Disruptive technology Case study – Park Community School, Havant
FOCUS
LESS THAN half of the required academic buildings in the United Kingdom have fire sprinkler systems installed and remain non compliant with national guidance. Unfortunately, many counties have limited public funding to address this with costly steel fire sprinkler systems. Hampshire and other self insured counties are looking to provide fire safety without depleting their budgets. When the decision was made to rebuild
and expand a large school in Hampshire, school and fire safety officials wanted the new buildings to have the best possible fire sprinkler systems. Because much of the work on the
£18m project would be done while the Park Community School in Havant was in session, builders also needed a material that was affordable, flexible enough to accommodate design changes and relatively quiet and easy to install. One example of fire sprinkler
systems using the reliable CPVC material for decades is BlazeMaster Fire Protection Systems. This material poses a real challenge to traditional materials found in fire sprinkler systems in terms of cost, performance and lasting quality. ‘BlazeMaster pipe and fittings were
chosen for those reasons’, said Colin Taylor, head of the Oxfordshire office for domestic sprinklers, which has operations throughout England. ‘We believe it’s the
easiest medium to work with and it allows a flexibility to the design.’ Work on the large project began in late 2014 and was completed in summer 2015. Using these fire sprinkler systems made it easier to meet project deadlines and remain on budget, Mr Taylor said, adding that the amount of changes forced upon them during the installation would have resulted in very high additional costs had the piping systems not been used. They also saved time and labour on a broad work site, given that the task involved several multi storey buildings and required a total of 913 sprinkler heads. ‘The nice thing about BlazeMaster Pipe & Fittings is that installing it is a one man job, meaning that all the engineers on site could get on with their own areas, because it’s lighter than steel,’ Mr Taylor continued. In addition, as much of the installation
was done while school was in session, contractors needed to minimise disruptions. ‘We used all hand tools and we didn’t need any noisy threading machines. It also meant we could start and stop work in certain areas more easily than if we had been using steel,’ he commented. The system has received FIRAS Installer
Certification from Warrington Certification and the design has been well received by the National Fire Sprinkler Network and British Automatic Fire Sprinkler Association
www.frmjournal.com FEBRUARY 2018
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