Technology Notebook

Data Center::Fire Suppression

FM200
Interesting information gleaned from overview from vendor:
- This system puts out a fire by quickly lowering the temperature of the room by 20 degrees or more. This also creates a vaccum in the room which, in addition to lower temp, puts out the fire. This change in pressure can displace ceiling tiles and stir up dust from the floor. Very shortly after the gas is deployed the room warms back up and the pressure in the room returns to normal.
- The gas is inert and not toxic to breath.
- The gas disperses sideways from a nosel that looks like a sprinkler head.
At our site this will be integrated with the same control system as our pre-action system.
So...it will work as follows:
- smoke alarm in the data center => the preaction system will release water control valve making water available to the system. The pipes remain pressurized so pipes still have only air in them until the heat from a fire causes a sprinkler to open.
- multiple smoke alarms in the data center => FM200 system will alarm, 30 second delay, the gas will be released. temp will go way down, ceiling tiles will be sucked down into the room--some will fall out, "hurricane" wind may blow more dust up from the floors, A/C system will be shut down to prevent air flow that would further feed fire. A few seconds later the room will warm up and the pressure will become normal. No cleanup procedure required. (just dust things off...)
Other interesting info from Q&A
- It is required to have a 4 foot square of ceiling around our sprinkler heads to allow for proper operation. If the sprinkler head is not at the top of the ceiling it will not heat up at the same rate as the rest of the room and not kick in soon enough.
- Sprinkler heads - bottom plate will melt off at 135 degrees F. That exposes an element that will melt at about 155 degrees F.
- in some cases locality may allow water fire suppression systems to be removed. This would likely require a backup system. Many times this is not allowed however either by the local statutes and/or building management.