PERFORMANCE OF AUTOMATIC FIRE SPRINKLER SYSTEM

IN HIGH-RISE OFFICE BUILDINGS IN MALAYSIA

Azlan-Shah Ali and Chan Hong Choon
Department of Building Surveying, Faculty of Built Environment,
University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Tel: +603-7967 6813 Fax: 603-7967 5713 e-mail: asafab@um.edu.my
Abstract
Automatic fire sprinklers is a significant device used to extinguish but more importantly, to
control and prevent the spread of fire. Hence, it is utmost important that fire sprinkler system
is checked and maintained periodically to prevent systems failure and further damage should
there is a fire break out. The purpose of this paper is to identify factors that are affecting
implementation of maintenance for automatic fire sprinkler system and to illustrate how these
factors could affect maintenance performance of automatic fire sprinkler system. Key
Performance Indicator (KPI) was used to measure the performance of fire sprinkler system. In
the survey, 35 questionnaires were distributed to respondents in high-rise office building for
data collection. Data collected were then analyzed using software SPSS. From the results,
knowledge and teamwork of maintenance personnel, frequency of building maintenance work,
outsourcing and compliance of maintenance works to regulation have significant correlations
with the number of breakdowns of fire sprinkler system and numbers of complaints received.
The findings suggest the importance of having good maintenance for fire fighting system in
order to ensure that the fire sprinkler is performing well in saving life and properties.
Keywords: Fire safety, Fire sprinkler, Maintenance, Performance measurement
1.0 Introduction
National Fire Protection Association, NFPA, (1991), highlighted that high-rise building
possesses unique fire hazards that could not be found in other types of building structure.
Fire may cause fatal and serious injuries to buildings occupants and destroy the building
which may indirectly lead to loss of life, property, production and unemployment
(Ramachandran, 1999). Automatic fire sprinkler system is one of the important fire fighting
appliances commonly used for extinguishment during the event of fire in high-rise building.
However, it may fail to operate due to improper and lack of maintenance (Hall, 2009). Lack
of automatic fire sprinkler systems maintenance may lead to insufficiency of water flowing,
misuse of sprinklers such as usage of hangers or a base for anchoring hangers, insufficient

water pressure, and corrosion of sprinkler pipes, water tanks, sprinkler heads and others (Hall,
2009). For instance, on 15th October, 2004, a fire broke out in South Americas tallest
high-rise building, a 56-story government office building in Caracas, Venezuela. The fire
sprinkler system installed in the building was not functioning as required due to improper
maintenance. Furthermore, the system was disconnected to the alarm panel for monitoring.
This caused the fire alarm fail to detect the fire occurrence in the building (Moncada, 2005).
This scenario indicated that maintenance of automatic sprinkler system is important factor to
ensure that the fire sprinkler system is well functioning. Hence, this paper will review
objectives of this research on the factors that are affecting implementation of maintenance for
automatic fire sprinkler system and to illustrate how these factors could affect maintenance
performance of automatic fire sprinkler system.

2.0 Maintenance of fire sprinkler system

Nothing man-made thing is indestructible in the nature of things, but performing repairs at
intervals by an activity known as maintenance can extend useful life (Dhillon & Liu, 2006).
Al-Sultan and Duffuaa, (1995) found that maintenance can provide critical support for heavy
and capital-intensive industry by keeping machinery and equipment continue to operate in a
safe condition. Maintenance can be defined as those activities required to keep facilities in as
built condition and therefore continue to keep its original productive capacity (Reason, 2000).
Lewis, (1999) noted that the responsibility of maintenance department is to look after all
works related to the economic preservation of the facilities, equipment and systems in order to
perform their designed functions. There are always 5R maintenance actions to be involved
eventually; namely retaining, repairing, replacing, redesigning and retrofitting the system to
its required function (Lee, et al, 2001). Proper maintenance of automatic sprinkler systems
can overcome deficiencies in risk management and emergency response (Nick Artim, 1994).
Maintenance of protection involves inspections as well as performing any special
investigations or tests bearing on the performance of the devices and equipment. It also
involves taking action to repair or keep the devices and equipment in dependable operating
condition, and assuring correct procedures were carried out by personnel responsible for the
performance of the equipment (NPFA, 1981).

According to Soh, (2000), the sprinkler system comprises of fire pumps, water storage tanks,
control valve sets, sprinkler heads, flow switches, pressure switches, pipe work, valves, water
supply, alarm gong and piping arrays (Puchovsky, 1997). All automatic fire sprinklers should
be in good working condition and if not so, should be replaced. They must free from dust,
grease, or paint, particularly on the heat-responsive element (Huggins, 2002). For instance,
sprinklers head that have coatings of paint, whitewash, excessive deposits, bronzing, or other
coating should be replaced by new sprinklers. Piping should be checked to ensure that it is in
good condition, free from mechanical damage and not being used to support fixtures, ladders,
or any other loads to prevent delayed of sprinkler response, an inoperable sprinkler head, or
system failure. Sprinkler pipe should also not suffer for corrosion and it must be properly
protected against corrosion (NFPA, 1981). Water-flow alarm devices should be tested
regularly along with the scheduled inspections of fire protection equipment. Main drain test
should be conducted annually according to the procedure established in NFPA 25. This test
provides a comparison with the original main drain test pressure values. It can be used to
detect deterioration in the system water supply (Huggins, 2002).

3.0 Factors that affect maintenance of sprinkler system

The way of performing maintenance will influence the availability of the facility, failure,
quality and cost, as well as safety of the operation (Visser, 1998). There are numerous factors
that affect the performance of fire sprinkler system. This includes skill and knowledge of
maintenance personnel, implementation of planned maintenance scheduled, frequency of
maintenance work, teamwork of maintenance personnel, outsourcing of work, compliance to
regulation and Information Technology (IT). These are discussed in great detail below.

3.1 Skill and knowledge of maintenance personnel

Knowledge is very important for planning and revising the maintenance program as well as
the resource requirements (Lee et al., 2001). Maintenance personnel who are lacking in
knowledge and skills could lead to poor quality of maintenance in the high-rise building. Poor
quality maintenance could draw problems and resulting in poor performance of fire sprinkler

system in the high-rise building (Sherwin and Lees, 1980). For instance, nowadays, there are
not many people who can align the bearings and seals with the shaft in a pump (Sherwin,
2000). Due to that, maintenance manager need to carefully identify the person who can repair
the system. Different degree of knowledge could influence the performance of an automatic
fire sprinklers system which in turn affect the maintenance cost and frequency of failure.
Therefore, effort to increase skill and knowledge of maintenance personnel may improve the
performance of an automatic fire sprinkler system, reduce operation and maintenance cost for
corrective maintenance and increase the system availability (Dirickx and Kristner, 1979).

3.2 Planned maintenance scheduled

Planned maintenance work of fire sprinkler system includes activities such as taking reading,
minor adjustments, lubrication, cleaning, start-up, shut-down and others of an automatic fire
sprinkler system. Planned maintenance is very important to ensure high maintenance
performance (Oke, 2006). Most of the maintenance schedule develops both maintenance and
production team through minimizing idle time, breakdowns and delays

3.3 Frequency of maintenance work

Tam et al. (2007) noted that the performance of building services equipment is affected by
frequencies in maintenance works. Frequency of maintenance work should be based on the
system requirement beside the frequency of usage. A perfect model for inspection frequency
will minimize overall costs consists of both breakdown and inspection costs (Mathew, 2004).
For instance, frequent inspection of an automatic fire sprinkler system can help to determine
its true status and early actions could be taken to prevent it from failure. This indirectly
reduces the costs of repairing the fire sprinkler system as corrective maintenance may lead to
high repair cost.

3.4 Teamwork of maintenance personnel

Teamwork of maintenance personnel is important in order to prevent errors and deliver
continuous improvement (Oakland, 1995). Ali (2008) reported that teamwork is important in
maintenance works. This is because maintenance works involved various professions it

cannot be performed individually. Without good relationship of working team, the number of
equipment breakdown will subsequently increase. For instance, without teamwork, a
maintenance personnel will work individually thus, causing other individual personnel to
repeat the work. This situation leads to the increase the overhead and administrative cost for
maintenance works.

3.5 Outsourcing of work

There is an increasing number of public and private sector outsourcing building services
maintenance work to reduce running costs (Lai et al., 2004). The advantages of outsourcing
include better and faster work done, less hassle, reduced total-system costs, exposure to
outside specialists, greater flexibility to adopt new technologies and more focus on strategic
asset management issues (Watson, 1998). Outsourcing has potential of leveraging the
contractors knowledge and creativity to deliver optimal maintenance service.

4.0 Research Methodology

In this research, the researcher intended to use quantitative method. The research is conducted
in 4 stages which include preliminary study, research proposal, of data collection method and
finally conclusion and recommendation.

Stage 1: The problem area was identified as the failure of automatic fire sprinkler system.
Preliminarily data is an important step in the research process and can be gathered or
collected through literature survey. Literature survey is the documentation of a
comprehensive review for the published and unpublished work from secondary sources of
data and it is one way of summarizing secondary data (Sekaran, 2005).

Stage 2: During the preliminary study, problem statement and area of study were clearly
identified. In this research, literature finding was carried out after the general area of interest
and problem is identified in initial stage to set the parameters of this research. The relevant
data was collected from literature survey while the aims, objectives and scope of study were
formulated at these stages. Data gathering includes the questionnaire survey which was

formulated based on the summary of this researchs important information.

Stage 3: The data of this research was collected from primary data and secondary data. The
primary data used are from the questionnaire survey. Secondary data includes books, websites,
journal, articles and others. The questionnaire survey was designed according to objectives of
this study. Researcher used self-constructed closed-ended questions survey for the study. The
closed-ended questions have a limited set of response categories and therefore it was easier
for the respondents to answer the questions. The closed-ended primary data were collected by
distributing questionnaire survey form to the target respondents in high-rise office building at
Petaling Jaya and Kuala Lumpur in order to achieve the research objectives. Three parameters
have been set up as limitation in this study which includes the height of the building (more
than 10 storeys), installed with an automatic fire sprinkler system and the built up area for the
building must be more than 50,000sf. 35 closed-ended questionnaires responses were
obtained during field data collection at Petaling Jaya and Kuala Lumpur.

Once all of the data were obtained, it was analyzed by using statistical method. Data analysis
is the phase that is important in interpreting findings. In order to achieve the objectives, the
data were analysed by using the Statistical Package for the social science (SPSS) software,
version 16.0. Cronbachs Alpha coefficient test is the most common method of checking on
the instrument used; it only allows a reading of more than 0.70 (Pallant, 1996). In this study
the reading of the test is 0.75 which indicates that the scale and data obtained is reliable.

Stage 4: This was the final stage of the research. This included the process of documentation
together with conclusion and future recommendation of the research. At this stage, all of the
relevant data were written up in the report.

5.0 Result and Findings

Table 2 shows that there were negative correlations in the correlation test. This indicates that
there is significant relationship between maintenance and fire sprinkler performance. The
result also shows that there are 9 significant correlations between maintenance variables and

fire sprinkler system performance. The results are further discussed.

Table 2: Correlation matrix between maintenance and automatic fire sprinkler performance
1.

Skill and knowledge of

maintenance personnel

2.

4.60

0.553

.065

-.340*

-.377*

.151

4.57

0.698

.172

-.297

-.315

.238

4.40

0.812

.220

-.332

-.415*

.298

4.40

0.881

.299

-.389

-.475

.196

3.71

1.100

.151

-.351

-.364

.226

Implementation of
planned maintenance
scheduled

3.

Frequency of building
maintenance

4.

Teamwork of
maintenance personnel

5.

Outsourcing of
maintenance work

Legend:
* Correlation is significance at 5 percent
** Correlation is significance at 1 percent
1: Ratio of actual maintenance cost to target maintenance cost

2: Average numbers of breakdown maintenance works

3: Average numbers of complaints receive
4: The condition of an automatic fire sprinkler system
M: Mean
S: Standard Deviation

Inferential analysis is used to identify significant relationship between maintenance and

performance of an automatic fire sprinkler system. In this study, independent variables are
referred to the maintenance variables such as skills and knowledge of maintenance personnel,
implementation of planned maintenance scheduled, frequency of maintenance works,
teamwork of maintenance personnel, outsourcing of maintenance works, compliance with
regulation and usage of Information Technology (IT) while dependant variables referred to
the ratio of actual maintenance cost to target maintenance cost, average numbers of
breakdown maintenance works, average numbers of complaints received and the condition
of an automatic fire sprinkler system. Spearmans rank is used to express significant
relationship between maintenance. The result of the correlations matrix between maintenance
and automatic fire sprinkler performance is shown in Table 2.

5.1 The effect of skill and knowledge of maintenance personnel in automatic fire
sprinkler performance: Skill and knowledge of maintenance personnel have significant
correlation with average numbers of breakdown maintenance works and average numbers of
complaints received. As mention by Chan, et al (2001), skill and knowledge plays important
roles in planning and revising the maintenance program. Maintenance personnel must have
their knowledge and skill to retain the fire sprinkler system in the building. For instance,
maintenance personnel must have clear understanding on the systems requirement, operation
and details of the system. Such knowledge is crucial for the maintenance personnel to reduce
an error to occur when they are conducting maintenance activities especially in high-rise
building. Sherwin (2000), in her Journal of Quality in maintenance engineering stated that
there are few people who can align the bearings and seals with the shaft in a pump nowadays.
This could affect the performance of an automatic fire sprinkler system in case it fails or
breakdown. Therefore, by increasing skills and knowledge of maintenance personnel may
improve the performance of an automatic fire sprinkler system through minimization of
failure (Dirikx and Kristner, 1979). Fewer complaints will be filed by the employees or the
occupants of the building if there were fewer breakdown or failure of the buildings services.
For instance, the employees or occupants may feel comfortable and satisfied if the building is
free from any breakdown and failure of its facilities such as leakage of fire sprinkler.

5.2 The effect of building maintenance frequency to the performance of automatic fire
sprinkler: Table 2 shows that frequencies of building maintenance have significant
correlation with the average complaints received. Tam et al. (2007) found that the
performance of equipment is affected by frequencies of planned maintenance. Frequency of
maintenance can be done daily, weekly, quarterly, annually and others. An appropriate
frequency for fire sprinkler maintenance is important as it can disclose its true status and early
action can be taken to prevent it from breakdown or failure. This statement is supported by Ito
Nakagawa (2000). Decrement of breakdown or failures can reduce the average numbers of
complaints lodged by employees or occupant in the building. For instance, the employees or
occupants may complaints if there is defect such as rusty of sprinkler head. Employees or
occupants may feel comfortable or satisfied if the building is free of breakdown or failure.

6.0 Conclusion
The result of this inferential analysis showed that the higher skill and knowledge of
maintenance personnel and frequencies of maintenance works may result in lowering the
number of breakdown of fire sprinklers system and this will reduce the number of complaints
received indirectly. It could be concluded that proper management of building maintenance is
vital to ensure the well functioning of fire sprinkler system.

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