KATflow 200 checks pumping rate in yacht deck-integrated fire extinguishing system

Yacht renovation project: reliable firefighting foam flow measurements during the technical upgrade of a helicopter firefighting water system

KNAACK & JAHN Schiffbau GmbH, based in Hamburg, Bremen and Kiel, is a reliable partner to its maritime customers including shipyards, shipping companies and suppliers at home and abroad, thanks to its many years of experience in shipbuilding, conversion and repair. The experienced specialists at KNAACK & JAHN Schiffbau GmbH design, implement and renew sophisticated control systems for specific projects, such as thermal oil and fresh water systems, exhaust systems, complete engine rooms or piping for ship decks and fire zones.

As part of a complete yacht overhaul, additional fire protection had to be retrofitted to the existing helicopter landing pad fire extinguishing system, and Katronic’s hand-held, non-invasive, clamp-on KATflow 200 flowmeter gave KNAACK & JAHN a convenient way to accurately verify the installation.

So-called classification societies, which are technical monitoring institutes and at the same time insurance companies for ships, classify ship extinguishing water systems in different categories from H1 to H3. Before the retrofit, the yacht had a manually operated fire extinguishing system with an extinguishing pistol that was to be supplemented by a manually triggered, automated extinguishing system with pop-up nozzles. The following technical specifications applied to the new system:

• The pumping capacity should make it possible to provide the foam supply required for fire-fighting with a delivery rate of 6 l/min/m² in a riser line over several decks within 30 seconds at the fire-fighting location.
• The fire extinguishing system should hold a total foam supply for a fire-fighting duration of five minutes. The applied foam water blanket is lighter than kerosene and suffocates potential fires by spreading as a film between the air and the fire agent.

A portable KATflow 200 ultrasonic flow meter from Katronic was used during commissioning to verify the pumping capacity of the new helicopter landing deck fire extinguishing system and to dose the seawater added to the extinguishing foam. With the intuitive hand-held device, several measuring points can be measured and evaluated in a very short time. The clamp-on transducers can be uninstalled within seconds and reattached to the outside of pipelines at another location, so that widely branched pipeline systems can be checked quickly, easily and comprehensively. The KATflow 200 was used on copper-nickel-iron (CuNiFe) pipelines with and without an outer layer of paint, in the nominal diameter range between DN 40 and DN 100. The use of flow measurement technology offered KNAACK & JAHN Schiffbau GmbH "an uncomplicated and fast procedure for checking the system parameters", according to Mr. Oliver Ehlers, Fire Fighting Systems department at KNAACK & JAHN Schiffbau GmbH.