TITLE:
False Alarm Prevention System for Automatic Fire Shutters in Cold Storage: Focusing on Air Sampling and Waterproof Fixed Temperature Detectors
AUTHORS:
Deok-Cheol Lee, Chur-Kyu Yang, Young-Jin Choi
KEYWORDS:
Cold Storage, Automatic Fire Shutter, False Alarm, Air Sampling Detector (ASD), Water Trap
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Building Construction and Planning Research,
Vol.14 No.2,
June
30,
2026
ABSTRACT: This study investigates the prevention of false alarms in automatic fire shutter systems within cold storage warehouses, which are frequently triggered by condensation and frost. Despite the advancement of fire safety regulations from basic smoke and heat detectors to photoelectric and flame-type sensors, the high-humidity and low-temperature environments of cold storage facilities still present significant reliability challenges. To address these issues, this paper proposes a hybrid interlock system that utilizes an Air Sampling Detector (ASD) as the first-stage trigger and a Waterproof Fixed Temperature Detector as the second-stage trigger. The proposed ASD system incorporates a dedicated water trap designed to effectively separate and remove moisture from the sampled air, thereby preventing sensor malfunctions caused by water droplets. In smoke response tests on five sampled units, fire signals were transmitted within 15 - 32 s, well below the 120 s maximum transport time. During a 105-day field monitoring period, 19 of the 20 installed ASDs recorded no false alarms, and the single false alarm was traced to an improper sensitivity setting rather than condensation, whereas 12 false alarms caused by condensation and frost occurred in adjacent areas equipped with conventional spot-type smoke detectors. However, the second-stage spot-type heat detectors were mounted at a ceiling height of approximately 10 m, which exceeds the 8 m limit for spot-type heat detectors under the Korean fire detection code (NFTC 203); their role in this study is therefore limited to demonstrating environmental durability, and regulatory compliance of the second stage at high ceilings remains an open issue. These findings suggest that the proposed first-stage ASD can improve the operational reliability of fire shutters in specialized logistics environments.