MechChem Africa September 2018

Mike Feldon, MD of foam dosing fire protection specialist, Dosetech, talks about the supply of its latest portable foam fire protection systems to mitigate against surface fires in the petrochemical industry. Foam dosing trailer guards against surface fires

D oseTech (Pty) Ltd and FireDos GmbH (Germany) have, for the past three years, been supply- ing the latest portable foam fire protections system into the South African petro chemical industry, says Mike Feldon, the company’s managing director. The first unique custom-built trailer system was required as a standalone water- driven system for dosing 3% foam concen- trate and to feed thewater and foampre-mix through a 22 000  ℓ /min monitor/deluge gun in order to be able to extinguish large surface fires in crude oil storage facilities. Kantey and Templer Durban were the design engineers and FireDos GmbH were able to meet the design requirements and manufacture the complete system, which included their new generation Firedos moni- tor technology, which adds not only reduced friction loss and greater throw distance,

but the ability to adjust the flow on the monitor whilst in operation from 5 000 ℓ /min to a maximum of 22 000 ℓ / min.WithDoseTech supplying the local technical support, document control and training, the foamdosing trailerwill be used to suck foam concentrate from bulk portable foamtankers in the event of a surface fire. A 2 nd trailer system was required as a stand-alone water driven system to dose 3% foam concentrate into a premix solution. This solution will be used to feed existing onsite firefighting equipment, such as tank top pourers, rim seal protection, bund pourers and existing portable monitors. MuellerCompanyrecentlyacquiredSinger control valves, which enables DoseTech to now offer a complete range of manual and automatedfire protection controls valves, in-

The ‘Oval Flat Design’ of the new FireDos monitor allows water and foam to pass through with minimal turbulence.

cluding bury gate valves with indicator posts, OS&YGatevalves, Deluge, pressure reducing, pressure relief, flow and level control valves, all with FMGlobal or UL listings. q The custom-built trailer was required as a standalone water-driven system for dosing 3% foam concentrate.