Edwards Pull Station Glass Rod Replacement

[Denise Rose]

As an Edwards pull station with a glass rod can be reset without the glass rod installed, are Departments enforcing the replacement of the Edwards glass rods after use OR if they are found not to be installed in the pull station during an inspection?

The fire alarm is fully operational and the glass rod not being installed in the pull station is not affecting the fire alarm.

The Fire Code/CAN/ULC Standards do not address the re-installation of the glass rods and our Department is inquiring what other municipalities are enforcing and what Code reference used for glass rod replacement.

[Al Bastien]

Hi Denise.

Two trains of thought on this:

1. The device is ULC tested and listed with the “glass” rod inserted. They are shipped from the factory this way and replacements are easily available. In order to continue to be a “complete unit” as listed by ULC, the rod must form part of that assembly.

2. The design of the manual station has remained relatively unchanged since the 1940’s and the rod existed as a means to identify which manual station was activated should it also have been reset before the fire department arrived. With the addition of addressable modules to the back of the device which provides to the point information, the rod is now redundant.

The problem is that not all manual stations are addressable and in the case of the Edwards 270 series, both conventional and addressable look alike on the surface.

From a regulatory perspective, I can say that CAN/ULC-S536 states:

6.7.2.1 Each manual station shall be tested by actuating the device as intended.
6.7.2.2 Each two-stage manual station shall be tested by actuating the device as intended so that the first and second stage functions are confirmed.

“as intended” is the key to answering your question I believe.

Edwards publishes the testing instructions on the inside of every manual station:

“TO TEST
REMOVE GLASS ROD AND SAVE. WITH PULL LEVER IN NORMAL POSITION, CLOSE STATION COVER AND ACTIVATE PULL LEVER TO INITIATE AN ALARM ON THE SYSTEM (WHEN PROVIDED TEST KEY SWITCH). OPEN THE STATION AND RETURN SWITCH AND PULL LEVER TO NORMAL POSITIONS. REPLACE GLASS ROD AND CLOSE STATION COVER. ”

If you don’t remove the glass rod, or more importantly, don’t replace it after testing the manual station, how did you test it “as intended”?

My personal leaning is towards thought #1 not only because of the status at the time of listing, but also because of what the testing Standard requires. I also think that since the glass rod is an indicator of an activation should the device have been reset, which takes nothing more than a terminal driver and a “flip of the switch” so to speak it could also be considered “important”.

Hope that provides some additional information for you to consider.

Al

[Author]

Posts