Fire Suppression Systems and Their Types

Author: RandyAJames | Posted: 27.07.2012

Fire can be very destructive and need to be immediately detected and controlled. Fire detection can be done by installing fire detectors and alarms which start ringing as soon as there is even a hint of smoke. Control of the fire is done by the fire suppression systems which use a variety of agents to subdue and put out the fire.

Today, there are many laws which insist on the installation of these systems in all industries using heavy power equipment, so as to limit loss of life and property. Most of these systems use wet agents or dry chemicals to help suppress the fire and based on the agents used, they can be classified into 

• Fire Sprinkler systems: They use water as the agent for suppression and automatically start sprinkling water immediately when a fire or its effects like increase in predetermined temperature, smoke etc has been detected.

• Gaseous Fire Suppression: This is also known as clean agent fire suppression since these systems use inert gases or chemical agents to suppress a fire.

• Dry chemical fire suppression: These systems are basically used for industrial applications and coat the surface of the combusting equipment with dry ABC or BC type powder to stop the fire

• Carbon dioxide fire suppression: These systems work by attacking the oxygen content in the atmosphere of the room on fire, thereby removing the oxidizing agent without which fire cannot burn.

• Foam Fire Suppression: This works by cutting off the contact between the fuel and oxidizing agent, rapidly cooling the area and shielding the fuel from radiant energy.

The foam system using compressed air and solution to form foam is one of the most effective fire suppression systems used by fire fighters today. It has several advantages over the other systems and is able to prevent a good deal of loss to life and property.



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