I'm curious to see how the rest of the people on the forum handle protection at the top of the stair shaft, as we have an internal debate in our office.
The 2007 edition of the NFPA 13 handbook has an exhibit, 8.29, which is on page 334, and is involved with 8.15.3.2.1 in the 2007 edition. If you're not familiar with the picture, I'll see if I can get a scan, but its basically a cross section of a stair tower, and has two circled letters on it: B under the lowest intermediate landing, and A above the top main floor landing. Basically this Exhibit and the explanatory handbook text after 8.15.3.2.1 implies that the head at the top of a non-combustible stair shaft is only to protect the top floor landing, and NOT the entire footprint of the stair tower itself. So under this code, the interpretation was that you could protect a 24x10 foot large stair tower with only two standard spray heads. Does anyone else feel this is appropriate? Or how do you feel about the code/handbook change and the nuance behind this situation. I will start with the discussion by saying that I see the appeal of only installing the one head over the top floor landing as installing another head at the top over the intermediate landings can often be difficult to do off ladders, especially if its a very tall stair tower. I also can also understand that from an AHJ perspective, 'sprinklers installed at the top of the shaft' in the code language would be conservatively read as the ENTIRE top. What are your thoughts? Thanks, Ben Young
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