I can't see any practical application in racked storage areas. It would be very difficult to target a fire at the bottom of a rack with a cannon mounted above the rack how knows how far away. The cannon would have to be able to bend water over the top of one rack and down in between to get to the source or just blast the daylights out of anything in it's way and then just focus on one point. Determining how high the cannon would have to be above the racks and below the steel, how far away from the commodity to protect or how far off or around any other obstruction like columns or racks in order to access every possible space in a 3D environment would take some real "mathemagical" genius.
The boat storage might work. But I'd hate to see cannons target one boat and fill it until it fell off the rack or collapsed the structure. Craig L. Prahl, CET Fire Protection Group Mechanical Department CH2MHILL Lockwood Greene 1500 International Drive PO Box 491, Spartanburg, SC 29304-0491 Direct - 864.599.4102 Fax - 864.599.8439 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.ch2m.com -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Steve Kowkabany Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 5:17 PM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Automated Water Cannons for Use inStorageApplicationsandLargeOpen Areas Craig, Large open areas with minimal obstructions would indeed be best for this it would seem, but I bet certain storage situations would work well too if the cannons could be spaced far enough away from the commodity/racks. The advantage would be that the flame detection and control algorithm could direct multiple cannons to attack the fire from various angles at once. The system could be programmed to adapt to whatever particular fire scenario it detected. Imagine a marina with rack storage of boats that has 6" pipe on the walls feeding a series of these cannons. The IR cameras in the space could detect fires in any boat and direct several of the cannons to spray it from various directions. This would seem like a good solution for the boat storage problem that has plagued us for so long, or other solid shelving applications in which it is difficult to get in-rack sprinklers to activate. It would be interesting to see one of the big manufacturers test these systems, since they are already being used. I wonder what other types of applications they use them for in Asia and how they have been performing. Steve -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 4:25 PM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Automated Water Cannons for Use in StorageApplicationsandLargeOpen Areas So it seems like the typical application is large open areas with relatively low hazards. Storage areas would seem to create a bunch of problems. Craig L. Prahl, CET Fire Protection Group Mechanical Department CH2MHILL Lockwood Greene 1500 International Drive PO Box 491, Spartanburg, SC 29304-0491 Direct - 864.599.4102 Fax - 864.599.8439 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.ch2m.com -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Tim Frankenberg Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 4:21 PM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Automated Water Cannons for Use in Storage ApplicationsandLargeOpen Areas Chris, That technology is already out there. There are systems in Asia that use triangulation of flame detectors to aim a water cannon in the location of the fire. I have seen an installed system in large train station in Japan. Kind Regards, Tim Frankenberg Tim Frankenberg, CFPS Fire Product Manager Potter Electric Signal Company LLC 2081 Craig Road St. Louis, MO 63146 www.pottersignal.com -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Chris Cahill Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 2:47 PM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Automated Water Cannons for Use in Storage Applications andLargeOpen Areas Stream of thoughts: Is in a storage application does the storage itself create areas where the water can't reach because it hits things that are not on fire. Just like FF can't use monitor nozzles at the doors most times. In a large venue many times the throw is to get over seats for example. The target area, sports floor, is relatively small compared to the space around. Also, typical fire hazards in an arena are low in height compared to storage up to the joists. You can sometimes lob the water over because you have clear space over what's not burning. But not in a typical storage occupancy. Ever heard whining about the 3' with sprinklers. Certainly it's viable depending on what the performance objectives are. Accept you will lose the building and some protection that fails is better. Just kidding. Either way sprinklers or cannons you are just as screwed in a failure of any kind. No testing to support it will control the fire. Another concern is the blast from the cannon breaking up whatever is burning into several chunks of burning stuff. Think aerosols rocketing about. I've pushed down walls with master streams. Granted they were weakened from fire to start. I'd certainly love to see the fire testing this was put through, the China version. Easily I can see combining CCTV fire detection and current robotics and current auto-oscillating nozzles used in hangers. But together does it actually put out the fire. Like all good ideas and this may very well be the only things slowing it down is money. Chris Cahill, P.E. Fire Protection Engineer Sentry Fire Protection, Inc. 763-658-4483 763-658-4921 fax Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Mail: P.O. Box 69 Waverly, MN 55390 Location: 4439 Hwy 12 SW Waverly, MN 55390 -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Steve Kowkabany Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 1:14 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Automated Water Cannons for Use in Storage Applications and LargeOpen Areas Has anyone ever heard of automated water cannons being used for fire protection in the US? This technology is being employed in China and was mentioned in a recent article in NFPA magazine about the new Beijing Olympic stadium and swimming venue. It sounds like basically a remote controlled monitor that can throw water up to 200 feet which is actuated and controlled using a vision system that can detect fires. They apparently use them frequently in large open-space applications. This sounds like an excellent application for the dry storage of boats possibly and other storage configurations. Imagine having three or for of these monitors in a warehouse or marine with some cameras to cover everything. Then upon detecting a fire, it could feed live video to the monitoring station and even turn itself off automatically after visually confirming the fire was out. Just kicking around an idea. Any thoughts? Steve Kowkabany, P.E. Fire Protection Engineer Neptune Fire Protection Engineering LLC 616 Davis Street Neptune Beach, FL 32266 904-652-4200 Phone 904-212-0868 Fax _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field) _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field) _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field) _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field) _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field) _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field)
