Hughes Christensen Ltd, a company specialising in the
manufacture of rockbits for the oil drilling and exploration
industry, has had its ten year old fire detection system upgraded
without any disruption to its operations.
This was achieved thanks to a unique detector addressing
mechanism from Apollo Fire Detectors Limited and the project
management skills of Ashdale Engineering Ltd the company that
designed, supplied, installed and commissioned the new fire
detection system and which is also responsible for its
maintenance.
The Hughes Christensen site is in Belfast, Northern Ireland and
comprises a two-storey building incorporating a major manufacturing
area with CNC machinery bays, furnaces and areas designated for
quality control, maintenance and stock. In addition, there is an
adjoining office block which houses the canteen, administrative
offices, IT centre and staff changing facilities.
The facility had been equipped with Apollo manual call points,
sounders and interfaces over nine years previously, but new
insurance requirements meant that the automatic fire detection in
the offices and non-production areas of the plant needed upgrading.
Thanks to Apollo's policy of using the same open digital protocol
for all its intelligent devices, Ashdale Engineering had no
difficulty in sourcing fire detectors that were compatible with the
existing devices.
John Richardson, Ashdale's Technical Sales Engineer, comments:
"In this case, forwards and backwards compatibility was a very
important aspect of the system. Being able to add to a system that
had been installed for nearly ten years meant that the client could
retain its existing breakglasses, sounders and interfaces. This
saved money, time and disruption for the client."
Over 125 XP95 devices, the majority of which are optical smoke
detectors, were required to upgrade the system. Ashdale
Engineering's aim was to install the new fire detection equipment
with as little disruption as possible to the customer's operations.
The unique addressing mechanism common to all Apollo intelligent
product ranges was crucial to success.
The patented XPERT addressing system is simple, user friendly
and gives accurate identification of detector location. It consists
of a simple plastic card that fits into the base and can be read by
the detecting head. Setting the address simply involves the removal
of pips' from the card using a screwdriver. The coded card is then
inserted into the base where it locks into position. As the
detecting head is rotated into the base the remaining pips on the
card operate the address buttons on the base of the detector and
the address is read by the detector electronics.
Because the XPERT card is purely mechanical, it is not
susceptible to damage and power failure during installation and
commissioning. There is no complicated computer program to run and
no additional equipment to carry around site. With the address
information held in the base, detecting heads can be swapped to
meet changes in use or changed for maintenance reasons without the
need for any reprogramming. Extending the fire detection system
later is equally simple.
Apollo's XPERT addressing system enabled Ashdale Engineering's
installation team to install the detector bases during the first
fix' of the system. This not only helped to speed up installation
time but also allowed commissioning to be carried out much
faster.
John Richardson concludes: "The end result was that Hughes
Christensen was only without a working fire detection system for a
few hours whilst the changeover to the new panel occurred.
Throughout the whole process, the factory was able to keep
operating with zero false alarms and minimal disruption to the
factory's day-to-day operations."
The upgraded fire detection system has been designed to BS5839:
Part 1 and interfaces with boiler and gas systems at the factory so
they can be shut down in an emergency. It also links to the fire
control panel in a separate warehouse on the site. A one out, all
out' evacuation procedure is initiated in the event of an
alarm.