Loft conversion/fire curtain

I’m thinking of getting a loft conversion done in my house, a small two-floor late-Victorian London terrace.

I’ve read a few threads on this forum regarding the associated fire regs, particularly those about the requirement for 30-minute fire-resistant enclosed access from the loft down right to the front door. This situation is posing a few problems for me, as our existing staircase opens into an open-plan ground-floor area, which includes a kitchen. The front door is on the other side of the house from the foot of the stairs: to comply with loft-conversion/three-storey-dwelling fire regs, I’ll need to erect some fire-resistant construction right across the house, thereby creating an enclosed escape route.

The obvious solution would be a stud wall with a fireproof door in it, spanning the whole open-plan area: a spectacularly hideous and claustrophobic option, given the already compact nature of the house, and which would frankly render the entire loft scheme a non-starter.
There’s been mention of sprinkler systems, but it seems they’re an expensive pain (I’d need to upgrade the size of our piping etc) and in any case unlikely to win approval from the building-regs people as a standalone solution (ie no enclosed barrier).

But I’ve just heard that a drop-down fire curtain could be acceptable – something like this:

http://www.coopersfire.com/documents/literature/Fire/FireMaster10.pdf

These things are linked to a detection system and automatically drop down across an opening (in my case, the 3.5m wide by 2.3m space between a boxed-in steel frame which spans the house, just beyond the open-plan cooking area – there’s a door out into the rear garden from the area thus left enclosed behind the fire curtain, granting the requisite separate escape route). The fire-curtain roller mechanism would be fitted across the back of the top beam, with the curtain’s runners down the side beams.

It seems like an unobtrusive solution, but is it:

(a) likely to satisfy building/fire regs?

(b) not going to cost the earth (I’ve seen vague mention of “a couple of grand”, but no idea if that would include the detection system and so on… no prices on that Coopers Fire website or any of the others)?

I’d be very grateful to hear from anyone with experience of fitting domestic fire-curtains, or who’s had them fitted as a solution for a similar problem to mine...

The sensible route to take in the first instance is to discuss your plans with Building Control at your property and try to find an acceptable solution. As you may have read on the forum, Building Control can sometimes be lenient with the regs if it is reasonable and can be justified and the inspector is amiable! With a bit of luck you’ll get a good inspector who will proactive in the solutions department, just luck though frankly you might get a stickler. It would be prudent to try to meet with the actual inspector for your area rather than any inspector as he’ll be the one who inspects your job.

I’ve not heard of a fire curtain being used in a domestic situation, that’s not to say its not possible though although the financial cost may be detrimental. Detection I would think would be fairly simple via a smoke or heat alarm so not too bad I suppose, I’d expect it would need battery back-up though. A concern would be how would the fire brigade then access a fire in the kitchen should that occur with a continuous fire barrier in the way? There may also be issues with its maintenance, in a commercial situation it would be serviced every year or whatever and tested periodically to ensure it was all OK, what’s to stop you or the next owner never bothering to check it or service it ever again?

Next step phone BC!

That's very helpful, thanks for taking the time to respond. A good point about the fire-brigade access, as there's no route to our rear door that doesn't involve going in through other people's houses and over their garden fences.

I understand that asking a Building Control inspector is the thing to do, though I'm slightly paranoid that he'll take objection to our current open-plan layout and make us put up a wall even if we don't get the loft done! The downstairs area was opened up over 10 years ago, but I haven't found any documents confirming the job was signed off by building regs.

The firm I linked to (Coopers Fire) aren't the only ones actively promoting their fire curtains as a domestic solution to loft-conversion fire issues, but I haven't managed to find a householder/builder who's actually used them as such. Anyone??

Hi,

I have the exact same issue but our attic conversion was done a long time ago before we bought the property and we are opening up the ground floor layout which now means that our stairwell does no longer comply with current regs as it needs to be enclosed.

We are also hoping to use a fire curtain or sprinkler system but the Building control officer seems to work very much by the book so it may be a hard argument to win, have you had any luck or found any case studies on this?

Thanks!

Building Control are reluctant to adopt fire curtains in domestic situations due to the problems mentioned already. In a commercial situation the Building owners have a duty of care towards its occupants and have (or are legally obliged to have) more interest in ensuring the system is maintained etc whereas you and the OP are really going through the motions in order to get the certificate from BC and BC know it!

Whilst doing some similar research myself, I came across this article from BDOnline with reference to Foster Lomas architects who have clearly made it work and regs compliant (although I suspect they had quite a budget to work with).

http://www.bdonline.co.uk/buildings/technical/safety-without-sell-out/3104433.article

Hi I have a ViiFire fitted in my house, building control liked it because it gave protected access down from the loft to the next floor down (house is in St Albans)
BUT SERVICE COSTS are VERY HIGH Coopers Fire charge £475 inc VAT for an annual service, I would not have bought this had I known.