Had a chat with an old fire alarm inspector that has me second guessing my panel choices

Was pulling a zone 6 panel out of a church basement last Tuesday when this retired inspector walks up and starts watching me. He said he's seen 3 different buildings burn because installers used those cheap all-in-one combo panels that mix fire and burg. When the fire alarm triggers, the whole board gets pulled for replacement instead of just fixing the smoke loop. Now I'm looking at my current job spec for a new elementary school and wondering if I should push for separate fire and security panels like the old guy suggested. Has anyone here run into issues mixing them on a commercial site?

2 comments

2 Comments

robert27511d ago

Stuck with separate fire and burg panels on a school job a few years back after the inspector hit me with the same logic. City AHJ ended up agreeing with the old timer too, made us pull out the combo panel and run two separate boxes. Saved me a headache down the road when the security system needed service and the fire alarm stayed live.

coleman.christopher11d ago

@robert275 nailed it. Had the same thing happen on a church job a couple years back - inspector made us swap in two separate boxes. Saved a ton of grief later when the security guys kept tripping the fire panel by accident.