecting the most appropriate detection speed so that any foreseeable incident can be handled in the most effective way. The detection speed needed to detect and mitigate an explosion from a high-pressure hydrogen vessel, for example, may be significantly different to the demands from a floating roof tank containing crude oil. At the same time, it is important that resilience against false alarms is maintained for obvious reasons.
At FDG, we believe there is no one-size-fits-all optical flame detector. The capabilities of devices vary from one technology to another and one application to another, which is why we have implemented a range of detection-speed capabilities across the whole FlameSpec family.
The FlameSpec Family – when every second counts
The FlameSpec Family can detect a fire from a long distance without the smoke or heat needing to reach the detector first, which means the detector’s response is extremely quick (see table 1). In addition to this regular detection capability all FlameSpec detectors have a selectable parallel detection mode called UltraFast. When selecting UltraFast detection, the IR3 range response to an explosion, at short range, is less than 40 milliseconds (ms). The UV-IR response is even more impressive, detecting the explosion in less than 5ms.
The X5 factor
NFPA 33, defines a list of requirements for Spray Application Using Flammable or Combustible Materials. The 2018 Edition, section 9.9.1, specifically requires ‘automated liquid electrostatic spray application equipment, both listed and unlisted, shall be further protected by listed optical flame detection, installed, and supervised in accordance with NFPA 72. The optical flame detection shall, in event of ignition, react to the presence of flame within one-half (0.5) second.’
All FlameSpec X5 models meet this requirement, with some of the response data shared in table 2. Please note the suffix 5 denotes this performance capability has been independently verified by Factory Mutual (FM).
urthermore, section 15.5.10 defines the protection needs for Automated Powder Application Equipment. In this section, it is stated that ‘automated powder application equipment, both listed and unlisted, shall be further protected by listed optical flame detection, installed and supervised in accordance with NFPA 72. The optical flame detection shall, in the event of ignition, react to the presence of flame within one-half (0.5) second.’
Other applications can benefit from the X5 factor too.
Although the requirements for a sub-half-second speed of response are well documented by NFPA 33, speed of response is also a concern in other applications. Typical applications include those where a fire can move at high speed, this might be on printing presses, parcel or luggage conveyor systems, road or train tunnels. Detection speed is key in these applications to ensure the damage caused by a fire is kept to a minimum.
Fire & Gas Detection Technologies Inc. are the true innovators in optical flame detection, and we focus on the daily challenges that impact productivity, safety and the bottom line with innovative solutions that reduce false alarms in the most challenging of applications.
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