Remodels and the Fire Marshal

Remember that code requires that the Fire Marshal be notified and permission be received from the Fire Marshal before anything on the fire system can be added, deleted or moved.

The exception to this is maintenance so if you are not moving a smoke but you are putting a new one in or putting in a new panel that is the same then Fire Marshal approval is not required.

When remodels are done BAG all SMOKE DETECTORS otherwise they will need to be replaced if they get too dirty and it will cause false alarms.

When changes to a building are made that affect the view of the Horn Strobes or speaker strobes are made the AHJ Fire Marshal needs to be notified.

One example of this would be installing racking in a warehouse. Recently we had a warehouse where the owner put racking in front of wall mounted horn strobes so when the Fire Marshal visited he is not only making the owner move the horn strobes to the ceiling but he is also going to have other current code requirements be retro-active.

When your old Fire Alarm is grandfathered often the Fire Marshal will not require upgrades although when remodels or building changes are made many times they will require that the entire building be brought up to code.

When you have remodels on specific systems it is best to call the Alarm Contractors that install those brands be the ones that you call.

Examples:

For Notifier brand fire alarm systems call FPS Fire Protection Services which is Mountain Alarm, Pye Barker

For FCI Gamewell call Nelson Fire

For SIMPLEX call Johnson Controls - Larry Love 801 898 6003 Larry.Love@JCI.com

For EST you can call Wasatch Electric or PST

For Mircom call PCS Power Control Systems

For Potter, Silent Knight and Fire-Lite call the dealer that installed the original system since they will have the battery calculations and the plans and normally it will be less expensive since they already have much of the work done.

Call Larry Love 801 898 6003 on his cell