Vertical turbine Fire Fighting pump set start up
Channel: Alamatofrag - Mohamed Rashed
Date: 2023-03-06

Fire pumps
Fire pumps are usually housed in a pump room very close to the fire tanks. The key thing is that the pumps should be located at a level just below the bottom of the fire tank, so that all the water in the tanks can flow into the pumps by gravity.
Like all important systems, there must be backup pumps in case the main pump fails. There is a main pump that is electric, a backup pump that is electric, and a second backup pump that is diesel-powered, in case the electricity fails, which is common. Each of these pumps is capable of pumping the required amount of water individually – they are identical in capacity.
There is also a fourth type of pump called a jockey pump. This is a small pump attached to the system that continually switches on to maintain the correct pressure in the distribution systems, which is normally 7 Kg/cm2 or 100 psi. If there is a small leakage somewhere in the system, the jockey pump will switch on to compensate for it. Each jockey pump will also have a backup.


The pumps are controlled by pressure sensors. When a fire fighter opens a hydrant, or when a sprinkler comes on, water gushes out of the system and the pressure drops. The pressure sensors will detect this drop and switch the fire pumps on. But the only way to switch off a fire pump is for a fire fighter to do this manually in the pump room. This is an international code of practice that is designed to avoid the pumps switching off due to any malfunction in the control system.
The capacity of the pumps is decided by considering a number of factors, some of which are:


the area covered by hydrants / standpipes and sprinklers
the number of hydrants and sprinklers
the assumed area of operation of the sprinklers
the type and layout of the building