Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Gaseous extinguishing systems protect critical infrastructure against special hazards and are fundamental for the safeguarding of personnel and high-value assets.
Under ISO 6183 CO2 systems, must be continuously monitored. Coltraco Ultrasonics welcome this new regulation.
ISO 6183:2022:
Clause 6.2.4.3 – The content of the containers shall be monitored continuously. Any loss of more than 10% carbon dioxide in any container shall be automatically indicated.
CO2 systems can leak, leaving the personnel and assets at risk. Therefore, it is important to ensure that these systems are monitored and maintained. Given that CO2 systems are designed specifically to the individual need of a room, area or building, a 10% loss of agent may render the system incapable of fully extinguishing a fire.
Continuously monitoring CO2 systems is essential for protecting occupants in the premises and mitigates financial and reputational loss to critical infrastructure in the event of a catastrophic fire.
ISO 6183:2022 provides the requirements and recommendations for Carbon Dioxide Gaseous extinguishing systems in building, plants and other structures. It is vital to ensure compliance for the safety of your personnel and high-value assets.
PermaMass® FEATHERWEIGHT
The PermaMass® FEATHERWEIGHT constant monitoring system ensures that CO2 fire suppression systems are always fully operational. It ensures that no slow leakage or accidental discharge has occurred, which could reduce the effectiveness of the systems fire protection capabilities in the event of a fire.
The PermaMass® FEATHERWEIGHT goes above and beyond ISO 6183 by:
- Providing real time live contents monitoring, showing the exact amount of agent in the cylinders, and, therefore, loss of agent to less than 1% accuracy above 10kg agent weight or 100g below.
- In the event of any loss – with an alarm threshold set at 10% of contents within a container, in order to comply ISO 6183, the system will show you the exact amount of agent loss, including percentage loss in each individual cylinder, allowing quick assessment of the problem to allow quick and effective, and most importantly planned remedial action before a major event occurs.
- Operating at high temperatures. CO2 has a critical temperature of 31°C, the point at which the gas behaves as a supercritical fluid, meaning liquid level testing is not possible as no liquid level is present. The PermaMass® FEATHERWEIGHT compensates for temperature, meaning compliance with ISO 6183 can be assured in every climate.
PermaMass® FEATHERWEIGHT is also capable of monitoring Inergen™ and clean agent cylinders with combined Nitrogen. It is the world’s first Three-Gas-System to continuously monitor a loss of agent quantity in real-time. Thereby allowing you to ensure and exceed compliance of ISO 14520-1 Gaseous fire extinguishing systems 9.2.1.3.
Designed for ease of use, the PermaMass® FEATHERWEIGHT is easy to retrofit to your fire systems, providing you confidence in your fire suppression systems without undue difficulty and cost. It is lighter and cheaper than traditional full-mechanical load wight systems and once installed and set-up the system is fully protected without requiring user input.
This instrumentation is capable of:
- Monitoring up to 12 cylinders (48 by connecting four main units together using one power source).
- Accuracy to 10 g or better than 1% above 10 kg total cylinder weight
Building on our history of innovation, quality and reliability, the PermaMass® FEATHERWEIGHT is a unique instrumentation combining electronic hardware such as highly accurate strain gauge sensors, software design with its intuitive interface, and enhanced mechanical capabilities.
Why use ultrasonic instrumentation?
The use of ultrasonic technology is a regulatory approved alternative method for monitoring the contents of cylinders.
Using ultrasonic technology to check the contents of your fire suppression cylinders is non-invasive, non-destructive and non-disruptive. As a result, it is safer for personnel because it does not require you to shut down the fire suppression system during routine inspection.
Over the long term, our ultrasonic devices are cheaper and save you time and money. Enabling inspection to take place without disruption of your cylinder installation, or by providing continuous monitoring, using ultrasonic instrumentation means there is no shut-down. This saves valuable time and though their one operator and easy to use design you also save on labour costs.
