Yes, just what i posted. Straight lift under 850 sq ft.
Manual counterweight is acceptable and covered.
I know you are not referring to
ANSI here because
ANSI 1.22 says less than 925 square feet can be un-powered, but I'm still really confused by statements in
ANSI 1.22 that seem contradictory or paradoxical as they relate to hand-cranked winches. The idea that non-emergency operation "shall not require more than 3 minutes" doesn't jive with a hand-cranked
system... so are they technically no longer allowed or at least no longer recommended? Does
NFPA make any distinctions about how a
manual counterweight system is to be reset?
Hand-line vs hand-crank,
etc?
Another
point on deleting the requirement. Besides fire
curtains and deluge systems, you can use doors. I've done one or two with rolling metal fire doors. Comparable cost, always motorized. There are other listed devices. Horizontal coiling doors with motors and batteries. (Wan door is one). You can also use mechanical
smoke protection, big exhaust fans in brief. So lots of choices. And the code permits you to design other ways to provide a 20 minute barrier between
stage and
auditorium. I've thought about a plywood wall coated with intumescent paint.
Therefore the code change would be to remove the requirement for
proscenium opening protection, not the removal of the
fire curtain option for thus requirement. Make sense?
This mostly makes sense. It seems there needs to be some means of protecting an audience from a fire or
smoke situation on
stage long enough for emergency
egress to occur. Or are you suggesting even that might not be necessary in modern theaters due to other factors that make fires less likely to occur and spread in the first place? Such protection can be achieved various ways as you have described, one of which is a fire
safety curtain or door.
Fire
safety curtains or doors can provide another life
safety protection as a "railing" to prevent falls off the front of the
stage... but the value of this depends very much I think on a particular theater's architecture. If there's a large
apron downstage of the fire
safety curtain then there is still potentially a fall hazard present. Or if the elevation change from the
stage to the audience is exceptionally shallow for some reason such a railing may not be required in the first place. And of course, an actual railing
system on the front of the
stage could serve the same function. I'm actually curious what codes and standards have to say about the fall hazard at the front of a
stage in particular as this is somewhat of a separate issue from fire protection. When is the elevation between
stage edge and front row high enough to require a
safety railing?
As has been stated, fire
safety curtains or doors provide other advantages that are quite secondary to life
safety, such as protection of property, security, possibly more efficient heating and cooling during off-periods,
etc. Given those advantages, and the added benefit of helping ensure the curtain is always working properly, I am certainly for lowering the curtain on a routine basis provided you have the means of doing so practically. If you have one, you might as well use it for all of its advantages.
@BillConnerFASTC
It seems at least for the moment that there is no visible champion pushing for elimination or reduction of
proscenium opening requirements. I know in previous revision cycles moving the needle has required firms like Arup to contribute a massive amount of effort for fire/
smoke propagation studies. Without anyone beating the drum on this and putting a study together to examine it in depth, I'm not sure we'll see any significant changes in the near future.
Sounds like this could be an interesting and valuable project for a Graduate or Doctoral thesis in fluid dynamics at a research school.
I have also had
incandescent fixtures get knocked out of focus and burn holes into treated
curtains.
I was on a college faculty, one year old space by reputable designers and contractors, including new
curtains, and in midst of dance tech rehearsal.
Leg caught on a high side on top of
boom.
Smoke and flames. I went up
Tallescope with Matt knife and dropped it. Carried outside. Burst into flames.
Many years later at code meetings, the top engineer at one of the legacy code organizations declared flame retardant treatments to be one of the greatest frauds on the American people.
Take it for what it is worth but I don't give much credit to flame retardants. YMMV.
That sounds rather terrifying. Thank you for enlightening me on the term "
Tallescope," I've seen those things before but never knew what they were called. There are some rather interesting videos on YouTube illustrating different techniques for rescuing a worker from a
Tallescope.
I have also had
Altman 360Q's burn holes into legs. I'm guessing the flame retardant treatment on the
curtains is what kept them from developing into actual flames... they just smoldered a little. I don't know how valuable they are in residential applications, but in theater draperies placed in close proximity to exceptionally hot lighting fixtures flame retardants seem like a good idea.
Or you could have your
hand crank
system upgraded to a
braille winch system and get a whole new
fire curtain and
smoke pocket while you're at it.
I think a conversation with our facilities planning and operations people is definitely in order. I believe our
proscenium opening is right between that 850 and 925 square feet specified by
NFPA and
ANSI so a conversion to motorized would definitely be a good idea. Does the phrase "
braille winch system" not refer to a
manual hand crank
system? Everywhere I see the phrase "
braille winch" it's in relation to a hand-crank
winch. A braille-style curtain would not be used in our space, our existing is a straight lift. Even though it is presently
grandfathered in, a replacement of the
asbestos curtain would be preferred if we were going to be lowering the curtain on a near daily basis.