Hose reel supply tapped for showers

[Guest GeoffN]

We are installing a completely new shower facility on a site in Halifax. The nearest mains fed water supply is a 50mm supply to a Fire hose reel. Do the fire regulations allow us to tap into this supply to provide the feed for the showers?

Regards

[Tom Sutton]

BS 5306 part 1 2006 clearly state “The water supply to hose reels should be kept entirely independent from other water supplies within the building including those for other fire-fighting systems.”  Therefore your proposals would be in contravention of the British Standard and consider the situation with people showering when a fire hose reel is needed the pressure could be reduce to a level where it could be ineffective on a fire.

Edited September 4, 2015 by Tom Sutton

[AnthonyB]

What sort of premises is it?

The current trend in several types of premises is to withdraw hose reels from service and replace with extinguishers (in fact in the majority of premises there are already enough extinguishers in place to negate the need for the reels!)

A competent fire risk assessor can justify this and then you can use the take the reels out of service and use the supply for other purposes.