The requirement for an audible waterflow alarm signal under NFPA 13-2007 is not more than 5 minutes under 6.9.1 (this is the non-silenceable water gong connection in the alarm valve trim)
The requirement for a waterflow alarm when the sprinkler is supervised with a fire alarm under NFPA 72-2007 Section is 5.11.2 and that is a maximum of 90 seconds delay after sustained flow begins. Depending on the local building code in effect a sprinkler system may not necessarily require a connection to a supervisory control unit and can just be required to have the exterior audible waterflow gong / bell / horn in which case the requirements of NFPA 13 are applied solely. If there is a building wide fire alarm system installed or the sprinkler system is supervised through a control unit and possibly a supervising station then the requirements of NFPA 72 are applied, but that does not necessarily negate the dedicate waterflow gong / bell / horn. The IBC actually requires the local alarm and mandates the connection to the building wide alarm where such exists. Generally a mix of line voltage electric bell or water motor gong on one pair of flowswitch contacts and the low voltage 12/24 volt alarm IDC/SLC on the other pair of contacts to make code compliance. Hence the major manufacturer's make their flow switch with two sets of isolated contacts and a divided compartment to also be compliant with the NEC. Did that answer it or was there another issue? Dave P. ------------------------------ Message: 14 Date: Mon, 23 Aug 2010 09:40:37 -0700 From: "Gregg Fontes" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Subject: Audible Water Flow Time Message-ID: <[email protected]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" If not mistaken, NFPA 13 allows up to 5 minutes to receive an audible alarm through the inspectors test on a wet pipe system. On a standard wet pipe system, was there or is there any other requirement that would limit the audible alarm to 60 seconds? Thanks, Gregg Fontes Cen-Cal Fire Systems, Inc. 209-334-9119 ********************************************** _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://fireball.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum For Technical Assistance, send an email to: [email protected] To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[email protected] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field)
