Fire extinguishers - cheap or known brand?

Hi,

I'm about to buy around 25 fire extinguishers and some blankets, and find that prices differ widely for the same type and size.

Are they fairly generic items, labelled to suit the seller, (e.g. Arco, Screwfix), or is there a definite difference in quality where you get what you pay for?

I'm looking at 1kg Dry powder and a blanket for 14 kitchens, and 6kg Dry powder and 2kg CO2 for 6 hallways.

Regds

Reply to
Richard Faulkner
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They should all comply with BS. But as they require periodic inspection/testing you should check that you have a local firm who will do that on extinguishers they have not themselves supplied.

Are these actually required by HMO or similar licence? If not you might be better simply banning chip pans, smoking, and candles among the tenants. Or fitting sprinklers. Unless the occupants are trained in how to use the extinguishers, they're worse than useless (in that they can delay someone's escape).

Owain

Reply to
Owain

If you need that many, you probably also will need them maintained. In that case, it is far better to go to a company that supplies and maintains the extinguishers for an annual fee.

Colin Bignell

Reply to
nightjar

| > I'm about to buy around 25 fire extinguishers and some blankets, and find | > that prices differ widely for the same type and size. | >

| > Are they fairly generic items, labelled to suit the seller, (e.g. Arco, | > Screwfix), or is there a definite difference in quality where you get what | > you pay for? | >

| > I'm looking at 1kg Dry powder and a blanket for 14 kitchens, and 6kg Dry | > powder and 2kg CO2 for 6 hallways. | | If you need that many, you probably also will need them maintained. In that | case, it is far better to go to a company that supplies and maintains the | extinguishers for an annual fee.

Have you had the Fire Brigade round to inspect the premises? You probably need to for that big a job. If the Fire prevention Officers demand a different type you are wasting your money.

Dry powder fire extinguishers need servicing every 10 years last time I looked. One might as well throw them away after 10 years.

Reply to
Dave Fawthrop

They all have to be approved. I've bought cheapies in the past and they've appeared to have been of excellent quality. Not from the following company, but at similar prices.

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I'm looking at 1kg Dry powder and a blanket for 14 kitchens, and 6kg Dry

Your main problem is making sure you can find someone to sign them off yearly without requiring you to buy their own overpriced stock. I'd go for bigger than 1kg for a communal kitchen, even if the statutory requirement is less. I've got a 6kg in mine. 1kg is just for show and will barely extinguish a waste paper basket. Don't skimp on blanket size. 1.2m is vastly easier to use than 1.0m. 1.8m will put out a person pretty quick, too, although might start getting a little unwieldy.

Christian.

Reply to
Christian McArdle

Extincteur maintenance is a terrible rip-off. They're unserviceable these days anyway, so it's simply a budgeting exercise in periodic replacement of any failures. Look at the prices, but simply bulk buying cheap retail extinguishers, doing your own testing cycle and maintaining by replacement is much cheaper.

Reply to
dingbat

Sprolly lets.

Reply to
Chris Bacon

They will be soon. I've got hard wired smoke detection and alarm systems, but will soon be having a "risk assessment" by a council employee, and I am sure that fire extinguishers will be necessary to keep him quiet.

Agreed - but I dont make the rules.

Reply to
Richard Faulkner

In message , Christian McArdle writes

The flats are all self contained, but I take your point.

OK

Reply to
Richard Faulkner

Hi,

I got some 1kg ones for £5 ea from Lidl the other day, but for hallways where they are bigger and may need to aid escape, I'd have thought it better and cheaper in the long run to get refillable ones with a gauge.

cheers, Pete.

Reply to
Pete C

Anyone putting a dry powder extinguisher in a kitchen should locked in a kitchen with a pan of boiling oil and made to use the extinguisher on it. In the unlikely event of there being any survivors they should be shot. It is an act of folly.

For kitchens only Class F extinguishers should be used. For all other locations AFFF are the best general purpose extinguishers. CO2 is of very limited use as is dry powder as both suffer badly from flashback and are fairly ineffective on most domestic (Class A - ordinary combustible solids) fires.

Reply to
Peter Parry

Well, I wouldn't go to Chubb.

That is not true of the ones in my factories.

I have not found that to be true. Also, the DIY route makes it much more difficult to prove compliance with any fire safety regulations that apply.

Colin Bignell

Reply to
nightjar

I have grave misgivings about the antics of a national security company (no names, no libel suits) which maintains the extinguishers both at my place of work and my church. At each visit they find several extinguishers which need replacing, apparently because the powder settles. As if this weren't expensive enough, they always manage to find others that have "worn parts" (how?), or new places that need extinguishers (which will have to be replaced in n years time...).

Moreover, there are always "new regs" which involve expense, like pretty glow-in-the-dark signs whose glue is so bad that they fall off the wall in a few months. Church members are now coming to dread the annual visit which stings us for about a grand. I have deep suspicions that the engineers are on commission or under instructions to sell. But their methods seem highly suspect. The person who meets them at the church cannot be expected to know whether the new signs are really required or find out what a reasonable price is with the engineer hovering over them making worrying remarks about safety. A couple of years ago they appeared without an appointment and nobbled a teenage cleaner, getting her to sign for the work. We got a partial refund on protesting that she wasn't authorised to approve it, but I'm sure others just pay up.

If it were up to me, I would "self-maintain" them by buying cheap replacements every now and then, but I suspect the insurance company, safety inspector, and/or fire brigade wouldn't stand for that.

We did have a Fire Brigade inspection a few years ago. They told us we mustn't lock the front doors of the church. This was of great value to the tealeaf who walked off with the PA system through the front door which was only bolted on the inside.

Chris

Reply to
chris_doran

We feel the same way at our church. If we decided to give up the annual visit and something then went wrong we would be put in a somewhat indefensible position, morally if not legally. And then you can't say to much when you are told that a water filled extinguisher has corroded internally and needs replacing for £180, Screwfix price £60. "Ah but is the quality the same" would no doubt be the response ...

Reply to
Tony Bryer

Your response is that it meets BSxxxx and, therefore, must be regarded as suitable for the purpose. Indeed, my experience of cheapie extinguishers is that they feel of very high quality. I would much prefer a 1 year old cheapie to a 10 year old Chubb, covered in half peeled off labels from long defunct maintenance companies. I would be happy with either, though.

Christian.

Reply to
Christian McArdle

There are anti-caking agents in the powder, sodium bicarbonate, normally something like silica fume. In a sealed container, their lifetime ought to be measurable in decades. Occasional inversion of the extinguishers should keep the powder mobile. Using one of this type of extinguisher creates a terrible mess. Thermodynamically, water is probably the perfect extinguishing agent for most fires. Massive specific heat and large enthalpy of vaporisation are where the answer lies, plus exclusion of available oxygen. It is also available and inexpensive. Various bodies of water are maintained in England under Civil Defence regulations. Should the mains fail (and this would indicate a very serious emergency) the Fire Brigade can pump out of these sources of water. The Hampstead ponds and the lake at Trent Park are two I know of, but there must be thousands dotted around the mainland.

John Schmitt

Reply to
John Schmitt

You can change your supplier to someone who charges sensible prices, although, if it who I think it is, you will also be on a five year contract.

Colin Bignell

Reply to
nightjar

It destroys printed circuit boards too -- within a few days of exposure, the board has corroded to pieces.

Where you have £M's of computer equipment which you would rather not destroy due to a small fire or accidental discharge, there are some quite clever extinguishing gas systems such as halon (no new gas production now), argon, FM200 (breaks down into fire extinguishing components only when heated, and pretty harmless otherwise), etc.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

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