Fire extinguisher training

[Firespritz]

Can anyone help me find a fire extinguisher training aid I saw advertised in Firehouse Mag. a few years ago? It is a small portable propane "fired" fire extinguiser training aid to simulate fire. Any ideas or sources would be great. Please E-mail me with any info. Thank you.
Thomas
Firespritz@firehousemail.com
Orange County Fire Rescue Florida.

[309@vrfd]

make it yourself. just get a large diameter alum. pan (square will work). Have a local plummer help if you can't do it, coil copper tubing in the bottom and drill several very small holes in the tuping. drill a hole in the pan and solder a connection through the pan. use about a 15' of high preasure rubber hose that will connect to the fitting on the pan and to the regulator bottle, with a quarter turn shut-of valve between the regulator and the prop. Fill the prop with water and turn the gas on. light with a fuse and away you go.

[MetalMedic]

Sounds pretty elaborate. I have had great luck with cutting the bottom third off a 55 gallon drum, welding some ribar handles on it and floating a mixture of diesel and gasoline on top of water to serve as your training fire.

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Richard Nester
Orrville (OH) Fire Dept.

[tmr91]

You might want to contact your local fire extinguisher service companies. We did had training session with ours last year, it was great. They already had a fire simulator which they brought to our station. They even supplied us with some fire extinguishers that needed tobe used(had to be rehydro tested). We were more then happy to help them out. Hope this helps.

[firebox1]

BE GLAD TO HELP U OUT I WOULDN'T MAKE OUR OWN THOUGH THERE IS NO WARRANTY WITH A HOME MADE ONE I EMAILED U SO CALL ME AND I'LL GIVE THE INFO ON THIS UNIT.

[DAVE BASALA]

hello asst. chief from hazle twp. we built are fire extinguisher training program. by cuting a 55gal drum in hafe not in the middle but side ways and then put about 3/4 water and about 3/4 diesel and some gas to lite the diesel. and have the person stand back about 5 feet from the fire and aim it at the top of the barrow.

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FIREFIGHTER.DAVID BASALA

[Firespritz]

To all my Brothers who have replied. The idea using the burn pans, with diesal or other fuels is a great idea. I am trying to stay away from that for various reasons. The ideas using propane helped me alot. I am going to a big propane Dist place here to talk to the guy that runs that to help me build something. Please keep the ideas comming. I can use them all. Thank you.

[Halon]

Our office, many years ago, tried using water type pan with deisel/gasoline mix.

Problems:
Even thought they were taught differently, some of the participants would direct the majority of the presure of the fire extinguisher into the pan. Result = flammanble/combustable liquid all of the ground.

Gasoline is too volital to be safe and would flash. Too much can go wrong. Some instructors would mix it at an incorrect ratio.

Always needed to keep a charged fire extinguisher to extinguish the final fire or in case of an emergency.

Next we tried to use a pan with diesel mixed in with sand. That cured the splashing problem. However, we recognized the byproduct of the water pan and the sand pan idea to be a hazardous material and was some what more difficult to dispose of properly, we changed to the lp gas pan.

The best choice: Our lp gas burn pan is approximately 2x2 ft. A Y shape burner constructed out of galvanized pipe with holes were drilled in it for the "jets". A threaded flange was welded on the side of the pan to allow the fastening of the burner (inside of pan) and a 3 ft. section of pipe (outside of pan). The pipe on the outside of the pan was necessary to protect the unregulated high pressure lp gas hose from the fire. The connection to the tank was made without a regulator to accomodate a large enough fire for effect.

Good luck with what ever you choose.

Halon

[Gary Dreyer]

We went to the local propane store and purchased an adaptor from propane tank to 1/2" npt then used an air blow gun for the valve we then made a burner out of black pipe and placed in a 20 gallon wash tub. In the line we also used some quick connect air chuck adaptors just for the ease of operation. The whole set up cost about $35 using air hose for the line. although this is a 2 person operation the classes are rarely done with less than 2 people and we can kill the fire instantly if there is trouble.