Sprinkler in Telecom Room

Status
Not open for further replies.
M

Mahdi

Member
Location
Saudi Arabia
Occupation
Electrical Engineer
Hi,

while performing a general inspection in a new housing project i found that each house has a dedicated telecom room, the room has a telecom rack and a dedicated telecom grounding busbar, and since there is no dedicated electrical room in the house the power system main busbar is located in the telecom room, which seems okay please correct me if i am wrong. there is also a light fixture, switch, cable trucking, junction and pull boxes in the room.

My concern is there is a fire protection water sprinkler installed in the telecom room, is this permitted?

i found the following code reference online:

NFPA 13 Clause No. 8.15.11.2 Sprinklers shall not be required in electrical equipment rooms where all of the following conditions are met:
(1) The room is dedicated to electrical equipment only.
(2) Only dry-type electrical equipment is used.
(3) Equipment is installed in a 2-hour fire-rated enclosure including protection for penetrations.
(4) No combustible storage is permitted to be stored in the
room.''

i am not sure if the walls and door of the telecom room are fire rated, i need to check. and since the power grounding busbar is inside the room, is the room still considered as a telecom room only ?

please advise
 
Is this a residential dwelling unit? Should you be looking at NFPA 13R/D? Is sprinkler a dry type or pre-action type, or is water present at the head?
 
You mention telecom room but the NFPA 13 you cite is about electrical rooms. In NFPA 70, sprinklers are allowed in electrical rooms but not the working space as defined in 110.26
 
There is no problem with a sprinkler in a telecom room. NFPA 13 Section No. 8.15.11.2 would be for an electrical room that you were trying to eliminate a sprinkler from, but generally we don't rate the walls (especially not 2 hour), so we put sprinklers in electrical rooms anyway. Definitely Telecom Rooms.
 
If there is something producing enough heat to activate the sprinkler head in that room, the electrical and phone equipment is already junk and the activation of the sprinkler head will likely save the rest of the building.

No reason to want to avoid the sprinkler head in the room.
 
Rock86 said:
Is this a residential dwelling unit? Should you be looking at NFPA 13R/D? Is sprinkler a dry type or pre-action type, or is water present at the head?
Click to expand...
Yes a residential dwelling unit with a water present in the head type sprinkler.
 
Mahdi said:
Yes a residential dwelling unit with a water present in the head type sprinkler.
Click to expand...
Do you think that is an issue?

I sure don't. I would be more likely to purchase that house than an equivalent one that did not have fire sprinkler protection in that room.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ron
don_resqcapt19 said:
Do you think that is an issue?

I sure don't. I would be more likely to purchase that house than an equivalent one that did not have fire sprinkler protection in that room.
Click to expand...
In my previous job one of the senior electrical engineers did not allow sprinklers to be installed in electrical and telecom rooms in a commercial building he said a smoke detector and a fire extinguisher is enough we don't want water near electrical equipment.

In my case here there is also a smoke detector provided connected to a fire alarm panel that is linked to the fire department and monitored remotely by BMS. So even if there was nobody in the house and a fire occured somebody will know and can deal with the fire using an extinguisher. And not cause water damage to the telecom equipment.

This housing project is currently being handed over to the end user and im part of the team who is going to be responsible for all maintenance works. I don't want to be replacing telecom equipment racks if they get water damaged.

What's your opinion, should i have them remove the sprinkler ?
 
Mahdi said:
In my previous job one of the senior electrical engineers did not allow sprinklers to be installed in electrical and telecom rooms in a commercial building he said a smoke detector and a fire extinguisher is enough we don't want water near electrical equipment.
Click to expand...
While the smoke detector will notify you, the sprinkler protects the building from the electrical system. A smoke detector and a fire extinguisher is unlikely to be able to provide that protection.
Also water used on electrical equipment will damage the equipment less than using a dry powder fire extinguisher, as the dry power agents are typically corrosive to the electrical equipment.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top