Ansul - Fire Suppression System Design
Fire School Training
Even the best equipment needs trained and experienced operators if it is to be used effectively. For this reason, Ansul has a fire school that provides hands-on, three-day fire training that involves fighting more than 20 different types of fires including gravity-fed and pressurized gas and liquid fires and unconfined spills. When training is done on-site, at the 350-acre school in Marinette Wisconsin, they get the benefit of high-tech industrial props including a tanker truck, overhead flange, paint locker, and propane jets that are used to create the kind of firefighting challenges faced in real life.
In addition to learning how to fight fires, students are also taught invaluable fire extinguisher inspection and maintenance procedures that emphasize how important regular service of these tools is. They are also taught to recognize and report abnormal conditions that might get in the way of high speed, effective performance.
Ansul fire training is OSHA 29 CFR and NFPA 10 compliant and students are issued with a certification of completion after the course.
- OSHA 29 CFR refers to Title 29 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) that contains the main set of rules and regulations that relate to labor.
- NFPA 10 (mentioned above) provides the requirements needed to ensure that they will work as intended to provide the first line of defense against limited sized fires. The course is designed specifically for end-users of Ansul extinguishers.
The Ansul Fire School also offers an NFPA-compliant one-day, hands-on Extinguisher Service & Maintenance Certification Training Program for those who inspect, service, and maintain their own Ansul fire extinguishers.
In addition to training held in Wisconsin, Ansul offers training in remote locations.
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Fire Extinguishers and Handline Units
The extensive Ansul product line includes hand-portable and wheeled fire extinguishers, as well as large self-contained handline units. They form a vitally important part of any Ansul system design.
Ansul portable extinguishers come in a variety of different forms and are made in accordance with various ANSI/UL, ULC, and/or NFPA 10 and other standards. Like all fire extinguishers, the Ansul brand is manufactured to include different classes of fire extinguisher that correlate with a particular class of fire. So, for example, a Class K extinguisher would be used in a restaurant fire that involves burning oil.
Ansul fire extinguishers include:
- Stored pressure Sentry extinguishers that are manufactured for use with dry chemicals, carbon dioxide, or water. They include general purpose Sentry dry chemical extinguishers.
- Cartridge operated Ansul extinguishers that are ideal for high-risk industries including aviation, chemical, petrochemical, mining, oil and gas, and power generation. Cartridge operated extinguishers are reliable and easy to service, may be recharged on the spot and promise superior performance.
- Clean agent portable Cleanguard fire extinguishers that include MR conditional extinguishers that are manufactured for use in magnetic resonance environments as per the relevant ASTM standard. These are especially useful in magnetic imaging rooms, semiconductor fabrication facilities, and for other similar applications. Contained in a silver rather than a fire-engine-red cylinder, the extinguishing agent is also electrically non-conducive and won’t damage sensitive electrical equipment like computers. It doesn’t leave a residue, doesn’t require cleanup, and is considerably less toxic than comparable products. Standard clean agent extinguishers are used when water, dry chemicals, carbon dioxide, or foam might damage equipment and materials in commercial and industrial facilities. These also don’t require cleanup and don’t leave any residue.
- Restaurant portable Ansul K-Guard and F-Class fire extinguishers. F-class extinguishers are made in accordance with European standards and manufactured for use with a low pH liquid agent developed to work fast in extinguishing flames caused by hot cooking fuels including fats and oils. The K-Guard fire extinguisher meets the NFPA 10 requirement for solid fuel cooking using a firebox that is 5 cubic feet or smaller and is ideal for the full range of kitchens. Rated for Class K fires caused by grease, cooking oil and both meat and vegetable fats, K-Guard extinguishers have silver cylinders.
- Wheeled units that are highly mobile but can be operated fully by just one person. They include Red Line dry chemical extinguishers manufactured for use in areas where there is a risk of large-scale fires including iron and steel mills, loading docks, and airports, and Sentry carbon dioxide extinguishers that are designed for fighting fires in areas where flammable gases or liquids, or energized electrical equipment is present.
Ansul system design might also include manual hose-line units that enable efficient fire suppression in remote locations, when multiple hazards are being faced, or when there is limited personnel available for firefighting. They are particularly useful and effective in situations where hand-portable and wheeled extinguishers are not able to provide sufficient capacity.
Fire Extinguishing and Clean-up Agents
Ansul’s product line for fire extinguishing and cleanup includes dry chemical and foam concentrates, discharge devices, proportioning equipment, as well as gaseous clean agents, spill-control chemicals and treatments, and vapor mitigation and neutralizing agents.
When designing Ansul systems, it is essential to have a thorough knowledge of these products so that they can be specified together with the hardware required to discharge or dispense them. Different product types are intended for different applications and different classes of fire.
Foam concentrates include:
- Ansulite alcohol-resistant aqueous film-forming foam (AR-AFFF) that contains Class B polar solvents that are perfect for suppressing fires that involve petroleum fuels, rubber, and flammable and combustible liquids including crude oil gasoline, ethanol, and diesel fuel. Because it is AR, it produces a foam that is also effective on hydrocarbon fuels.
- Ansulite aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF) that contains Class B hydrocarbons that are also ideal for suppressing the types of fires mentioned above, petroleum, diesel etc. The product excludes oxygen and inhibits the release of combustible vapors.
- Jet-X high-expansion foam concentrates that are intended for use when fighting Class A, B, and LNG fires inside and outdoors. If they are used with high-expansion generators, the foam can fill extensive areas including warehouses, mine shafts, and aircraft hangars. It causes little or no damage to electrical equipment.
- Class A foam concentrates that are designed to combat fires that involve fairly ordinary materials including wood, paper, rubber, coal, and plastic. Specific products are Ansula-A and Silv-ex.
- Ansul fluoroprotein foam used to suppress fires that involve bulk storage and handling of hydrocarbon in petrochemical and refinery facilities.
- Target-7, a vapor mitigation and neutralizing agent that is used to suppress the highly dangerous vapors so often released from chemical spills.
- Training foam (3% and 6%) that is used in proportioning and generating equipment. It minimizes the effect of fire training on the environment and is not intended for use during firefighting operations or even live fire training.
Discharge devices for Ansul foam concentrates include high expansion generators for use with Jet-X high expansion foam and storage tank protection equipment that is designed to protect flammable liquid storage tanks by applying foam down the inside walls of tanks. Foam monitors and sprinkler heads for protein and fluoroprotein foams are also available.
Other portable equipment includes high-expansion foam generators, handline nozzles and eductors that create a foam solution for handline nozzles, foam systems mobilcarts for hazardous areas with flammable liquids, and various trailers.
Proportioning equipment, ranging from high-quality bladder banks to simple, inexpensive line proportioners, provides an effective means of mixing foam with the required volumes of water.
More sophisticated balanced-pressure pump proportioning systems (pump skids) improve efficacy by maintaining an equal pressure in the water and foam concentrate inlets but enabling quick accurate changes when required. Typically, these systems are used to protect aircraft hangars, marine docks, chemical processing plants, and tank farms.
Spill control products include free-flowing treatment agents that treat acid, caustic, solvent, and formaldehyde spills by neutralizing, absorbing, or solidifying them.
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Fire Detection & Suppression Systems
The range of Ansul system design products includes gaseous suppressions systems and detection and control systems.
Detection and control systems include conventional and analog addressable agent releasing systems that incorporate Ansul’s Autopulse detection, control, and fire suppression release panels. Conventional release systems detect smoke, heat, and flames, and perform key operations including shutting down equipment, sounding alarms, and releasing the fire suppression system. Analog addressable releasing systems are modular and systems can be configured for high rise buildings and campuses. These systems may be used with high-tech Vesda aspirating smoke detectors that have multi-level warnings and work just about anywhere.
Gaseous suppression systems include:
- Clean agent systems that incorporate valves, nozzles, and a variety of superior elements that suppress fires and protect equipment without harming occupants or the environment. There are a number of different systems from which to choose, all with their own benefits.
- Agent releasing panels are classified as detection and control systems (see above).
- Carbon dioxide systems of different kinds. High-pressure carbon dioxide systems suppress fires without leaving any residue and they are ideal for printing presses, engine rooms, coating machines, process equipment, vaults, spray booths, open pits, and dip tanks. They utilize individual cylinders that may be manifolded together for rapid simultaneous discharge. Low-pressure systems are ideal for non-occupied fire hazard areas, while mini-bulk low-pressure systems bridge the gap between the two types.
- Water atomizing systems that revolutionize Class B fire protection technology. The high-performance Aquasonic Water-Atomizing Fire System, in particular, has been engineered to protect specific hazard applications including generator enclosures, spaces for machinery, storage areas for flammable liquids, and enclosures for combustion turbines. This system utilizes readily available extinguishing media in the form of water and nitrogen that is non-toxic and effective.
Pre-Engineered Systems
Ansul‘s pre-engineered systems are designed for various industrial applications as well as specialized use in restaurants and for vehicles. While the equipment utilized in each system is not always unique to the system, the choice of equipment included in the system is vital and what makes it appropriate and efficient.
- Restaurant systems include kitchen portables (described above) and several specially designed fire suppression systems that offer superior protection in this environment. Dual agent restaurant fire suppression systems outperform all conventional single-agent systems.
- Vehicle systems include liquid agent, twin agent, and dry chemical fire suppression systems that are suitable for a range of applications. They are commonly used with one of the superior Ansul detection and actuation systems.
- Industrial systems include dry chemical piped fire suppression systems to knock-down the toughest flammable gas and liquid fires as well as dry chemical skid systems that add extra fire-fighting power. Twin-agent units combine systems that incorporate the best of both industrial systems.
has considerable experience with Ansul system design in a number of different industries. However complex your system needs to be, we are available to design it.
