PRESS THE GREEN BUTTON BELOW TO SKIP TO
"CONFINING RXFIRES"
The figure above shows a home surrounded by an AUTOMATIC Spray System that is putting up a wall of water that can stop a grassfire and embers. The water can come from a pool or a cistern or an above-ground tank.
At this home, a 600 gallon plastic above ground tank supplies the water. (Water from a household spigot is not nearly enough to protect a home.)
Note that the shape of the spray from each nozzle is actually a triangle.
Unlike rotary sprinklers, there are no moving parts.
When told to evacuate, the homeowner starts a pump and LEAVES.
The system will automatically start spraying when the fire is near.
The system was donated, by me, to the fire department in Mansfield WA, and was installed by me and by members of the local fire department.
The lowest cost version of the system uses hose to connect nozzles which are 10 ft apart.
The next section shows how stainless steel cradles can be used to bury the system in the ground. The nozzles are then connected by underground PVC pipe.
These inventions are protected by
US Patents 7,819,345, 7,942,350 and 9,561,393, 11,203,023,
and Canadian patents 2,693,158, and 2,891,833 and several
pending US patents.
The following photo shows two Tweets from the Fire Chief.
"AUTOMATIC" MEANS ARM SYSTEM & EVACUATE
SYSTEM WILL TURN ON AUTOMATICALLY WHEN FIRE IS NEAR.
THE SYSTEM CAN COST AS LITTLE AS $2000.
A house trailer system can be $2000 if the homeowner installs it themself. It is a simple installation.
A 2500 sq.ft. home might cost $4000.
A 3500 sq.ft. home might cost $6000.
EXISTING AUTOMATIC SYSTEMS COST MUCH MORE.
Fig 1 shows a complete automatic spray system.
IT HAS BEEN GRANTED A US PATENT 11,673,009.
The main idea is to manually start a simple, low cost pump before a homeowner is going to evacuate. Starting the engine on a simple pump means placing the choke, by hand, in the START position, and keeping the throttle at a low setting. Once the gasoline engine starts, the choke is placed by hand in the RUN position and the throttle is moved to the MAX position. Since the fire has not arrived yet, we don't want to spray water.
The electric 2-PORT VALVE is in the closed position, and no water sprays on the house yet.
In order to keep the pump cool, a small hose feeds the pumped water back into the tank.
The homeowner evacuates.
When the fire arrives, any one of the temperature sensors can cause the
2-PORT-VALVE to OPEN, and the spray is enabled onto the house.