Plot E2 Offices & Premier Inn – Media City
The Brief:
The design supply & installation of a life safety sprinkler system within a thirteen storey office and hotel new build complex to fully comply with LPCB regulations and integrate into the various media city buildings and main Media city sprinkler system comprising of a reception and restaurant level, 8 number office levels and a further 4 number hotel levels for the hotel chain Premier Inn.
This project incorporated an unusual architectural design due to the narrow nature and height of the building being designed to replicate a large Sail comprising of a steel structure completely encased in glass and as the steel structure comprised of predominantly castellated beams and due to the tight headroom on the various office floor levels this posed a particular problem for our designers and workshop pipe fabrication.
The top four number levels of the building were occupied and fitted out by the Hotel chain Premier inn and again due to the height restrictions imposed by the building design the ceiling voids created within the hotel bedrooms posed a particular challenge to our sprinkler designers.
Being part of the Media City site our sprinkler system would have to be integrated into a vast underground ring main which serves a multitude of premises located on the media city site in Salford quays and which would ultimately form part of the main sprinkler system water supplies provided by the Media City owners Peel Holdings.
Our Solution:
The new sprinkler system was integrated into he Media City water supplies and underground ring main and was designed and installed to comply with the higher specification for life safety requirements to ensure sprinkler coverage can be maintained at all times even during maintenance visits and all individual floor levels (13 off) were suitably segregated, zoned and electrically monitored to ensure only small sections of the system would be isolated at any one time and that these would immediately send alarm signals to the life safety alarm panel alerting the media city control room and the remote monitoring station of any potential fire sprinkler issues.
The glass and steel structure of the building comprised of predominantly castellated beams and due to the tight headroom on the various office floor levels all pipework had to be installed exposed and routed through the steel beam castellation’s (holes located within the beams) of the building to ensure that headroom was maintained and the sprinkler protection integrated with the vast array of other mechanical and electrical services to provide an industrial feel required by the architect and building designers.
On the upper four Premier inn floor levels and again due to the minimal ceiling void depths available we had to come up with a solution to the lack of space within the hotel bedrooms and still comply with the strict requirements of a life safety system.
As such our designers proposed, agreed and designed the hotel bedroom sprinkler coverage utilising special extended coverage horizontal sidewall sprinklers (specially imported from USA) and located these within the bedroom A.C bulkheads to afford coverage to the entire bedroom without the need to install the pipework in the ceiling voids.
The sprinkler installation within these premises were designed utilising AutoCAD and was fully hydraulically calculated utilising an approved hydraulic computer programme (FHC) which is unique to fire sprinkler organisations that are approved by the LPCB to undertake this level of work.
The Results:
On completion of the sprinkler installation the premises have benefited from a full life safety sprinkler installation in full compliance with LPCB regulations and acts as a 24hour 365 days a year automatic fire protection system which is designed to protect the office and hotel premises from possible malicious or accidental fire occurrences and is recognised by the buildings insurers as the best form of fire protection which is providing protection to the premises when the building is occupied or unoccupied and electrically monitored and linked to the fire brigade services for automatic attendance in the event of an activation.