DOD Facility Installs System Sensor Devices

  • Jun 04, 2012

Once completed, the Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio will be the largest military medical education and training facility in the world. To meet the Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) mandate for mass notification systems (MNSs) in all Department of Defense (DoD) facilities worldwide, the DoD chose to install an integrated fire and life safety/MNS system using System Sensor products at the facility. The following is an excerpt from a case study of the project:

"This is a big job because of footprint. There are more exam rooms and more smaller spaces, and a lot of wide-open class rooms," explains Duane Hannasch, President of Fire Alarm Control Systems, Inc., San Antonio, and part of the team involved in planning and integrating the fire and life safety systems and MNS for METC. "What made the system integration seem seamless was teamwork: working with the engineering team to get a design that will provide the readings that are needed for audibility and intelligibility."

One part of the design involved integrating the speaker and strobe placements. In all locations that had a fire alarm speaker strobe with a clear lens, a mass notification amber strobe was placed adjacent to it. The fire speaker strobes are ceiling mounted to achieve better sound distribution in these areas.

Hannasch points out that the System Sensor strobes had an added benefit: They were easy to mount. Because of their plug-in design, the mounting plate allows the installing technicians to pre-check the wiring before mounting the devices. "That's a big help, and it cuts installation time," he says. "We were able to get those mounting plates in and do the wiring checks before we put the devices in. It keeps from having to take the devices down again toward the end for wall painting, etc. Usually the general contractors like to see something on the walls. They don’t like to see holes with wires sticking out, so it allows us to cover that hole on the wall and look terminated, although the building may not be ready."

Read the entire case study here.

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