Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

charlie b · Dec 6, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Imagine a room that is 6 x 12.5 feet. In the center of the 12.5 foot back wall, you mount a 6.5 foot wide, 18 inch deep panel that is rated at 480/277 volts and at 1200 amps, and that has circuit breakers. This meets the description of "large equipment." It needs an entrance at each end of the working space. But what is an "end"?

Draw a picture of this setup on a sheet of paper. Use a scale of 1 inch represents 1 foot. Show the view as seen from the ceiling. Draw a box 6 inches high and 12.5 inches wide. Center the panel in the wall at the top of your sketch, making it 6.5 inches wide and 1.5 inches deep. Label the wall at the top of the sketch as the North wall, so that the wall at the bottom is South, the wall at the right is East, and the wall at the left is West.

Now draw dashed lines to show the working space around the panel. You will have a rectangle that is exactly as wide as the panel (6.5 inches) and is 3.5 inches deep (representing 42 inches of required working space). Label the dashed line at the left side of the working space as "West Edge," the dashed line at the right side of the working space as "East Edge," and the dashed line at the bottom as "South Edge."

Questions:

You have three "edges" of this working space. Which ones are addressed in the code statement, (you need an entrance) "at each end of the working space"? Must it be the East Edge and the West Edge? Must there be three entrances to the working space, since there are three edges?

Can you say that the East Edge of the working space has an entrance that is 42 inches wide and is the same height as the room (since there is no obstruction anywhere along the East Edge), and can you say that there is no door in that East Edge? Can you say the same about the West Edge?

Can you say that the South Edge of the working space has an entrance that is 6.5 feet wide and is the same height as the room, and can you also say there is no door in that South Edge?

You have four walls to the room. There is physical space in each of the walls to support a 2 foot wide doorway. Can you pick any two walls and put one door in each, and satisfy the rule?

If you put a door on the East wall and a door in the South wall, does this satisfy the rule about "at each end of the working space"?

Can you put two doors in the South wall, one to the far right and one to the far left, and satisfy the rule?

Can you put two doors in the North wall, one to the right of the panel and one to the left of the panel, and satisfy the rule?

Is this situation getting less clear, or is it only me that is getting less clear?

iwire · Dec 6, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Originally posted by charlie b:
Is this situation getting less clear, or is it only me that is getting less clear?

I thought I had questions before I read your post.

Now I am at a total loss on this.

charlie b · Dec 6, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Ok, I am done thinking.

Here is how I see the situation. The key word is "entrance."

The concept of having an "entrance" means nothing, unless there is an obvious way of saying, "now I am on this side of the entrance," and after taking one or more steps, you then can say, "now I am on the other side of the entrance." There must be some manner of barrier, for the concept to make sense.

The boundaries of the working space are not physical in nature. They are represented by imaginary lines drawn at certain distances away from the panel, and to certain widths. The working space itself is a mental image, not a physical boundary. You may draw lines on the floor to more clearly depict the boundary of the working space, but the working space itself remains a mental image.

Separate from the working space, there is talk about an "entrance" to the working space. There is also a minimum width and height of that entrance. That requires the presence of a physical boundary. It requires, at least, a doorway.

The remaining key question is this: Does that doorway have to be located at the boundary of the working space, in order to be called the "entrance to that working space"?

My answer is that it does not. A doorway (with or without a door) that is five feet to the right of the right-hand edge of a panel can be called the "entrance" to the right-hand end of the panel's working space. That is because it is this doorway that you pass through to gain access to the working space, even if you have to take several steps to get from the doorway to the edge of the working space.

No other interpretation of "entrance" can possibly make sense. I recognize that this type of argument essentially consists of "begging the question." But absent evidence of any other sensible interpretation, I may submit that is is the only valid interpretation.

From this I conclude that if that doorway, whatever its distance from the panel, has a door, the door must open outwards, and it must have panic hardware.

jim dungar · Dec 6, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Expanding on Bob's idea; If I have a single room building (say a machine shop) that is 20' x 40' and in one corner of the building there is a dedicated electical area which contains 2'd x 7'l 1200A switchboard and has a clear working space in front of it that is 6' deep. Would you require the doors on the building to have panic hardware?

As I see it you must be able to leave the working space in a hurry. If the door is only 1" from the working space isn't the person opening the door still in the working space? However, if the working space is twice as deep as required per 110.26(C)(2)(b) then a single entrance is allowed and therefore a door at any greater distance away from the gear would mean it is past the entrance point and is no longer in the working area.

iwire · Dec 6, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Originally posted by charlie b:
But absent evidence of any other sensible interpretation, I may submit that is is the only valid interpretation.

That is what we are stuck with (no offense meant Charlie) we have to go with the only 'workable' interpretation but then we get to the situation Jim describes.

The more I look the less I understand.

From now on all the electric rooms I build will be located outside in the middle of nowhere.

iwire · Dec 6, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Where's Pierre?

He started this, I now blame him for my headache.

mpd · Dec 6, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

I would not want to be in court if somebody got hurt in an electrical room and could not get out because they could not open the door.

iwire · Dec 6, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Originally posted by mpd:
I would not want to be in court if somebody got hurt in an electrical room and could not get out because they could not open the door.

None of us want anyone to get hurt in the first place.

But do you think this section of code is as clear as you first thought?

Imagine CharlieB was in court with his list of questions. I think he could bring the meaning of the section into doubt.

charlie b · Dec 7, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Originally posted by mpd: I would not want to be in court if somebody got hurt in an electrical room and could not get out because they could not open the door.

I have used a simple method to prevent this from happening: I lie to the architects!

More to the point, I don't give them any explanations of the rules, I don't mention exceptions, I don't offer alternatives, and I don't propose any "what ifs." Regardless of whether we are dealing with 1200 amp panels or with smaller panels, what I say is this: You will reserve a room (or rooms) for my equipment, and it (they) will be XXX in size, and the doors will open outwards, and the doors will have panic hardware, and there will be no storage in the room(s). If the panel is rated over 1200 amps, the only other thing I tell them is that I need two doors. By golly, if there is enough space in that room for double working clearance, so that I don't need two doors, then I figure the architect will still be able to give me two doors! The fewer rules that they have to know in detail, the better.

hess · Dec 7, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

first of all i think we need to know what a egress is.
a egress has a starting point and a ending point.
the starting point would be in the working area. the ending point would be outside. where all egress end.
now answer the question with this in mind.

charlie b · Dec 7, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Originally posted by hess: first of all i think we need to know what a egress is.

I don't think so. All we need to know is the direction of egress. Please note:

110.26(C)(2) Large Equipment. . . . Where the entrance has a personnel door(s), the door(s) shall open in the direction of egress and be equipped with panic bars. . . .

hess · Dec 8, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

if they must open in the direction of egress
do you know what a egress is charlie.

jim dungar · Dec 8, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

An egress is the "act of leaving", it is an exit.
Its opposite is an ingress, an "act of entering".

hess · Dec 8, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

that is correct
it is a path to the outside of a building.
the door must open in the direction of egress.
if you exit a room the door must open to egress,if egress is to the left then you must install a right handed door where you can open it up and not go around the door. if the number of people exceeds the door size and you must install a double door then you recess the door back into the room.

iwire · Dec 8, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Hess the NEC does not require double doors and as far as I can see the left or right swing is irrelevant as long as the door swings out from the required work space.

charlie b · Dec 8, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Originally posted by hess: do you know what a egress is charlie.

First of all, it is a grammatical error. Secondly, it is irrelevant.

The grammar error has already been pointed out by Jim: it should be an egress.

But that use of the word "egress," as part of the two word phrase "an egress," is irrelevant, since it is not used in the NEC article under discussion. The NEC does not say that the door must open in the direction of the door. Rather, the NEC says in the direction of egress. That means in the direction one must walk, in order to leave the room in which you are standing.

Now that I have answered your question, why did you ask it?

charlie b · Dec 8, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

I think you are confusing NEC rules with building codes.

Originally posted by hess: (The direction of egress) is a path to the outside of a building.

No, it's just a path to some room other than the room in which you are standing. There are fire codes that talk about getting from anywhere in the building to the outside world. But the NEC does not care if you get outside the building.

In fact, you can satisfy this NEC rule even if you can't get out of the building. Consider two adjoining rooms. Let there be two doors in the first room, and let the first room have the 1200 amp panel. Let the two doors to the first room open outwards, in the direction of egress from that first room. Now let one of the doors open into the second room. In the second room, there is nothing electrical. But there is no other way out of the second room, without going back into the first room. Not a great design, I grant you, but it does comply with 110.26(C)(2)! The NEC does not care if you wind up having to stay all night in that second room. It only cares that you can safely get away from the panel in the first room.

Originally posted by hess:. . . if egress is to the left then you must install a right handed door where you can open it up and not go around the door.

Not true. The direction of egress is from inside the room to outside the room. Once you are outside the room, the NEC does not care if you turn left or right or go straight ahead.

sceepe · Dec 9, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Way to go charlie.

If the panel is rated over 1200 amps, the only other thing I tell them is that I need two doors. By golly, if there is enough space in that room for double working clearance, so that I don't need two doors, then I figure the architect will still be able to give me two doors! The fewer rules that they have to know in detail, the better.

Glad to see someone else is taking a hard line with the achitects.

The only problem is that you have to carve out spaces early in the design and you don't know the equipment size until the end of the design (usally the very end). Its really an art to guess how big of a room you need before you know the first load. Architects love it when you tell them the day before the job goes out that you need a bigger room with a second set of doors and oh yeah, fire rate it cause the dry type ended up bigger than I planned.

I hate having a second set of doors because it takes up too much of my valuable wall space. I like to put dry types outside (or go with class 155 insulation), and get long skinny rooms with one door.

lile001 · Dec 14, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Originally posted by ed downey:
Pierre,
Good luck trying to find an architect who will give you that much room for electrical equipment.
-Ed

I have fought Architects for a while about electrical rooms and doors, and usually won. Usually the second tiem I work with them, they ask me how big to make the electrical room at the BEGINNING of the job, not the end!

The worst was when the electrical room opened into an egress hallway. The electrical code says the door has to swing out into the egress hall. The building code says no, no, doors cannot swing into egress hallways, you'll smack a panicking crowd right in the face when you open the door! We finally had to put the electrical room entrance in a a little alcove to keep the door swing out of the exit pathway.

lile001 · Dec 14, 2005

Re: Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Originally posted by ryan_618:
If you have a transformer larger than 11.25kVA, be sure to see 450.21(B). Other than that, there is no requirement, other than requirements that the architect should not about, such as accessory uses or incidental use areas.

Thanks, Ryan, I forgot all about the transformer requirement for fire rating! I nearly told someone they could put this stuff in an unrated room!

Does an electrical room have to be fire rated?

Moderator

Moderator

Moderator

Moderator

Moderator

Moderator

Senior Member

Moderator

Moderator

Member

Moderator

Member

Moderator

Member

Moderator

Moderator

Moderator

Senior Member

Senior Member

Senior Member