Honeywell to debut new fire and life safety products at NFPA conference

The fire and life safety businesses of Honeywell, which include Silent Knight, NOTIFIER, Gamewell-FCI, System Sensor, Fire-Lite Alarms, Honeywell Power, and Honeywell Analytics, held an online media briefing on Wednesday to discuss some the new products that they will featuring at the NFPA Conference & Expo next week in Las Vegas.

One of the common themes among the announcements from these companies was the integration of fire and life safety technologies given the recent standards development around mass communication systems. According to John Weaver, director of marketing for Gamewell-FCI, these standards, whether it’s NFPA 72, UL 2572 or best practices from another standards organization; these guidelines are going to have a big impact on the equipment purchasing decisions of end users.

“How do you really bring fire and ECS (emergency communications systems) together?” asked Weaver. “Every one of these documents, every one of these standards has been different from the previous one and it really shows an evolution.”

To help solve this dilemma for end users, Silent Knight has released a new combination fire and ECS panel called the IFP-1000ECS that is not only easy-to-use and program, but is also cost-effective, due to the fact that it reduces installation costs by having fire and ECS capabilities tied together in the same panel and because it can use existing wiring, according to Silent Knight Marketing Director Susan Adam. The panel features eight programmable ECS events (i.e. weather emergencies, active shooter, chemical leak, etc. and can have up to 15 pre-recorded messages.

According to Adam, these panels are ideal not just for educational campuses, but also places of assembly (stadiums, religious facilities, etc.), military installations, healthcare facilities, and government buildings.

“We are here to help them be ready for emergencies,” she said. “(This technology) is not just for the military anymore.”

Weaver said that one of the traditional problems with mass notification solutions on school campuses is that they’ve always wanted to be able to send alerts to students and faculty members through their cell phones. However, he said that studies have shown that only about 65 percent of students voluntarily enroll in these systems, which makes multi-modal notification products the best option for adequate coverage. “Our approach is really to have a cost-effective, integrated infrastructure,” he added.

In addition to the new combination fire/ECS panel from Silent Knight, here are a few of the products Honeywell’s other fire and life safety brands will be featuring at the show:

Gamewell-FCI

While Gamewell-FCI is also focused on this integration between fire and life safety technologies with its’ E3 Series fire alarm and ECS solution, they will also be showcasing several other products at this year’s show that can be connected directly to the E3 Series system including the new 4-Warn/CO detector. This multi-criteria fire and carbon monoxide detector incorporates four sensing elements into one unit to quickly detect smoke, CO, flame and heat, verifying a true emergency and deterring false alarms. When used with the company’s B200S sounder base, the 4-Warn/CO detector can reduce required detection upgrade costs by as much as 54 percent.

Additionally, Gamewell-FCI is also highlighting its new Xtralis VLC-400 Aspirating Detector, which can sense and verify the slightest traces of smoke.  The detector is designed for small- to medium-size areas where traditional detectors fail to quickly and accurately sense smoke and is ideal for high airflow spaces, atriums, ducts, tunnels, and freezers.

Fire-Lite Alarms and Honeywell Power

Stacy Deveraux, marketing director for both Fire-Lite Alarms and Honeywell Power, said that Fire-Lite will mainly be focusing on what the company is doing with regards to dealer support at the conference. She said that the company has extended its technical support for an additional two hours (8 a.m. to 7 p.m. EST, Monday through Friday). Though they average nearly 8,000 calls a month, Deveraux said that Fire-Lite has been able to maintain average wait times to under a minute in length. She said that they would also be featuring their free online tools, as well as the numerous training sessions they host for dealers across the country each year.  “We are definitely here to make our dealers successful,” she said.

On the Honeywell Power side, Deveraux said that they would be highlighting their Power Supply Selector Web app that helps installers quickly determine the appropriate power supply for fire alarm, video, intrusion and access control systems. The app is accessible via any smartphone or Internet-connected PC. Users of iOS, Droid and Blackberry devices can add a shortcut to their home screens for instant access to the app.   Honeywell Power will also feature its recently released IPGSM-DP, a dual-path, dual primary fire alarm communicator that eliminates the costly phone lines historically employed for fire alarm reporting. 

NOTIFIER

Peter Ebersold, marketing director for NOTIFIER, said that one of the company’s biggest announcements for the upcoming show will be the recent approvals of it Marine ONYX fire protection systems. These systems, which provide fast and effective fire protection for virtually any nautical environment, including oil platforms, luxury yachts, support craft and ships, were recently approved by the U.S. Coast Guard, Lloyd’s Register and ABS (American Bureau of Shipping). In addition, Ebersold said that NOTIFIER has developed a Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) that will enable ONYX Series fire and emergency communications systems to integrate with any CAP-compliant system.

Honeywell Analytics

As a result of its acquisition of Fire Sentry Corporation earlier this year, Honeywell has added the company’s flame and gas detection solutions to its’ lineup of products, according to Dan Olson of Honeywell Analytics, the division that Fire Sentry Corporation has been integrated into. As part of the Honeywell fire and life safety group, Honeywell Analytics designs, manufactures, services, and sells products for detecting toxic, corrosive and flammable gases, and for monitoring oxygen levels. According to Olson, there are three things that differentiate Fire Sentry products from the rest of the marketplace including WideBand technology, Quantum sensors and FirePic Technology.  

System Sensor

Jeff Klein, vice president of marketing for System Sensor, said that the company will be featuring three products at next week’s conference including its FAAST smoke detector, SpectrAlert dual strobe and dual strobe with speaker expander plates, and its’ Advanced Multi-Criteria Fire/CO Detector. Since first being launched at the NFPA show several years back, Klein said that several thousand FASST detectors have been installed.  FAAST’s smoke detection performance is built around its unique Dual Vision sensing technology. This sensor utilizes an extremely sensitive blue LED to provide very early warning fire detection. The SpectrAlert plates enable installers to combine the functions of two to three devices on a single mounting plate and back box, lowering the overall cost of the installation while requiring fewer devices on the wall. Klein said the AMCF/CO, which helps eliminate unnecessary evacuations and nuisance alarms, offers tremendous cost saving opportunities for hotel operators.